That right there is why Major misbehaves. If “the other one” were the problem puppy, we’d know his name instead.
His name is Champ. The good kid never get the attention. Sigh.
I mean, it’s likely that the lens had to be wide angle because the room wasn’t large enough to get far enough away for 50mm. The error, such as it was (I personally think the picture is awesome because it’s just so goofy, but given that it has clearly failed to serve the purpose for which it was taken I guess it’s fair to call it an error) was in arranging the posing. However, if you aren’t going to make Jimmy and Rosalynn get out of those comfy chairs, I’m not sure that you can get a group portrait that doesn’t have some issues. I guess probably the best solution aside from a complete venue change would have been lighting the shot such that the differences in depth were more apparent. If your brain registered Rosalynn as sitting notably behind Joe, as she actually is, the size difference wouldn’t jump at you like it does.