Tips for Shooting Your Family Photography Session
Shooting family pictures isn’t so easy. Having photography sessions with kids requires a lot of patience and effort. The only way you can make a family photography session fruitful is by changing your own attitude to shoot.
Most parents are not satisfied with the pictures they receive from the photographer after long tiring poses in daylight. The pictures do look good but they make you feel like you and your family just posed for the camera. If you want the best moments with your family captured most beautifully, I have 5 simple tips to help you shoot your first stress-free family photography session.
Here is the deal:
Be flexible.
You might think that you have the most smiling baby in the world but when you will start shooting pictures, the little munchkin may start crying or become annoyed. Family photographs involve all kinds of age groups and there is always one child in the family who is least interested in the family photography session.
You have to be flexible and ready for all kinds of disturbances. Just don’t start panicking if it’s not going according to your plans. That’s the beauty of family photos. They just don’t look good; they feel good when you see them. Unexpected and natural poses make the photographs more memorable. With simple ideas in mind and positive attitude, you can have a stress free photo session of your family.
Posing is so overrated.
When we talk about shooting pictures of family or kids, the meaning of word ‘posing’ must change. Regular posing is just about managing the small details of the subject’s posture in the photos. That mostly involves moving the head a little to the left, keeping the front foot forward, less slouching etc.
This way the pictures look perfect but your one-year-old baby can’t do that.
The approach for posing must change according to the age groups you have in the family photos. Instead of suggesting your kids do stiff poses for you allow them to enjoy being photographed. Try some fun poses with your family by holding balloons in hands, circling like a train, laughing out loud, hugging each other tightly, dancing or playing. What happens when your family is advised to do stiff poses? They become so uncomfortable and awkward that they start hating family photo sessions. Make it exciting for them by allowing them to pose for you according to their wishes.
Your kids must enjoy the photo sessions.
Do you remember how it was to be photographed when you were a kid? Dressing up according to your parents and then sitting in a lame position with your siblings to act all happy in the photos. What’s so happy about posing like this for a photographer? Instead of hiring a photographer, you can set up a recommended pro DSLR model on your own for your family photo session. Create situations which allow you to take beautiful, fun and lively photos of your family. What’s the point of a family photo session when your family looks happy but they don’t feel happy?
You can have this photography session while you are on a vacation or you can simply plan an outing outdoor in daylight to have the best family pictures.
Trust me, real and natural looking photos of your family are way more valuable than the ones taken in studios with fake smiles.
Focus on the heads.
The most useful tip to use when you are making your family pose is quite simple.
Keep their heads close to the same level. Family photo sessions are more about shooting relations and interactions and it doesn’t translate into pictures when everybody is standing far from each other. To sit down and pose can be easy for kids especially when you have various heights in the family.
Search for vibrant colors, textures, and clean backgrounds. You can utilize staircases and benches as well. There are many options. You can make the children sit between or beside parents. The whole family can sit or you can make the kids stand and parents sit. Go for whatever suits the frame best. You can also hold your kids in the pictures as it provides some vibe and feel of warm interaction.
Always start the session with essential shots.
Kids have very less patience for boring stuff. Though we all adore the candid interaction shots, we still wish to have one shot in which everyone is sitting perfectly looking directly in the camera. It is easy to get a shot like this at the start of the photo session as your kids are more cooperative and fresh at that point. Let them play and pose naturally after you get done with your essential shots.
For most families, the must-have shots are a family shot, shots of parents, and all the kids together in one picture.
Variety is important.
Variety is what makes your family photo albums so great. Too static and common pictures make it look boring.
Here are some easy and fun poses that you can try out with your kids to keep them involved in posing.
Author Bio
Stephanie Lewis is a writer and a newborn photographer. She joined Photography Concentrate team in 2017 and since then she has been trying to pursue the best photography and editing practices. Besides photography, she loves having coffee, meeting new people and traveling to exotic places. Read more photography posts at https://photographyconcentrate.com/
Photo credit: Pexels
Zoe Campos says
Thank you for telling me that I need to keep a positive working attitude if I want to achieve the perfect family photo that I want. We have two kids and one is a toddler, so it might be really hard for us to get the pose that we want. Still, I want to have one, so I can hang it next to the old family history photo that I want to be restored.