Family Portraits: Tips on How to Pose Your Clients

Posing for family portraits is much more than just putting people in a particular position & having them hold it. It’s about making use of your skills & a few tricks to assist your subject look their best in photos. Here are few simple yet effective posing tips that you’d like to apply while taking family portraits in Cincinnati.

 

Find a good spot & work it:

If you’ve shot many family portraits, then you better know these spots. It is where the light is diffused, soft, non-directional and the backdrop is simple yet aesthetically gratifying. For example, the open shade area with lush green trees in the backdrop. It is tough to get incorrect angles or poor light in these conditions.

Give basic guidelines instead of specific poses:

Sure, you wish to capture one or 2 classic shots of the entire family, so they can hang it over their fireplace or send it to their grandparents, but make the rest of the photo session enjoyable for them. Rather than spending your whole time positioning them, provide them some basic guidelines on posing and allow them relax and take your snaps from there.

Plan out groupings instead of poses:

Remember what’s critical to most clients is staying close to their family. Your client mayn’t see that their hand is in a perfect position or that they form a perfect triangle formation. However, they’ll notice if they don’t have a picture with a family member they wish. Combinations such as mom and son, dad and daughter, kids and grandma are all pretty important to your client. In most of the cases, this is more critical to them than good lighting, creative poses, or even being in perfect focus. These are the pictures that’ll find their way to different family member’s walls.

Hoot reactions & interactions:

This is more of a shooting philosophy rather than a posing technique. I’d rather allow kids to do their own things & be a quiet observe than have to push them into a pose. This is your best chance to take genuine reactions & unique pictures. Tell them something funny or, better yet, ask them to tell you something funny. Most children have a joke ready that they consider funny and they always laugh at their own joke. Even if it is not a genuine joke but they think it is funny and laughs on it. And that is all you need!

Contact Jill Mathews Photography if you want your Family Portraits in Cincinnati to be outstanding. 
 
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