Struggling with what to wear for your family portrait session? Try these tips!
- Start with one person; typically with mom or daughter’s outfit. For adult women, dresses, skirts, and jeans all work well. Find something that you feel good in. Don’t get caught up in Pinterest, instead find something that flatters your body type.
- Does your outfit have multiple colors in it? If so; pull from those colors for your family and add in neutrals like white, cream, or gray to avoid everyone looking the same.
- Is the first outfit a sold color? If so, choose one or two colors that coordinates well. Mixing different shades of a color such as light gray and dark gray is fine. Examples:
Pink and green
Purple and green
Maroon and blue
Gray and blue
Ivory and brown
Marron and teal
Yellow and gray
Blue and yellow
Orange and green
While and mauve
Olive green and cream
Burnt orange and light gray
4. Stick with one pattern or two different patterns at the most. Floral, mostly solid with a few stripes, and plaid are all good patterns. Avoid clothing with big logos and really distracting patterns, such as obnoxious stripes or polka dots. Two brothers in matching plaid works great and looks so cute! (If you have a third child, chose a solid color shirt for a boy or a solid color dress for a girl).
5. For men and boys, solid color shirts with a button or a button up shirt are great. If they are wearing a pattern, plaid looks nice. Horizontal stripes add weight in the belly area.
6. Pants look better than shorts for teenage boys and adult men. Little boys can wear khaki shorts, pants, bibs, jeans, etc. For big boys and men, jeans or gray, navy, tan, or olive khaki pants are perfect!
7. Plan the whole outfit, including shoes! They will be in the photos! Dress shoes or sandals are preferred over sneakers.
8. Accessories such as a jean jacket over a dress, a vest over a shirt, jewelry, a scarf, a bold necklace, etc. all bring character to the photo but are not required if it doesn't fit your family's personality.
Family photo outfits are so much more laid back these days than ever before. The days when everyone matched perfectly are gone. This is just a guideline and if the rules get broken, don’t worry. Pick outfits that you feel confident in over one that are perfectly paired. I know you’ll like the photos so much more if you like how you look in your outfit.
A few things I recommend avoiding:
-fluorescent colored shirts because they can make skin turn that color
-babies or kids wearing shirts with writing such as 'Big Brother' or 'Big Sister' because it's difficult to be able to get the shirt to lay just right and be easily read
-sneakers. Dress shoes, flats, boots, and sandals all photograph better.
-little girls wearing a dress or skirt without leggings, tights, stockings, or a diaper cover. I'm not a fan of diapers being visible in the photos.
-men in shorts; they just look awkward in the sitting poses and the photo can accidentally be shooting up the leg of their shorts.