Top 5 Family Photo Ideas for Christmas

Christmas is the ideal time to catch up with family and connect with loved ones over food and engaging conversation. It also makes for the perfect and at times rare opportunity to capture warm memories on camera and record how everyone’s changed and grown over the years. But a few random clicks of the camera aren’t going to make the cut – if you really want to immortalize your family Christmas or make your own Christmas cards and personalize them with some festive family photos, you need some expert tips about composing the ideal picture. And no, you don’t need a fancy camera or a professional photographer. Check out our top 5 family photo ideas for Christmas to make sure that you are able to make the best of your seasonal snap shot.

Simplicity is everything

• It’s the people that are the highlight of your Christmas pictures – don’t let the setting, clothes and props become more of a distraction than what they’re worth.
• Use simple clutter-free backgrounds that compel the viewer to focus on the subjects – open fields, plain fences, brick walls, empty beaches and tree trunks often work well in setting off the glowing faces and warm camaraderie of your Christmas photos.

Practice makes perfect

• Taking good Christmas photos takes lots of practice. Don’t be afraid of taking the same picture ten times and choosing the best one. This is definitely better than taking it just once and wishing for a better shot.
• Review the pictures for sharpness and turn to photo editing programs like Photoshop to remove micro expressions like the mid-blink or the mid-yawn.

What to wear

• Decide if you want to go with the casual look or the dressy one, but make sure the clothes are appropriate for the location of your Christmas photos.
• Pick a few main colors you want to work with and coordinate all outfits accordingly. Try different combinations until you get it right; remember you want the group to look good as a whole.

Think about the lighting

• Unless you own professional lighting equipment, your Christmas photos should only ever be taken in natural but bright and indirect sunlight.
• Make sure your picture isn’t ruined by shadows or streaks of light filtering through buildings or trees.

Be a creative visualizer

• Use different angles or shoot from your subjects’ heights.
• Use the rule of thirds to compose your Christmas photos – divide each picture by lines into vertical and horizontal thirds, that is, 9 equal boxes. Subjects that are placed on the side lines or one of the points attract more visual interest than those in the center.

You don’t have to be a professional artist to compose beautiful Christmas photos with your family. Just use some these easy family photo ideas to make your shots more interesting and memorable.