Any time you try to pose two or more people in a photograph and render them looking happy and relaxed, you’ll understand why professional portrait photographers are so well paid. Photographing portraits of groups is not easy. Many group portraits are family por-traits—records of happiness and togetherness. Taken every few years,the family portrait provides cherished memories of how the family looked “back then”and a fond record of the children’s growth.
Family groups taken in the home show the familiar warmth of home and, according to many, probably bring
the largest economic return. Outdoor family portraits are a close second, with the studio portrait usually ranking last in terms of popularity and sales.
When and why do people have a family portrait made?
Master photographer Robert Love says, “In our area, the number-one reason that clients call us to create a family portrait is because the complete family is getting together for a special occasion. Usually the parents have one or more grown children who don’t live at home anymore. More often than not, this person is married and has a family, as well. Now we have an opportunity to create a third-generation memento. With these extended families, we have photographed from eight to thirty people in one
image.”

Seniors and teens are an age group in transition. They often have boyfriends or girlfriends and are thinking about college or career, and they’re often thinking about leaving home, all of which can make for a very confusing time of life. A portrait made at this stage of their lives is a valuable heirloom because they will never look or act quite like this again.

School Dress Code.The basic requirements for all yearbook por-traits are very similar. No matter
what kind or type of clothing the high school requires, it must be
within school dress code. There is also a code that applies to hair, facial
hair, jewelry, piercings, length of shorts, height of socks, and so on.
Clothing may not have offensive or gang-related logos, and may not
feature alcohol, drugs, tobacco, or other illegal (for minors) substances.
Girls’ tops cannot be revealing, see-through, or low cut. Hats
cannot be worn in most yearbook photos—this includes the cap and
gown, fashionable hats, and cowboy or baseball hats. These rules are set
forth by the school to represent the look they feel appropriately repre-sents their students and parents.

All good photographers eventually come to the con-clusion that the quality of light is one of the single
most important “secrets” of great photography. Great landscapes depend on the combination of unique points of view and interesting natural light. Compelling portraits depend on lighting that reveals the human face in a unique way. Product photography is made alluring when imaginative lighting is used skillfully. In many instances, photographers need to add light to a photograph to make
it pleasing. The methods photographers use to add light to an image have evolved over the years, and that evolu-tion has accelerated over the past ten years.
When I started my career as a professional studio pho-tographer, we needed to use lights for every single shot we created. Our days in the studio revolved around de-signing lighting that emulated, and hopefully improved upon, the light found in the real world. We accumulated large collections of specialty lights, light modifying ac-cessories, and yards and yards of various fabrics meant to
diffuse light rays. As my career progressed and changed, we started doing more and more photographs
on location around the town and across the country. It was only natural to pack and carry
all of the heavy-duty accessories we used in the studio out to these locations. After twenty
some years, my back was aching and I no longer looked forward to taking the show on the road.
Photography had become more about packing and port-ing and less about designing beautiful light.

Photography, at least for most of us, is perceived as a daylight activity. Except for those special occasions (generally social events) when we use flash, we tend to reserve photography for the sunniest of days. Of course, this is when the world often looks its best. There is some-thing deeply psychological that lifts our mood when the sun comes out—and that works for our photos,too.
This is also something that camera designers, and those that produce film, have taken on board. Most
of the film we use is balanced, in terms of its color fidelity and contrast, for sunny days. Just think of those punchy colors on the vacation shots.