10 Days of Thoughtful Photos: Day 7

What to wear.... today were talking about the style of your images!

This might be the most popular question an family photographer is asked....
"what should we wear?"

Oh... where to start.

Let's back up and look at what we have already established. If you know WHERE you are going to have your photo shoot, and the overall "feel" of the shoot, the style or story you want to tell... then the WHAT becomes much easier! If your hanging off of a tractor and want a "down home feel" then you should work with jeans, plaids, comfortable things that ramp up your story!

The biggest "fail" in clothing choices, I feel, would be to do something that
1. You would never wear again.
2. Your so unused to wearing it that it would make you (or your child) uncomfortable.

Let's think back to our own childhood for a moment and remember the scratch sweaters, and "Sunday best" style clothing that couldn't get dirty, had lots of layers, was hot (especially in a studio) and made us all super "matchy" just what every child wants... to look like everyone else - right?

Compliments of http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/

 Oh, so many things wrong with this image.... but if you ever want a good laugh that website is FULL of them!!!!! So much better then Pinterest for humor value at least! Anyways... back to our subject....

 So I am going to give you a couple of "rules" for finding your holiday style.

1. Don't buy all the same shirt in every size for EVERYONE.
2. Don't use this "holiday red" anywhere near your face, during portraits, EVER.
3. Don't feel like you need to purchase clothes "just for" portraits.
4. Don't feel like you need to "match" everyone else. Let personalities shine.
5. If Johnny doesn't normally wear a tie, or sweater-vest... don't make him do so now!

If you want to take a "safe" route. Jeans, or black pants, and white shirts or black shirts, are always in everyone's closet. It's classic and timeless, and always makes a great black and white.

You can do variations of this by putting girls in one color, and boys in another, or each family member in varying combinations complimentary colors. Going outside that core box.. you can bring some "life and personality" by selecting one person to bring in a pop of color or pattern. It highlights this person, so the baby, youngest child, or mom are typically my suggestions. You can bring this color in with a dress, a shirt, scarf... what ever your family "style" is...

Or you can go way outside the box... and toss it out all together. Forget "classic" and really find clothes that compliment each other, and fit your families style, while telling a true story!  We are going to cover this tomorrow with day 8 "creating a color palette"!