What to wear for a family photo session | Branson Photographer

What to wear for a family photo session

I have planned to write this blog post for years and I’m finally doing it! “What to wear for a family photo session” is something that comes up a lot when my clients are planning their session. This is particularly true since I work with a lot of extended families and figuring out how to coordinate everyone can be complicated. I have 5 simple tips for what to wear for a family photo session as well as some examples of what works from my amazing clients.

I’ve worked with many families over the years and I wanted to show some examples of ideas that worked very well. If you have an upcoming session with me, or anyone else, I hope that these tips for what to wear for a family photo session will help you!

1. Coordinate, don’t match

The first tip that I give families is to coordinate, not match. Believe it or not, 30 people perfectly matching doesn’t look good! I recommend choosing 2-4 colors and basing what everyone wears around those colors. For example, you could use navy, yellow, pink and white. All of those colors look good together. That isn’t to say that everyone has to wear those exact colors but to use them as a base.

2. Denim can be your friend!

I really don’t recommend wearing ONE shirt color with jeans, but having everyone wear jeans or jean shorts is a pretty easy way to coordinate. Just remember, there is such a thing as too much denim:

Photo from Awkward Family Photos. It is not mine. 😉

3. Coordinate individual families, not groups.

Planning photos for a large group can be stressful, so try not to stress too much about the clothes. One way to do this is to coordinate individual families but not worry about the group as a whole. That makes it much more doable, doesn’t it?

+ What not to wear for family photo sessions

I couldn’t write this without a few recommendations for what not to wear. So here are two simple tips on what not to wear for the family photo session.

4. Say no to black and white.

Almost my entire wardrobe consists of black, grey and white clothing. There’s nothing wrong with wearing these colors, but many assume that everyone wearing black and white is easy and will look great. While dressing 30 people in black and white might be more convenient, it often doesn’t look very good. People tend to get “lost” when everyone is dressed exactly the same. This is particularly the case when there are a lot of people like an extended family session. Sometimes the white end up looking dingy and it’s just not a good look.

5. Say no to Only dark colors.

This kind of goes along with only wearing black and white.  Wearing all dark colors (black, navy, dark grey) typically doesn’t look very good. It’s fine for just a few people, but it doesn’t work well with a large group. It’s completely fine to mix these colors in, but make sure you’re adding some lighter or brighter colors for balance.

Now that you’ve read my 5 tips for what to wear for a family photo session, here is some inspiration from some of my former clients!

Do you see what I mean about not matching? This family looks great, and you can see some teals, corals, greens, but nothing is too matchy-matchy!

The individual families are coordinated, and then the group as a whole looks great together!

On an unrelated note, do you see that beautiful light? This is why I recommend sessions during the “golden hour” if at all possible! By the way, this couple was celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary! I’ve short more than 10 50th anniversary photo shoots, and I have several more on the calendar!

Here is another family that did a great job coordinating without perfectly matching. This is an instance where denim works really well! I also love the plum, pink and blues that they used to coordinate everyone. And again, it’s not too matchy!

I loved the colors that this family used for their fall photos. Fun fact, it was actually very hot when we took these but they were awesome and you can’t tell. I really love the navy, mustard, and red colors together.

One of my families last year had matching shirts made, aren’t they cute? If you don’t want to mess with trying to coordinate everyone, this could be another option!

I hope that you enjoyed this post on what to wear for a family photo session. If you have an upcoming session with me, I am so excited to work with you (yes, even if you choose to wear black and white!) If you’re looking for a Branson photographer for your extended family photo session, I’d love to work with you! Use the contact form to inquire if your date is available or to ask any other questions.