Visual Interest Guide

When shooting group portraits (or any portraits, really), the goal usually involves creating visually interesting portraits. Here is a basic visual interest guide for creating such portraits:

• Less visually interesting portraits
  • Traditional
  • Symmetry
  • Mirrored pose
  • Uniform spacing
• More visually interesting portraits
  • Editorial
  • Balance
  • Varied pose
  • Varied overlap

If your clients request both traditional, formal images, as well as editorial images, review your timeline to make sure you have adequate time to capture all of the requested images. It’s important to remember that creative, editorial poses require more time and effort. If time is limited, ask your clients which style they would prefer. Set the right expectations from the outset.