Fall Family Portrait Ideas

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Photo by monkeybusinessimages via iStock

It’s Fall! Photographically, the fall or autumn season is a prime time for all sorts of photography. Fall family portraits are one of the activities that we really love here at Photography Talk. 

A fall portrait has a lot of options for making something very special, especially if you like doing environmental portraits or other forms of outdoor portrait photography. Studio portraits are also popular at this time and give opportunities for making fall portraits without being outside.

Follow along as we discuss some fall family portrait ideas that you can use for your own family or for capturing portraits for other people, such as your clients as a photography business.

Table of Contents:

Fall Family Portrait Ideas - Timing

Photo by fotostorm via iStock

The timing for fall family portrait ideas will vary somewhat based on your location. More northern locations will have the warmer colors of foliage happening earlier than more southern locations. Elevation matters, too, with higher elevations encountering peak colors earlier than other areas.

Timing for fall family portrait ideas also covers the time of day you’ll want to be shooting. Golden Hour, morning or afternoon versions of it, has wonderfully warm lighting conditions that can be used to accentuate the already warmer tones of the turning leaves.

During the fall season, the clocks change off of Daylight Saving Time for many regions, so it pays to keep that in mind when planning out the hour of any planned outdoor photoshoot. 

Yet another factor to note is that the shorter daylight hours mean that the transitions from full sun to Golden Hour to sunset (or reverse order for morning times) will happen quicker than they do during summer. 

So, as a photographer, it pays to be prepared to shoot as quickly as possible to maximize your available outdoor hours. You don’t need to rush through the poses, but that lower light level of early evening will come up on you fast if you’re distracted.

Fall Family Portrait Ideas - Locations

Photo by skynesher via iStock

What locations work for fall family portrait ideas is something you can scout out well ahead of time. It is also good to check out location ideas online to see what certain areas look like during this time of year.

Local parks are often an excellent area to consider as a photoshoot location. You’ll want to check for any local regulations covering using the parks in your area for taking pictures for profit, but if there are fees, they are generally low, and rules are easy to follow. 

Another bright idea might be your own back or front yard. You'll want the proper insurance coverage when capturing fall family portraits as a professional. That’s often what some of the local park fees help cover, but it’s a good idea to be covered for liability in general as a photography business. 

Remember that most homeowners, renters, and personal auto policies won’t cover professional endeavors. In that same line of thought concerning safety, bring a light of some kind if your session will end close to or after sundown.

Fall Family Portrait Ideas - Posing and Composition

Photo by skynesher via iStock

Fall family portrait ideas can use the same posing and composition practices as we would for portraits any time of year. Depending on how large the family is, you can use simple ideas or become the conductor or director of your shooting session and be creative.

In outdoor settings, using things in the area often works well. A park, trail, or yard may have benches, low rock walls, rustic wooden fences, or tree stumps that can be incorporated into the posing and composition for sitting subjects, standing subjects, or as a prop to lean on.

Props for indoor settings fit into this category as well. You can bring in natural examples of fall foliage or use some realistic-looking fake stuff that can be at all sorts of stores during this time of year.

Fall Family Portrait Ideas - Displaying Images

Displaying and viewing wall art of your finished fall family portrait ideas can be every bit as much fun as it is to create them in the first place. Whether you’re using these fall family portrait ideas for your own personal fun or selling them as part of a portrait package as a professional photography business, you’ll want to have the highest quality materials and processes for prints.

Artbeat Studios has two types of prints that show off fall family portrait ideas in a fine way: Luster Finish Paper Prints and Giclée Canvas Prints. The canvas prints can be hung as-is, but you’ll probably want a frame for your paper prints. The Box frame option from Artbeat Studios is a nice choice for fall portraits.

For delivering the best possible fall family portrait prints, you’ll want to send Artbeat Studios the best image file possible. They can handle JPEG and TIFF image files up to 500 MB in size, and they prefer the 150 ppi resolution for printing, though they can provide 100 ppi to 300 ppi.

Here is a good explanation of the ppi differences in a YouTube video from the Artbeat Studios channel:

Large paper prints in a frame or large canvas prints with or without a frame will show off the end results of your fall family portrait ideas in a fine way. Artbeat Studios also has loyalty pricing, white-label shipping, and easy online ordering, which professionals can use.

Fall Family Portrait Ideas - Equipment

Photo by ozgurdonmaz via iStock

You likely already have the high-quality camera and lens equipment to take advantage of your fall family portrait ideas, so here are some helpful hints.

Family portraits can be made with wider or normal lenses. Still, it pays to have a short telephoto for single-person or two-person head and shoulder shots in addition to normal and wide lenses for groups and environmental shots. 

A fast aperture for incorporating selective focus is also useful. You can actually get all of this capability in one lens if you have a fast aperture, wide to telephoto zoom lens. 

The 24-70mm f/2.8 lens is a good choice in Full Frame format. Not only does this lens type have the focal length spread needed and a wide enough aperture for selective focus at the short tele end of the lens, but they're also almost always a pro-level lens with the extra ruggedness and reliability you want in serious photography gear.

A nice benefit of a high-quality zoom lens for outdoor portrait shooting is that you won’t have to spend time switching back and forth among lenses, taking full advantage of the limited shooting timing mentioned earlier.

The fall family portrait ideas will help you capture and display excellent photos, whether for your own enjoyment or as a professional photographer.

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