Six tips for taking photos of people this Christmas

Christmas is a time for family, friends and getting together, and many of us will be taking photos of those we will be with over the festive season. So, here are a few easy tips for how to take better photos of people, whatever camera you have......

Tip #1. Blur the background if you can.

This makes the people stand out more, and the background less distracting. If you have one of the newer iPhones, it may do this for you automatically. On older phones, if you have a 'Portrait' mode, it will blur the background for you. If you have other types of camera; on auto the camera should recognise you are talking a photo of people and try and blur the background for you. Otherwise, why not experiment and learn how to use aperture priority (if your camera has it) to create the blur yourself? If you can't do any of this, make sure you move the people to somewhere with a plain background if you can!

Tip #2. Try and shoot slightly from above.

Even if it means standing on something, shooting from slightly above people's eyeline gives much more flattering photos, than taking a photo from below looking up!

Tip #3. Candid is far, far better than posed.

I'm a firm believer in taking photos of people when they are NOT being posed. This creates much more natural photos. So, if you can just let people do what they are doing and try and capture that moment naturally.

Tip #4. Focus on the eyes.

If you know how to control where to focus with your camera, it's really important that the faces, and more specifically the eyes are in focus. If you're lucky enough to have a camera like mine, it has a feature called 'eye focus' which literally find the eye and makes sure it's in focus! If not, then try and find out how to control the focus area on your camera (on most phone cameras you can simply press on the screen where you want to focus)

Tip #5. Don't cut people off at joints!

If you take a photo with people in, but not including all of their bodies, think about where you cut them off in the photo. Cutting people off at a joint (elbow, knee, ankle etc) leads to really odd looking photos!

Tip #6. Think about light!

If you're indoors, turning off artificial lights and positioning people by a north facing window can provide really nice, soft natural light. If you are outside, taking photos of people in the golden hour just after sunrise or just before sunset can produce great results. If it's during the day time, try and make sure the people aren't looking into the sun and squinting at you! And finally, if at all possible, do whatever you can to avoid using your camera flash, which gives really harsh unpleasant light. Even taking photos by natural candle light is better than using flash.

Have a great Christmas!

Wherever you are, and whatever you're doing this Christmas, have a great time - and make sure you capture some of those holiday memories! And if you decide your new year's resolution is to improve your photography in 2022, don't forget to take a look at the range of courses that I offer here.