BEST OF GROUP PORTRAIT PHOTOGRAPHY,
2nd Edition

Any time you try to pose two or more people in a photograph and render them looking happy and relaxed, you’ll understand why professional portrait photographers are so well paid. Photographing portraits of groups is not easy.

Many group portraits are family portraits—records of happiness and togetherness. Taken every few years, the family portrait provides cherished memories of how the family looked “back then” and a fond record of the children’s growth.

If this scene were photographed with a normal or wide-angle lens, the reeds in the background, imaged sharply, would be so distracting that the portrait would be dismal. However, shooting with a long lens blows out the detail in the background and the foreground, and selective diffusion in Photoshop, further enhances the effect. Photograph by Tibor Imely.

When and why do people have a family portrait made? Master photographer Robert Love says, “In our area, the number one reason that clients call us to create a family portrait is because the complete family is getting together for a special occasion. Usually the parents have one or more grown children who don’t live at home anymore. More often than not, this person is married and has a family, as well. Now we have an opportunity to create a third generation memento. With these extended families, we have photographed from eight to thirty people in one image.”

A group portrait is only as good as each of the individuals in the portrait. You should be able to look at each person in the portrait and ask, “Could each of these individual portraits stand alone?” If the answer is “Yes,” then the photographer has done a good job.

According to one of the great group portrait photographers, Monte Zucker, “The first thing to remember is that each person in the group is interested primarily in how he or she looks. So, that means that you have to pay attention every person in the group, individually. No matter how good the pattern of the group, if people don’t like the way they look, all your time and effort are wasted.”

Robert Love concurs: “Each person in a group must look great—as if they were photographed alone.” Love makes it a point, in fact, to pose and create great individual portraits within his groups, a technique that takes time and patience to perfect.

Great group portraits do not only capture everyone in the group looking good; they should have a style and rhythm. Fine group images have direction, motion and all the visual elements that are found in fine portraits and in art. These pictures possess the means to keep a viewer looking and delving long after the visual information in the picture is digested.

In addition to family portraits, you will see many wedding group portraits in this book, primarily because weddings are the occasion for the “spectacular” group, where everyone is dressed formally, looks great and is in a happy and joyous mood. The couple will often require the wedding photographer to shoot a set number of groups from both sides of the family so that there is a permanent and stylized memory of the most important day in their lives.

A longer than normal focal length compresses your subjects and separates them from any potentially distracting backgrounds. Notice how completely the background falls out of focus in this romantic image. The foreground does the same thing. You can actually see the band of sharp focus that covers only the subjects. Photograph by Anthony Cava.

It is my hope that you will not only learn the technical side of group portraiture from this book—how to pose, light and photograph groups on a higher plane—but that you will also become a fan of the design systems used in creating compelling group portraits. This is the path to a higher level of photography and self-expression.

To illustrate this book, I have called upon some of the finest and most decorated portrait and wedding photographers in the world. Some of them I know personally, others I know their work well, and many I have heard lecture throughout the country. Some are newcomers to the limelight, but in every case, their group portraits are exemplary. Many of the photographers included in this book have been honored repeatedly by the country’s top professional organizations, the Professional Photographers of America (PPA) and Wedding and Portrait Photographers International (WPPI). I want to take the opportunity to thank all of the great photographers for their participation in this book. Without them, this book would not have been possible. I would also like to thank my illustrator and wife, Shell Dominica Nigro, for her enthusiasm and help in preparing this book.

I would especially like to thank the following photographers for their technical assistance and boundless expertise and especially for their endless patience: Michael Ayers, Robert Love, Bill McIntosh, Norman Phillips and Monte Zucker.

While this book will not be the equivalent of years of experience, it is my hope that you will learn from the masters how to photograph groups of people with style, artistry, technical excellence and professionalism.

Rich fall colors provide the ideal backdrop for a family portrait. Not only is this a beautiful setting, it is an expertly posed and executed portrait. Note the first phase in understanding how to create a fine group portrait—there is a design to the arrangement of people within the group. Photograph by Michael Ayers.