With the holidays just around the corner, your calendar is going to fill up soon. Between festive cocktails, family dinners, and the office’s Secret Santa exchange, you’ll be a jolly social butterfly in the upcoming weeks. You’ll also be in your fair share of group snaps, as a camera’s never too far away at these holiday get-together.
While you might not be able to control the composition of your holiday pictures, you can control the angle of your pose. When you’re getting ready to click that shutter, remember to position yourself from head to toe.
From your head, make sure your hair is styled, your makeup is on point, and your outfit is eye-catching. From your toes, make sure they’re manicured and polished.
If you’re tired of looking like a hot mess in pic after pic, it’s time you learn how to put your best face forward. Keep scrolling to learn the basic rules of taking a great holiday photo. These tips will help you pose like a professional.
1. Get the right Equipment
We know, the old excuse that it’s, “not you, it’s the camera!” is an old one, but sometimes, it’s true. Taking pictures with an old Moto G, equipped with just an 8MP camera, doesn’t do anyone favors — even if you’re an Instagram model. The iPhone 13 Pro Max or the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, on the other hand, helps everyone look their best.
The triple 12MP True Depth camera in the iPhone and the 108MP quad camera in the S22 Ultra are great for taking the best looking photographs taken on a smartphone. Admittedly, these highend smartphones come with all the bells and whistles for taking the best mobile photography.
Taking holiday photos is a great way to capture memories and tell a story of your trip. But to make sure your photos turn out the way you want them to, you need the right equipment. A digital camera can also create great photos.
It doesn’t have to be the most expensive or latest model – the most important thing is that it’s capable of taking the kind of photos you want. If you’re looking for high-quality images, you’ll want to look for models with good resolution and low-light performance.
You may also want to look into lenses for your camera – the right kind can make all the difference in the kind of photos you take. Other gear you’ll need includes a tripod (for taking photos in low-light conditions), a flash (for when you need additional light), and a bag (for carrying all your gear around).
And don’t forget extra memory cards and batteries – you’ll need them to store your photos and keep your camera running. With the right equipment, you can be sure to get the perfect photos to remember your holiday by!
2. Hold Steady
Finally, you managed to snap a shot in which everyone is throwing lewks and no one has their eyes close. It took several pics and a few rearrangements to get, so you’re desperate to send this off to the group chat. Only — you realize it’s blurry because whoever was holding the camera was shaking like a leaf.
Blurry photographs ruin an otherwise perfect picture. Same with those pics where you manage to lose your grip on the phone.
The sleek premium smartphone is far too easy to drop when it’s without a skin. Serious photographers know that they need some help from a company like dbrand. They produce the best holiday photo-proof iPhone XS Max skins out there.
Their latest design comes with a pattern of individually textured honeycombs to create the best grip possible, making it easier to hold tight and steady throughout any photoshoot.
You should put a skin on your iPhone XS Max or other smartphone of your choice, and think about adding a selfie stick into your holiday repertoire. Together, these accessories can banish blurry photos from ruining your holiday snaps.
3. Take Advantage of Decorations
If you were to show someone pics from last Christmas or Hanukkah, would they know the photos were taken during the holidays? If not, that was a serious misuse of setting.
You can inject an easy sense of holiday cheer by snapping pics by the tree, menorah, or garlands decorated with stringed lights.
Making sure you capture holiday decorations accessories in your shots will create a theme around the photo and will result in your best holiday snaps.
For example, you can use a gingerbread house as a prop in one of your photos to make it stand out. You can also try using holiday accessories like Santa hats, reindeer antlers, or elf ears to incorporate them into your photos.
Moreover, you can include your pets in the holiday snaps by getting them a Santa hat or an elf hat. These accessories will be quite helpful in making your pets look cuter than ever.
Just be careful to adjust the Lightroom app on your iPhone 14 Pro Max. This gives you the ability to manually adjust your exposure to balance bright bulbs in dark rooms.
You may also want to turn on a few extra lamps than normal to brighten any shadows the smartphone can’t improve through its Smart HDR.
4. Switch up the Angles
When you’re the star of several, frighteningly bad photographs, it’s easy to get in a funk. You stand in one spot, taking pic after pic hoping you’ll eventually nail it.
You know what they say about doing the same thing expecting different results. It can drive you mad!
Stave off holiday photo insanity by shaking things up. Move around and try different angles. They won’t always work, but you might find something that suits you.
You could do with learning something from the queen of selfies, Kim Kardashian. Have you noticed you rarely see her facing the camera face on? That’s not just a coincidence. Most people look better in a slight profile — particularly their left side according to science.
Another trick Kim K uses is a downwards pointing camera angle. By having to look up to meet the lens, she has to straighten her neck and jut out her chin, creating a more angular look to her jawline.
Stay away from a camera that points up. This will force you to look down at the lens, potentially creating an unflattering double chin in the process.
If you’re looking for the best possible photos, it’s essential to switch up the angles. Even a simple change of perspective can make a huge difference in the quality of your photographs.
Try shooting from different heights, from below or above your subject. Or, instead of taking the photo straight on, try an angle from the side. Moving around the subject can reveal shapes and lines you wouldn’t have noticed if you stayed in the same spot.
You can also experiment with different lenses to get different effects for the best holiday snaps. For example, a wide-angle lens can make a room feel larger, while a telephoto lens can compress the background for a more intimate photo.
Finally, don’t be afraid to get creative with angles and perspectives. Taking photos from unusual angles can add drama and interest to your photos, making them stand out from the crowd and very memorable, which is what the holidays are all about. So the next time you pick up your camera, be sure to switch up the angles — you never know what kind of incredible photos you can create!
Start Practicing!
Bad holiday photos aren’t a perquisite of the season. You can banish awkward and ugly snaps from your holiday tradition with a little time and effort. Just put some thought into your next photograph and remember these tips to help you iron out the kinks.
These four basic steps will lead you to the perfect pic this season. You’ll look so good, you may even want to use it as the header of next year’s holiday email chain!
