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10 Christmas Photography Ideas to Get You Inspired
Last Updated on
Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year, and there are plenty of opportunities to capture great photographs. While most people take photos of opening gifts or eating dinner, some people want to come up with other ideas to help capture the season. If this sounds like your situation, keep reading as we provide you with a list of Christmas photography ideas to get you inspired.
The 10 Christmas Photography Ideas to Get You Inspired
1. Classic Color Scheme
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One of the best ways to ensure that your photos have a Christmas feel is to focus on capturing the classic color scheme of red, white, and green. Any image containing these three colors will likely suggest the holiday season.
2. Christmas Pajamas
Photo Credit: Pixabay
One fantastic way to capture the Christmas season in a photo is to take pictures of family members in their Christmas pajamas. Many families even like to purchase matching outfits, which look great in a photo and make a fantastic memory for everyone involved. You can also include the family pet if you have one1
3. Falling Snow
Photo Credit: Tony Ross, Unsplash
A great way to remind people that your photos are of the Christmas season is to capture falling snow. That said, snow can be somewhat difficult to get on film. Fortunately, the people at Expert Photography have a stellar step-by-step tutorial to help you get started. It gives you tips for dealing with the cold, as well as choosing a location and setting up your camera so you can get professional results.
4. Christmas Props
Photo Credit: Pixabay
Adding a Christmas prop or two to your photos can tell your viewer that the image represents the holiday. You can use any relevant prop that you can find, from a Christmas tree to the gifts beneath it. Snowmen, reindeer, stockings, candy canes, and ornaments are all perfect examples of props that you can place in your frame to get your point across.
5. Christmas Party Booth
Image Credit: Pixabay
A Christmas party booth is a simple idea that is easy to implement. The best part is that you can likely build it at home with parts on hand. Mops of BBC has several ways that you can put this idea to use, all of which will make you feel like you are living in the holiday season.
6. Santa Hats
Image Credit: Pixabay
The Santa hat is typically only seen during Christmas, so it’s a great item to add when you want to emphasize the time of year. You can use any hat that you can find, or you can even make one by following the guide provided by Lia Griffith. This guide will help you make Santa hats for the whole family without breaking the bank.
7. Untangling Christmas Lights
Image Credit: Pixabay
Capturing a family member untangling Christmas lights is a way to capture the holiday spirit and take a great photo without being too cliché. The lights also illuminate your subject in interesting and unusual ways to help create photos that stand the test of time.
8. Stockings and Fireplace
Image Credit: Joshua Newton, Unsplash
A Christmas stocking and fireplace photo lets people know that it’s the holiday season, while showing them how comfortable and cozy home can be. The socks are a nice contrast to the fire, and you can change the aperture size to make background images more or less blurry.
9. Ornament Reflection
Image Credit: Mauro_B, Pixabay
An ornament reflection photo is perfect for letting people know what time of year it is. These images are fairly easy to create with a good knowledge of aperture size, and other camera settings will help you achieve even better photos. Click It Up A Notch has an excellent tutorial for improving your skill at capturing such photos.
10. Building a Snowman
Image Credit: Pixabay
Help viewers know what time of year it is by capturing snow-based activities, like building a snowman or making a snow angel. These images can be extremely powerful depending on how much the person performing the activity is enjoying it.
Christmas Photography Tips
Read your owner’s manual carefully, so you know how to change all the settings and understand what they do.
Fast shutter speeds will capture fast-moving objects, like snow, without blurring, making the image darker.
Slow shutter speeds are good for still objects because the image blurs easily. However, the blurring can create interesting effects!
Large apertures produce bright images, but they have a narrow depth of field, and foreground and background objects will be blurry.
Small apertures produce dark images, but the foreground and background will be less blurry.
Increasing the ISO will increase the brightness of an image. However, it also makes the image grainy, so you must adjust it until you get the best results.
Image Credit: Jakob Owens, Unsplash
Conclusion
Christmas is a fun season, and if you put a few of the ideas listed here to the test, you will be quite successful. We recommend starting with the classic color scheme and moving on to props like Christmas pajamas, stockings, and fireplaces, because they shouldn’t require much fiddling with the camera settings. However, once you get more experience, try out the other options, like capturing falling snow or a child building a snowman, as these may require manipulation of the camera settings to get the best picture.
Ed Malaker is a veteran writer who contributes to a wide range of blogs covering information on computer programming, pets, birding, tools, fitness, guitars, and optics. Outside of writing, Ed is often found working in the garden or performing DIY projects in the house. Ed is also a musician, spending his time composing music for independent films or helping people repair their guitars.
