Family Photographer, Johanna King, very kindly shared her Top Tips to take more meaningful family photos…
Hanging framed prints of candid, authentic moments of your family on your walls is the best possible gift you can give to yourself and your children. Yet, for most parents, this is one of those tasks that remains on the mental to-do list.
Life is busy, children keep moving all the time, photos pile up on the phone / hard-drive, and how to you choose what to print? I like to think that we can make it easier and a lot more enjoyable, by focusing on the moments that will MEAN something in the future. Take less photos, but better ones – or at least, be better equipped to take and select the right photos to get printed.

1. Go back to your WHY
Nowadays, pretty much everyone owns a camera, whether it’s a smartphone or a more advanced DSLR. It allows parents to document their children’s lives in a way that previous generations couldn’t.
However, what I have noticed (in myself and others) is that we get caught up in the “doing” (taking a lot of snapshots) and we don’t stop to THINK about it anymore. Without some intent, we just end up with thousands of images that will live on hard drives, the cloud or die with our phones.
Here are some examples of why you may be taking photographs of your family in the first place.
- You have a very bad visual memory and would otherwise not remember any of it.
- You want to capture fleeting moments to revisit for a lifetime.
- You love looking back at past memories, events and stages.
- You love having a record of your children changing over time.
- You want to preserve life’s small details that will fade over time.
- You want to share them with friends & family members.
- You want to have photographs on your walls that bring back emotions.
- You want your children to have memories to look back on.
- You want your children to have a record of family members and relationships.
Here are other ways to reflect on the “why” question:
- Chat with your children if they’re old enough, about the meaning and power of photographs. About memories.
- Look through photos together and see which ones they’re most drawn to.
- See if the photos you’ve been taking capture something meaningful or if you’re trying for “perfect”.
- Look at your childhood photos. Observe your reactions/emotions. Which are your favourites?
- Observe everyday moments with new fresh eyes. What do YOU find interesting? What makes your children unique?
When you reflect on your why regularly, it’s easier to pick and chose the moments you photograph, and later on, which pictures to print. You’ll start noticing the special memories that need preserving, and the people.

2. Get in the frame!
Think about your childhood photos. How many photos do you have of yourself with the grownups in your life?
Most of us don’t have enough of them. And a lot of the images are posed. If you’re lucky to have some candid images of loved ones sharing a moment with you, they’re likely some of your favourites.
There is often one parent that ends up behind the camera, and rarely gets in the photos with their children. Sometimes, they purposely avoid getting photographed, or delete every single photograph because they don’t like the way they look in them.
I get it! Believe me. If that’s you, you’re not alone. It’s not easy for someone else to get that candid smiling natural portrait of you that you like.
But imagine your children in 20 years going through their childhood photos and asking: “Where were you?”
I have personally worked on detaching myself from the way I look in photos (and in life). Body Neutrality is a lot easier than Body Positivity. I look the way I look, sometimes my body changes and it’s ok. It’s neither good or bad, it just is.
I want to be in photographs with and for my children. I want them to see me reading to them, brushing their hair, making muffins they won’t eat, feed them, hug them. I even want them to see photographs of me looking bored, or annoyed. I want them to see the real me and not a curated, perfect version of me.
Your children will want to see what you looked like, the way you looked at them, how you cared for them, the activities you used to share together.
In practice, it may look like:
- Selfies: don’t shy away from them, don’t add filters, they’re a great way to get in the frame.
- For a more natural feel, download an “interval timer app” (also available on some DSLR): it allows you to take candid photos at regular intervals, and keep the best ones.
- Give a loved one some clear instructions: “The next time [I’m reading a book to B.] would you mind taking a quick photo without asking us to look at the camera?” Maybe it’s baking / cuddling / nursing.
- Give a camera to your children! The angles may not be the most flattering but they’ll surprise you. Seeing the world through their eyes is fun!

3. Let go of the idea of “perfection”
When I talk to parents about getting “better” photos of their family, I don’t mean “perfect” photos. I don’t even mean that they will be better technically, even if that’s obviously a factor, and something I teach in my online courses.
By better, I mean more meaningful or more emotive.
Mess (and self-consciousness) used to get in the way of capturing precious moments of my family. I would avoid certain rooms or angles because of the background, even if the moment was meaningful to me. I’ve gone through a big shift in my personal photography in the last eight years and it’s very liberating. Would I even dare say “therapeutic”?
We all need to free ourselves from this idea of “perfection”. We know we can’t be perfect parents, that our children are not supposed to be perfect either, so why do we want to photograph something that doesn’t exist or that’s only partially true? Why can’t we embrace our reality? What are we telling our children when we are trying to show an improved curated version of our lives?
We need to start accepting who we are. What our family is. The imperfections, the mess, the chaos. It’s no different in any other houses. What everyone shows on social media isn’t the whole truth and the truth is much more interesting and meaningful.
My goal is to capture all the meaningful memories for my children and for me, print a manageable amount every year, maybe do a music slideshow of a bigger selection and feel “in peace” knowing the rest is backed up in an easy-to-understand filing system.
You know what? I’m not there yet. I have a system but I can’t seem to find the time or energy to sort through my personal images after working on my clients’ images. That’s ok. We are the first generation of parents having to deal with such an amount of digital photographs and the overwhelm is real. Every little I print is a win.

4. Enjoy the moment instead of capturing it
It is so easy, especially when photographing “everyday life” to fall into the trap of wanting to photograph everything.
This can result in digital clutter overload and too much time spent trying to “nail the shot” while being distracted from what is happening and not joining in on the fun.
That was me for a long time. Guilty as charged.
So, when I realised what was happening, I started to really become aware of the moments I wanted/needed to capture of my family VS capturing everything. More importantly, I’ve decided to be more mindful of the moments first, before running to get my camera. Most moments will happen again. And if they don’t, it might be best to take it all in and print it in my memory rather than miss it all because I was looking for my camera.
While I strongly believe those photographs will be priceless to my children someday, I also know that she’d much rather have her mammy REALLY there with her when we spend time together.
And this doesn’t only mean leaving the camera behind. It also means the phone, the computer, the chores, the worries.
I have to be honest with you… This is still a work in progress.

5. Print your photographs
My father took a lot of photographs and my mother organised them in slip-in photo albums for my siblings and I. They are one of my most precious belonging. When I was 10, I would ask myself questions such as “If the house was on fire and I could only save one thing, what would it be?” (as you do) The answer would always be “my photo albums”. I could picture myself throwing them off the window and jumping after them.
Since digital cameras became popular (and then smartphones), a lot of us stopped printing photographs and rely on disks and hard drives to keep our memories safe.
I often wonder who will go through my hard drives to find the photographs when I’m gone? Will they know where to look? Will they ever look at them? What about the cloud? Will someone figure out how to retrieve all the photographs?
I think I’m better off having 15 photographs printed every year (or even 1) than having 3000 photographs on my hard drive.
Whether you choose to store them loose in a big box, put them in slip-in albums, design photo books online, frame them, hang them on your walls, or a little bit of everything, it doesn’t matter, but do it. If you don’t do it for you, do it for your children.
Nowadays, there are a few apps / services that allow you to print very easily from your phone.
I would also recommend sitting down with a piece of paper and some pencils and create your own “Digital to Print” workflow that fits within your life!
Remember: done is better than perfect.
I hope you found these tips helpful. If so, I’d love to hear from you in the comments. You may like to take car in my free 5-day challenge or download one of my free guides. All the links are in the bio below.
Bio
Johanna King is an award-winning documentary family photographer based in Dublin, Ireland. When photographing a family, her ultimate goal is to capture those fleeting moments you want to hold onto. She will arrange them in a beautiful heirloom album for parents to treasure and always includes 2 mini-duplicates for the kids. She also teachers parents how to take meaningful images of their family life, and let go of perfection.
You can find more about Johanna and her work on www.johannakingphotography.com.
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