Portraits for Greeting Cards

I have never done a professional photo for a greeting card.
Sometimes I would dress the kids up and do something "Christmas-y" but most of the time I like to use a photo of us on vacation, or doing something else where we are all smiling and laughing together :-)

You can get a coupon for a free sitting at sears. Then choose 2 or 3 photos that you like and buy those. In total, it won't be more than 25.

Then you scan what you like and add it to a card. But if you are just going to get a card on photo paper and send it out, why bother. If you plan to get card stock or folded cards, then it's nice. But really expensive. I just paid $125 for 80 cards. Now I need 80 stamps!

I am a professional photographer, so of course I would say to use a professional :) I always have a photographer do our photo's every year. Even though I can do them myself of my kids, I like to be in the photo's once in a while also, so it's worth it for me to pay the price for a nice family photo.

Truthfully, I've not been O. that does the Easter, Christmas, birthday studio shots. Too much planning ahead & stress.
IF I do a photo card, I tend to use a cure shot I've taken sometime through the year.
Ok, I'll say it, there's something just a wee bit cheesy about the staged holiday shots! Lol. What's wrong with using a cute pic from a beach vacation, hiking trip, or a normal day that just turned our super cute?

We have a friend take our family pictures each fall. She is a great photographer and has a great camera. It is just a hobby for her, but she is really good! She doesn't charge us. We usually try to take her out to eat or something simple to show our graditude.

I would not want to spend massive amounts of $$ on pictures. There are other options.

Maybe if it is THAT important to your hubby, he can find a good, reasonable photographer and the money to pay... like by giving up lunches/dinners out for a month, or spending "fun" money for a month. Sometimes putting them in charge of getting things done within the budget is a reality check for our not-so-frugal partners!

I have always taken my own photos for photo cards. Anyone else I know does the same thing.

Usually we put the kids in front of the Christmas tree or go to a park and take nice pics of them, but we always use photos for our greeting cards that I take myself. I like them better that way! More natural and personal, I think.

I take my own photos then have Walmart make the greeting card incorporating the picture. My photos are just as good as a professional photographer if I say so myself. What often makes a professionals pictures look good is the background /backdrop of the photo and how you have the people posed. Look at professional photos to get ideas. Personally I love natural light photography. I have a small evergreen tree in my front garden that I put Christmas balls on. Then I put lights on these Pom Pom type decorative trees on either side of my door. I pose my kids on a rock in front of the tree with Christmas balls and I am able to get awesome pictures. If you don't have a spot at home go to a local hotel or fancy restaurant for pictures. I actually got great pictures of my daughter today as we were standing in line to see Santa at the mall. IMO my pictures turned out better than my sister's pictures that she had "professionally" done at JC Penneys.

One year we used a professional photograph, but that's only because we had family portraits taken earlier in the year. We would have never hired one just for a Christmas card. We always use personal photos. I agree with you, they are always more personal and capture fun moments. Sometimes they are from vacations that we take, sometimes they are photos w/ Santa. Just depends. Of all the photo cards that we receive, and these days that's almost all of them, very very few are professional photos.

I like to have professional photos done once a year of the whole family. If I want to send them out, I just get the the CD and print my own so there's no waiting.

I have a decent camera, and take lots of pictures of my son, and use one almost every year for cards. I also get copyright release CD's of the school portraits and use those for cards as well.

This year the theme is "Christmas at Baker Street" as I had just made my son a Sherlock Holmes Invernesse Coat and Deerstalker Cap this past October.

I am going to PS(PhotoShop) the border, then take the digital pic in and make winter background cards at Walmart and put a Sherlock themed Christmas greeting. I have about a hundred Copyright releases on file there for various pictures I have taken, so it is possible to take professional looking pictures yourself, and snicker all the way to the bank at the money you saved.

Lighting, focus/flash, ISO, macros, background setting, and voila! Perfect card material. Experiment with those nifty free online cardmakers and a picture and go crazy!

I paid $20 to print 20 photo cards at Walmart, and $30 for 20 at Walgreens, so rather inexpensive, and you can use your own photos. Just remember if it looks too good, ask for a copyright release document to sign--it covers your end.

Have fun Mama!

I am a picture/video addict and I thought about it for cards this year, but then I quickly put it in the back of my head.

For one, they are christmas cards, after ppl look at them, they will just stay and gather dust.

Secondly, the picture they would have to cut it out in order to save the memory.

If I want them to see a picture portrait, it is better just to send the real photo or send digital christmas cards

Just my thoughts.

Most of our Christmas cards have been with photos we've taken ourselves. Candid shots of kids are the best kind, I think. My favorite card ever was the one where we used a snapshot of our oldest daughter, then 15 months, crouched in front of the tree, gently touching an ornament. The look of amazement on her face was just priceless. I captioned it, "Tiny little tots with their eyes all aglow..." My parents STILL have that card hanging on their bulletin board, and my daughter is now 10.

Anyway, if you absolutely must get professional portraits, why not go to Picture People or someplace like that? They take pictures all day every day of little kids, so they're pretty good at it, and the prices aren't totally outrageous. We had professional photos at the ballet studio this year (for the Nutcracker, so they were Christmas-themed anyway) - I just bought the digital copy of the photo, went to tinyprints.com, and made my own cards. They came out cute.

But I say, why not just do candid shots? Saves money, and is just as cute!

Do the photos yourself. You can dress your daughter anyway you/she wants, take as many photos as you want, various outfit changes, etc. It is also less stress on you, & your daughter. You can pin up a sheet or favorite blanket for a background, or place on a piece of furniture.
The best thing is by taking it yourself, you can print or e-mail as many copies as you want/need. If they are done by a pro or studio, you need to purchase extra copies from them, as it is illegal to copy professional portraits.
I did this myself with my daughters, & they look as good as the pro portraits we spent over $300 on for one daughter.

I take the pictures and have the cards created and printed at Sams club. There is absolutily not point in spending money, when you can do it free at home.

But if you are trying to save .. I would hand deliver to the people that you see .. save money on the stamps.

i'm trying to see your hubbs point of view.

Sometimes it is important for dads to have a nice 8x10 short of their kid for the office or something, so while i know you are talking about cards, does he have any other professional picts of your dd?? He might not be articulating it right but he might just want a nice shot of her that wasn't done in the backyard.

I do agree some people can take lovely lovely candid shots that look professionally done, annnnnnnnd some people can take ok shots that THEY think look professionally done. and there are alot of "professionals and or amatures" that have nice cameras that think they can take great shots that maybe aren't really that great.

if we are striclty taking phhto greeting cards. then yes i usually like the shots i have taken, but mayb you could have laid out all the cards you recieved and asked him to point out his favs or called attention to the fact that there were no JC PENNEY"S portraits in the whole stack.

if he wants her taken into penny's or sears or where ever for picrts with the fake snow background then make that be his christmas gift from you.

for what it's worth, the day they take the photos they can give you the cards and you can start addressing the envelops so that in one week or less you can pick them up slide them in and drop them in the mail.

another option is to limit the list of people you send those cards too. maybe just hubs professional contacts, which might be another reason he wants proffessionalp icts. and hten you can send cute ones out to your fam.

lots of ways to look at this. and making your loved one unhappy on christmas seems silly to me.