More than one person in a portrait

A portrait of a couple, a family, or a mother with a child is not "the same thing with more faces". Every additional person adds several problems at once: they have to be drawn as a likeness and placed next to the others so that everyone looks photographed in the same moment.

There are two routes to such a portrait, and both work: one photograph of everyone together, or several separate photographs from which the family is assembled again. The question isn't which is better, it's what you prepare in advance.

If you have a shared photo

In a single photograph the people are already tied to each other: the same light falls on them, they stand at the same distance from the camera, the shadows go the same way, the scale is honest. None of that has to be reconciled, and the work can go straight to likeness and character.

It is the shortest route, and if you have such a photo, start there.

If the photos are separate

A portrait from separate photographs is ordinary work, not a fallback. People live in different countries, the picture gathers several generations, someone is no longer alive, and everyone together is exactly what you want on the wall. Family pictures like this are made regularly.

What happens then: light, angle and scale differ for each person, and they are brought into agreement by hand. That is a distinct part of the work, and it affects composition and timing, so say early that the photos will differ.

How to help when the photos are separate:

• choose photos with similar light: all outdoors on an overcast day, or all indoors, rather than a mixture;
• watch the angle: if everyone looks slightly left and one person looks right, the group falls apart;
• give several frames per person, not one;
• say who is central. In a group someone always is, and it's better if you decide.

What makes the work harder

Photos of different ages. A picture from ten years ago beside yesterday's brings different quality, different clothes and a different age. It is solvable, but better when the difference is mentioned up front rather than discovered along the way.

Children. They don't hold a pose for more than a second. A group shot with a child is almost always accidental, and that's exactly right: a living expression matters more than a tidy pose. Shoot in bursts.

Animals. A dog or a cat in the frame lives by its own rules: photograph them at their eye level rather than from above, and don't expect them to look at the camera at the same moment as the people.

Too many people. The more faces there are, the smaller each one is in the finished work. Five people on a sheet-sized portrait means five small faces, not five portraits. Either the format grows or the group shrinks.

Format and composition

One person sits well in a vertical format; two or more usually want a horizontal or square one. A group portrait needs more width and more air around it, or people end up pressed against the edges.

So the size and proportion for a group are better discussed before the work starts than after: re-cropping a finished piece means cutting through people.

A short checklist

1. Have a shared photo? Start there. Don't have one? Separate photos work too, just say so at the start.
2. Similar light and similar angle for everyone.
3. Several frames per person.
4. Say who belongs at the centre.
5. More people means a larger format.