Which Family Photos Should You Actually Print?

One of the hardest parts of getting family photos back is deciding what to do with all of them. You might have a favorite right away, then another one makes you laugh, then you find the one where everyone is looking at the camera, and pretty soon you’ve marked half the gallery as a favorite. I get it. I spend a lot of time with these images too, and I know how hard it can be to narrow them down. The Goodell family’s session is a perfect example. We created the classic family portraits that you’d immediately think about putting on the wall, but there were also so many smaller moments mixed in. Those images may not all end up framed above the fireplace, but together they tell a much fuller story of their family right now. That’s why I love helping families think about their photos based on how they want to enjoy them instead of feeling like they have to choose one single “best” image.

When you’re thinking about wall art, start with the image that feels the most like your family. It doesn’t necessarily have to be the photo where everyone is looking straight at me with a perfect smile. Sometimes it is, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with loving that traditional family portrait. Other times, it’s the image where everyone is interacting and you can see a little more personality. It also helps to think about where that photograph will go. A large family portrait over a sofa is going to have a different feel than a smaller framed piece in a hallway or bedroom. Knowing where you want to enjoy your photos helps us choose the right image and the right size instead of ordering something and trying to find a spot for it later.

Then there are all those photographs you love that don’t necessarily need their own place on the wall. A look between siblings, one of the kids being completely themselves, a close-up, or a moment between parents might not be the photograph you choose for a large piece of artwork, but you probably don’t want to leave it behind either. This is where I really love albums. An album gives those images somewhere to live together, so you don’t have to pick one photograph that somehow represents your entire family. You get the beautiful portraits alongside the funny expressions and all those little interactions that happened in between. If you have kids, I think those in-between photographs get even better with time. Their expressions change, their personalities grow, and the things they do every day right now eventually become the things you’re so glad you can see again.

I also know ordering prints can get overwhelming pretty quickly. What size actually works over the couch? Is an 8x10 going to look tiny on that wall? Which photos look good together? Would you enjoy an album more, or would you rather have something framed where you can see it every day? It’s easy to get stuck on those decisions and decide you’ll come back to it later. That’s part of why I’ve made printed artwork a part of my family photography experience. I want to help you figure out what makes sense for your family and your home instead of handing over a gallery and leaving you to sort through all of those decisions yourself. We can talk about what you love, where you’d like to see your photographs, and what you actually want to walk away with before everything gets forgotten on the to-do list.

When I look through the Goodell family’s session, I don’t think there’s one photograph that tells the whole story. There are images that would be beautiful on the wall, while others make more sense alongside the rest of the session in an album, and I think that’s true for most families I photograph. You don’t have to find the one technically perfect photo. Think about the photograph you’d love to walk past every day, the expressions you never want to forget, and the moments you’d want to sit down and look through again years from now. Those are usually the ones worth printing.

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Which Family Photos Should You Actually Print?

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