An opinion on senior portraits, creative expectations, and why young men deserve something better.
TL;DR
Senior portrait photography has become remarkably creative for girls, but too often, boys are still photographed using a familiar, predictable formula. As a male photographer, I think we're missing an enormous opportunity. Young men deserve portraits that acknowledge their individuality, confidence, and growing independence. The photographer's perspective matters, but so does just getting out of the way.
We need to talk about senior portraits for boys.
There's a particular kind of senior portrait that I see far too often. A teenage boy is displaced, removed from his familiar environment and recontextualized in a place that feels more tame, often pretty, while he smiles politely(Read: awkwardly) at the camera. Maybe he's leaning against a wall. Maybe he kneels in the street, or sits on a step. Maybe his hands are awkwardly tucked into his pockets, too deep to be natural or cool. Perhaps he's wearing an outfit that looks suspiciously like something his mother picked out. It's a perfectly pleasant photograph.
That's precisely the problem. There's nothing particularly wrong with any of these choices individually. But when they become the default formula for photographing an entire generation of young men, I think we need to ask ourselves what we're actually accomplishing.
Are we creating portraits that reflect who these young men are? Or are we simply creating photographs that satisfy an adult's (Read: a middle age women's) idea of what a nice teenage boy should look like? Those are two very different things, and I think the senior portrait industry has spent far too much time confusing them.
Look at the standard for girls.
Spend some time exploring contemporary senior portrait photography. Look at how young women are being photographed. There's fashion. There's attitude. There's experimentation with styling, location, expression, and movement. We encourage senior girls to be creative, to bring their personalities into their sessions. We celebrate their individuality. We give them permission to be confident, dramatic, playful, sophisticated, or whatever else feels authentic to them. The results can be incredible.
Now look at the way we photograph boys. Where's that same ambition? Where's the opportunity to experiment with identity, posture, personality, and visual style? Why do we so often settle for a handful of pleasant photographs of a teenage boy looking vaguely uncomfortable in a location someone else selected? I don't think boys are inherently less interested in how they're represented.
I think we've become far too comfortable expecting less from their portraits.
Frankly, I think that's a failure of creative direction, and pulling the boys into the process early on, so they feel heard and seen before they arrive on set.
I'm a man. And yes, I think that matters.
Let's address something that differentiates me from much of the senior portrait market. I'm a male photographer. All of my other industry experience aside, I believe that gives me a meaningful advantage when I'm working with teenage boys. Not because men are inherently better photographers. And certainly not because women are incapable of making extraordinary portraits of young men. However, I remember what it felt like to be a seventeen year old boy, on the brink of adulthood, looking forward to buying my first lottery ticket, buying my first pack of cigarettes (even if only because I could), staying out all night, because what curfew? I remember wanting to be taken seriously. I remember having my own ideas about how I wanted to look, how I wanted to present myself, and how I wanted other people to perceive me. I remember that strange period of life when you're still very much someone's child, but you're increasingly aware that you're becoming your own person. And I remember that the version of myself I wanted the world to see wasn't necessarily the same version my parents saw.
That's a perspective I bring into every session. I don't approach a seventeen-year-old boy as someone who needs to be arranged into a pleasant photograph. I approach him as a young man developing an identity of his own. And I think that difference is visible in the work.
Your son doesn't need another photograph that makes him look like a good little boy.
This might be the most provocative thing I'll say here. I think a lot of senior portraits of boys are created primarily for their mothers. Obviously, I understand why. Parents are often the people organizing the session, coordinating the outfits, making the arrangements, and ultimately purchasing the photographs. They've spent eighteen years watching their children grow up. Of course they want beautiful portraits. Of course they want to remember this moment.
But I think there's a risk when we allow the parent's (Read: mother's) expectations to become the entire creative direction. We start photographing the boy as someone to be remembered rather than a young man who is actively becoming. Those aren't necessarily the same image. A mother might want to see the sweet boy she's loved for eighteen years. She might feel more comfortable in that moment having someone present that back to her in a nice, neat little package.
However, her son might want (Read: need) to see someone confident, independent, interesting, and capable of stepping into the world on his own.
I think there's room for both perspectives. In fact, I typically run all my senior shoots with both in mind. There should always be photos for the senior and the parents.
Confidence isn't something I can manufacture.
I'm not interested in taking a teenage boy, putting him into a series of artificially masculine poses, and pretending we've created confidence. That would simply be replacing one formula with another. I don't want every boy to look like a fashion model. I don't want every boy to look like an athlete. I certainly don't want to impose my own interpretation of masculinity onto someone who is still figuring out what that means for himself.
What I want is collaboration. I want him to have some ownership over the process. I want him to recognize that we're creating photographs together, rather than simply fulfilling a list of expectations. Sometimes that means giving him direction. Sometimes it means experimenting with a pose or encouraging him to try something unfamiliar. And sometimes it means getting out of the way long enough for him to contribute something of his own.
I can recognize when a pose feels forced. I can adjust the lighting, composition, and direction. I can create an environment where he has room to experiment. But I can't decide who he is.
The strongest portraits happen when my experience as a photographer meets his developing sense of himself.
That's the collaboration I'm looking for.
You can see the difference.
I recently photographed a senior whose family came into the session with an extensive list of ideas. We'd discussed outfits, props, locations, and different possibilities for the photographs. As the session unfolded, the original plan became much simpler. Eventually, the senior and I were working one-on-one. Something interesting happened. Without his mother's presence, he began contributing more directly to the photographs we were creating. His posture became more assured. He began making choices about how he wanted to present himself. He wasn't simply standing where I told him to stand. He was collaborating.
Some of the strongest photographs from that session came out of those moments. There's one image in particular that I keep coming back to. He's standing on his own, looking into the distance. There's a quiet confidence in the way he carries himself. Nothing about the photograph is particularly complicated. It's what it doesn't have that makes it so strong. It doesn't have the awkward presence of someone telling him how to look like a good little boy.
Afterward, when his family came in to view the finished photographs, many of the images they gravitated toward came from that more collaborative portion of the session. That's the difference I'm talking about. Not a different camera. Not a more expensive location. Just a different relationship between photographer and subject
Boys deserve to feel as good in front of the camera as girls do.
One of the things I love about photographing senior girls is how much creative energy often surrounds the experience. There's excitement about the photographs. There's a willingness to experiment. There's anticipation about seeing the finished images. I want boys to experience that same sense of possibility.
I want a teenage boy to look at a photograph of himself and feel genuinely excited about how he's represented. Not because someone told him he looked handsome. Not because his mother loves the photograph. But because he recognizes something of himself in it. Maybe it's confidence. Maybe it's individuality. Maybe it's an emerging sense of who he wants to become.
Whatever it is, I want him to have that visual reminder that he can carry with him throughout his life. As important as that has become for girls, I think it's just as important for boys. Maybe more so...
Explore my approach to Senior Portraits for Guys, or see more of my work at South Atlanta Photography.
studio@southatlantaphotography.com
770-727-5607
