Must Have Camera Accessories for Your Thanksgiving Photo-Taking

Thanksgiving Day is a wonderful time to take photos of family members and friends. Every family has at least one official photographer among the group. If you happen to be the family photographer, we have some must-have accessories and tips to help make your pictures memorable!

Use a Tripod for Group Shots

Move away from the usual boring group shots of your family all gathered together on the sofa or in front of the mantle. Instead, try to make your shots unique. The Thanksgiving meal takes center stage, so try to capture it as well. Before shooting take into consideration height and width of your frame and position the family to fill the frame. Use the tripod from Beachcamera.com and auto-timer so you can also be included in the shot.

Large Memory Cards for Several Candid Photos

Candid photos are where the fun is. You want to capture your children’s experience of celebrating the holiday. Don’t think about position and decorations, just take the photo. Keep the zoom lens on, with a wide aperture and fast ISO, to reproduce emotions of children. Candid photos capture your family when they are not expecting it. So, make sure you have a large enough memory card in your camera to tell the story of this special day. 

Keep Your Camera Safe

Take mouth-watering shots of food. Let the food speak for itself and tell its story. Set your camera’s ISO between 800 and 1600 to boost its sensitivity to light. Next, adjust your white balance to the type of lighting found within your home. If you have incandescent or tungsten lamps, use the tungsten setting. If your lights are fluorescent, the fluorescent white balance setting will work better. A backlight brings out all depth, character, texture and dimension that make the food look more mouth-watering. Use fresh ingredients as props. Make sure you take some photos of the food as it is cooking. Just make sure you have a microfiber cleaning cloth from Beachcamera.com handy to clean the steam from your lens! The kitchen during Thanksgiving will be a very busy place. Pay special attention to how lighting is distributed throughout the kitchen and where the best angles are for snapping candid photos.

From the moment the first person comes in the door, remove your camera from your bag and start snapping away. Capture the emotion of your family gathering by getting candid shots, zoomed-in close ups and all of the details this special occasion