Cap and Gown Pictures - The Slowestuff Blog

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Cap and Gown Pictures You Can Take on Your Smart Phone

Rolling into graduation season, we love to see graduates milling about in their hard-earned academic regalia. Here are some great cap and gown pictures you can take with your smartphone on their special day before they walk the stage at the commencement ceremony to get their coveted degree or diploma.

This post is all about cap and gown pictures and poses that you can take on your smartphone that your graduate will love.

A high school graduate will typically have senior photos taken in regular clothes by a professional photographer sometime during their senior year. Typically, they won’t have their gown sets or additional items for their senior pictures. On graduation day, the graduate will have their gown & tassel so it is usually just family snapping pictures of the grads on their big day, an hour or two before the ceremony.

For the Amateur

This is not a post to give you tips or tricks on high quality camera settings or how to set up those features for the best shot based on your conditions. We are definitely not photographers!

These picture ideas are for the folks who are getting to graduation on a wing and a prayer, throwing on their cap and gown, trying to keep it together, and still snap a few pictures on their iphone or android that they will love for years to come.

Cap & Gown Pictures – Planning

Classes are complete, graduation packages are ordered, class yearbook is in hand, and the graduate is sporting a custom class ring or custom school apparel proudly proclaiming their graduating class. School colors are plastered everywhere with excitement and nerves high – or even frayed. This is such an exciting time, but it can also be overwhelming for your newly minted graduate.

Our goal is to give you some ideas for shots to keep in mind before you head out to take pictures, so it will be a piece of cake once you get there. Planning ahead is definitely the better way to go. We have learned that your graduate may be nervous or stressed out, so you may have to give lots of coaching during the pictures since they likely haven’t thought of what to do in the photos.

They will be looking to you to give instructions. After it is all said and done, they will be thankful you did, and you will be thankful you did a little planning!

PICTURE IDEAS

The pictures featured here were taken on an iPhone with little to no editing. They are all taken outside, which is the best lighting you can find!

We want to give you some great cap and gown picture ideas for poses and angles to get decent pictures without spending a lot of cash. You could easily edit your pictures with a photo editing app to make them look even better!

Holding The Cap and Gown

Try a few with your graduate holding the cap and long tassel, with the gown over the shoulder. It still says “graduate” while being able to feature him or her in their graduation outfit! If you have that cap locked down with bobby pins, you could have the graduate hold their diploma cover instead.

If you are in the market for a white graduation dress, regardless if you are working towards your high school diploma, bachelor’s degrees or master’s degrees, check out this post of 65 white dresses. We have put it in a format that makes it easy to shop and compare styles so you can find your personal preference and the perfect dress for your big moment.

You can also change up the angles a little bit for interest in the picture and to give it a bit of movement. You can tell it was a fantastic graduation day. The sun is a paid actor!

We took pictures of her walking up the steps as well, and caught this art house vibe.

Cap And Gown – The Gritty

Let’s talk about the gritty. No, not the dance, but the vibe of the cap and gown pictures you can take on your smart phone on the day of graduation.

We are calling these cap and gown picture ideas ones that embrace the gritty— pictures taken in and around the school that are not necessarily in super scenic or pretty park like settings. They capture character and some realism in the shots.

We like these pictures taken outside the school with the school sign included and all the “gritty” that goes with it. The condition of the school plus the chalk that some of the students wrote on the sidewalk, with the cap and gown and a gorgeous day, just adds so much character and interest to this picture.

It will also let your graduate look back and remember what it was like to go to school at that particular institution. Good or bad memories, perhaps, but memories nonetheless! (Remember graduates, you don’t want to peak in high school!)

Check Your Angles!

Sometimes, it is all about angles. Look at where the sun is as well as what is in the background of your shots. There are a lot of factors that can go into capturing amazing cap and gown pictures.

Here is a good example of why it is a good idea to take pictures from a variety of perspectives. Sometimes one picture can look decent, like the first picture, but from a slightly different angle, it looks better.

You have to have the classic graduation cap toss!

(We took approximately 1 million of these pictures to capture just the right one. Don’t hesitate to be super extra in the number of pictures you take. You can always go back, review the ones you like, and delete the rest. You may be pressed for time [or patience] so just take a bunch of pictures and figure it out later!)

Here is another example of different angles producing slightly different pictures. Which one do you like better?

We love how the lower angle shows the clouds in the windows! We didn’t even realize that effect until we got home and went through the pictures.

Cap and Gown – How Not To Look Like A Box

Graduation gowns – safe to say they are not the height of fashionable attire. Slightly boxy, with soooo much fabric!! Depending on the sizing chart (or whether the school used one at all) the gown lengths can vary as well. No worries, though. Even with a lot of material happening, these are an admittedly distinctive gown.

One way to combat your graduate getting lost in all that fabric is to get them to move! Here are a few ideas on things to do for great shots in the cap and gown.

The graduates will like these tips too, because they will have something to do with their hands. Isn’t that the most awkward feeling—not knowing what to do with your hands in a photo?

Walk

Have them walk towards you while holding their cap with the gown front zipper open. Those caps don’t stay on at all, and these photos will look very natural and chic with the interest of movement.

Gown Zipped Up

To take pictures of the gown zipped up, have them put their hands on their hips to give them at least a little shape! If your graduate has graduation accessories like honor cords or graduation stoles, this will also help to break up the big boxy shape.

Another option is to turn to the side and lift one leg to give a little interest beyond that huge volume of gown (plus show off any cool tattoos!)

Gown Unzipped

If you want some pictures of your graduate with the gown on but unzipped, this does give a little more options to see the person and not just the enormous gown, while still being very obviously a graduation picture.

Take A Stroll – Find Different Interest Points

Wander around your school to different points of interest to capture some cool shots. We love that this school put a message on its football scoreboard congratulating the class. Perfect picture opportunity!

You can also snap pictures of your graduate not looking at the camera. We actually prefer these ones of her looking up at the scoreboard while holding her graduation cap in place! Be sure to consider different perspectives on a similar picture, as it can completely change the result.

Another perspective to try is to flip your phone upside down, and lower it to the ground to take some pictures. That is how we captured this super cool angle with the graduate standing in front of the school tunnel.

Have A Seat

If your graduate is willing to sit down, it can create some fantastic options for cap and gown pictures. You can even take a little cushion with you for them to sit on if they don’t want to get their outfit dirty, and just hide it in the gown fabric.

Try some with your graduate holding their cap in front of them.

Close up seated

Looking to the future!

Time For Your Close Up – Cap and Tassel

We also love to get close-up shots of the tassel, and our favorites are the ones with a blurred background and a focus on the graduation year. We just used portrait mode on our phone for that, but you can also add in blur later via photo editing apps.

We hope this post inspired you to grab your smart phone and take some amazing shots of your graduate before (or after) they walk across that stage!

If you want to look for some spring dress ideas and inspiration, check out our post here!

Congratulations to all the graduates, and good luck!

Slowestuff