Quick answer: the best friend photos are ordinary, repeated ones. Recreate an old photo, take one strip every time you meet, or share a strip across cities. Below are 20 ideas, from one afternoon to a ten-year habit.
Look through your photos from the last five years and count how many contain your closest friends. For most people the number is surprisingly low. Leave out group shots from weddings and birthdays, and it drops again.
This is a real gap and it has a simple cause. Romantic relationships get documented because there are occasions built into them. Family gets documented because families take photographs at Christmas. Friendship has no equivalent structure. There is no anniversary, no annual portrait, no moment where somebody says "we should get a photo".
So it goes unrecorded until someone moves away. Then you realise you have almost no proof of the years that mattered most. Here are 20 ideas for fixing that, from a single afternoon to something you keep doing for a decade.
Six ideas for the next time you are together
The unflattering one, deliberately
Four frames of the worst faces you can produce. Nobody looks good, everybody keeps it, and it is reliably the strip that gets sent back and forth for years.
Recreate a photo from years ago
Find one from school, university, or the first year you knew each other, and restage it exactly. Same positions, same hands, same terrible posture. Printed alongside the original it is the single best thing on this list.
The stack
Faces layered diagonally from front to back rather than in a row. Works for three or more, and it fills a frame far better than a line of people does.
One person, three reactions
One friend tells a story off-camera. The strip captures the other three reacting to it. Nobody poses because nobody is thinking about the camera.
Everybody's signature pose
Every group has one person who always does the same thing in photos. Four frames, each person doing somebody else's. Merciless and affectionate in equal measure.
The pile
Everyone as close to the lens as physically possible. Cheeks squashed, half a face cut off at the edge. Chaotic and warm, and it works for any number of people.
Seven ideas for friends who live far apart
Long-distance friendship is harder to maintain than long-distance romance, because nobody schedules it. Couples have standing calls; friends have a group chat that goes quiet for six weeks.
The synchronised strip
Same time, different cities, one duo booth. The strip contains both of you and neither of you is in the same country. It is a strange, good object.
Same prompt, separate strips
Agree a theme, shoot separately whenever you each get a chance, then put the two strips side by side. Works across any number of time zones because nobody has to be awake at the same moment.
The handover
One person takes a strip and sends it. The next person recreates the last frame as their own first frame. Passed around a group, it becomes a chain that eventually loops back.
Your window, my window
Both of you take a strip showing what is outside. Cities, weather, seasons on opposite sides of the world. Quietly one of the most moving things you can make.
The reunion countdown
One strip a month until you next see each other. Frame one holds up the number of weeks remaining.
Wearing something of theirs
A jumper, a jacket, something you borrowed years ago and never returned. Both take a strip in it, separately.
The same coffee
Both order the same drink, both take a strip with it, at whatever local time makes sense. It's deliberately ordinary, which is exactly why it works. staying close with long-distance friends has more in this direction.
Seven ideas that build a record over time
The annual strip
Once a year, same pose, same order, everyone who is there. Miss a year and you have a gap that tells its own story. This is the highest-value idea here by a wide margin.
The attendance record
Every time the group meets, take one strip, whoever turns up. Over the years it becomes an honest record of who was around. That includes the people who drifted away.
Same place, every time
Pick one fixed spot, like a favourite pub, a kitchen or a doorway. The people change, the background does not. A portrait of a place told through everyone who passed through it.
The milestone strip
Every time someone in the group hits a milestone, take a strip with whoever is nearby. A new job, a move, a degree or a survived breakup all count.
The airport strip
Taken at every departure and every arrival. Over several years of a long-distance friendship this becomes a surprisingly complete history.
One strip per trip
Every holiday, weekend away or day trip gets exactly one strip. The constraint of one forces it to be taken at the right moment rather than the first.
The last day
Whenever something ends, like a shared flat, a job or a city, take a strip on the final day. Nobody thinks to do this at the time and everybody wishes they had.
How to actually get everyone to do it
The ideas are the easy part. The hard part is getting four busy adults in one place at once. The usual "we should do something soon" almost never works.
- Name a date, not a period. "The 14th" produces a decision. "Sometime in spring" produces nothing.
- Make it small. A ninety-minute coffee gets agreed to. A weekend away gets postponed indefinitely.
- Make it repeating. "First Sunday of the month" removes the negotiation permanently. A recurring event needs deciding once.
- Take the photo early. Not at the end when people are leaving and someone has already gone. In the first twenty minutes, while everyone is present and no one is tired.
- Be the person who insists. Somebody has to be slightly annoying about it. Everyone is glad afterwards, and nobody volunteers.
Getting a group into one frame
Booth crops are tight and webcams are wide-angle, which is a difficult combination for more than two people. A few practical adjustments help.
- Stagger heights. Some sitting, some standing, some crouched. A row of heads at identical height wastes most of the frame.
- Get closer to each other, not to the camera. The instinct is for everyone to lean in towards the lens, which distorts whoever is nearest. Compress sideways instead.
- Push the camera back. Further than feels right. A laptop at normal desk distance fits two people comfortably and four badly.
- Watch the edges. Wide-angle webcams stretch anything near the frame edge. Put the people who care least about their photos there.
- Diagonal beats horizontal. A diagonal arrangement front-to-back fits more people into the same rectangle and looks considerably better.
For pose specifics once everyone is in position, the 25 pose ideas covers group arrangements in more detail.
When the whole group lives in different cities
Duo Booth fits two people per strip, so it suits best friends in pairs. For a bigger group, try LensBooth World. Up to six friends explore a 3D city as avatars and pose side by side in one strip. No camera is needed.
For two of you, open our online photobooth for long-distance friends and send the link. One countdown runs on both screens, and you each get the strip.
Why friendship photos matter more than they seem to
One thing catches people off guard in their thirties. The friendships that shaped them most are the ones they have the least proof of.
The flatmates from your early twenties. The group from a first job. The people you saw four times a week for three years and now message twice a year. Those friendships were huge, yet they often left almost nothing behind. You get a few badly lit photos from nights out, and nothing from the ordinary days.
It happens because ordinary days do not feel like they need documenting. You will see these people again next week, so what is there to record? And that is true, right up until you do not.
One strip, once a month, with whoever is around. Ninety seconds. In ten years, it'll be one of the few things showing what this time was really like. There's more on that in how to start a photo strip tradition.
Start with the next time you see them
Do not wait for an occasion. Occasions give you the photos you already have, with everyone dressed up, posed and slightly performing.
The strips worth keeping are from the unremarkable days. Somebody's kitchen. A coffee that overran. A Tuesday for no reason. Those are the ones that, years later, actually look like the friendship.
The online photo booth with no app works on a laptop or phone, or as a shared link across cities. Four frames, thirty seconds, and it is done.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are good photo ideas with best friends?
Recreating an old photo of the same people works best. Restage it exactly and print the two side by side. Silly faces, a diagonal stack instead of a row, and one person reacting to another's story also beat posed group shots.
How do you take photos with friends who live far away?
Either use a duo booth to appear on one strip from different cities, or agree a prompt and shoot separately. Then place the strips side by side. The second way works across any time zone, since nobody has to be awake at once.
How do you fit a group of friends into one photo booth frame?
Stagger heights so people sit, stand and crouch instead of standing in a row. Squeeze in sideways, move the camera further back than feels natural, and line up diagonally to fit more people.
When is the best time to take a group photo?
In the first twenty minutes, not at the end. By the time people are leaving, someone has usually already gone and everyone is tired. Early photos have everyone present and nobody performing for the camera out of obligation.
Why do I have so few photos with my friends?
Because friendship has no built-in occasions. Couples have anniversaries and families have Christmas, but friends have no such prompt. So the ordinary days go unrecorded, which is why a small repeating ritual is worth it.
How can best friends take pictures together online?
Best friends can use a browser-based photobooth like LensBooth. One friend starts a session and shares the link. Both cameras show in the same window. One synced countdown takes the shots together, putting you both on one four-frame strip.
Sources and further reading
- Portrait photography - Established conventions for photographing people, which booth framing borrows from.
- Rule of thirds - The composition guideline behind most advice about where to put a face in the frame.