passport style photos - background?

[Shelley]

Not sure, but can anyone suggest a good background colour for taking passport style of photos. I take pics of students (hundreds) and they wear a white collared shirt and sometimes maroon colour of the college uniform. They receive a wallet size card with their pic on it - which by the way most students don't like.

Is white the best background for passport style photos - i would buy the appropriate coloured material to put on a pinup board as the background.

Thanks for any tips or hints. :)

[Lani]

Unless you have the white background lit it will come out a shade of grey anyway, which would be pretty neutral, and suit a range of skin and hair colours, as well as the maroon of the uniform. Hard to pick another colour that will work across the board. Interesting to hear what others think. :)

[dalewilde]

yeah white background is the only accpeted for passports and the photo can only be like your display pic just the face and a little neck.

[Shelley]

Thanks - had a feeling white was the way to go.

[discontinued]

I've worked with school photos the past 4 years (quit last year though - finally) and we have a few backgrounds that work with majority of uniforms. For groups grey is the main option then we also have a cream colour that a few schools would request. The individuals have a blue cloudy kind of backdrop. They get painted and look nicer than plain grey for indivs. Those photos are also used for student IDs (state approved).

If they are for passports then white but if they are just passport style for personal use I'd stick with either grey or paint yourself a blue cloudy bg (or you can buy them from various places). Grey is easiest to colour correct, least that's how I found it but is a bit dull for indivs.

Hope I've helped and that made sense. How many schools do you photograph?

[Shelley]

Hi discontinued

I just do the photos for the school I work at - we have a smartrider done thru Transperth and download photos on the school system as well - which i do. So they are only passport size and style. I am trying to make them look consistent and better quality. When you work at a school, you do all sorts of jobs, even though I am a librarian.

Actually I don't think I could do school photos all the time - it is quite challenging for a number of reasons.