Faux Photo Booth Fun!

Unless Santa can work a miracle, there’s no way our Christmas cards will be out in time. Because of this, I thought I’d share our silly photo shoot here as an interim holiday greeting. 

I knew I wanted to do a photo-booth approach to the family photo this year, but it presented two problems:

1. Where can we find a photo booth these days?
2. If we do find one, how will we sneak the dogs in?

I’m thrilled to say that, thanks to the help of friends on Facebook, I found several photo-booth locations in Utah. If you’re interested, I’m told you can find them here:

Utah Photo Booth Locations

• Boondocks in Draper
• The Thanksgiving Point Movie Theater in Lehi
• Valley Fair Mall (by Penny’s)
• South Towne Mall (in the food court, by the carousel) 
• The Kmart in Bountiful (sadly, they’re no longer in the other UT Kmart locations)

We found the booths, but we just weren’t sure how we were going to sneak the pups in, so we decided to set up a faux photo booth in our home. To do this, we hung a blue sheet from our plant shelf, and we pleated the sheet to give it a more authentic feel. We then set two kitchen stools in front of the curtain to make it feel more booth-y. 

Wanting a more festive booth, I cheesed it up with garland and twinkle lights. I simply clipped them to the sheet with clothespins. 

With the booth backdrop set up, it was then time to test the camera. I grabbed a cute model, set my camera to remote shooting, and tweaked the position of the camera until it captured the booth. 

I don't know why, but this photo had Cory and me laughing to the point of tears. It's just that odd. It reminds me of the "American Gothic" painting with a Santa twist. LOL 

Now, it’s time for props. We wanted our photo strip to spell out a greeting, so we selected props that would work to communicate our note. And, of course, costumes were in order. Some of our props included the following:

Photo Booth Props

• A joy banner
• A globe
• A chalkboard
• A patterned paper #2
• And costumes (Santa hats, doggie scarves and sweaters, and New Years hats) 

With everything set, it was time to let the photo fun begin. Of course, this meant many, many outtakes. Here are just a few of those for your viewing pleasure. :)

Honey, the globe is not a basketball. 

And there goes the basketball...errr, I mean globe. 

Everybody just calm down! 

Which way did Jack go?

Oh, here he is. But where are the other two?

Now which way did Cory go? Can't we all just sit still long enough to take a good picture. (If you have high-strung, energetic dogs, you know what wishful thinking this is.)

Uh oh, is that our booth backdrop falling down around us? Yeah, I think it's time to call it a night. 

Believe it or not, between the many outtakes we actually got a few photos that worked. I put those images into a free digi photo booth template that you can download here (complete with instructions for using it). 

And, drum roll please... Here’s the outcome! 

Can you make sense of our greeting? If not, I’ll give you a hint, it says, “Joy to the world,  & a happy New Year!” 

You might think us crazy, but we had SO much fun with this little evening project. A faux photo booth would be a happy thing to set up in your home this holiday. Hang a sheet, grab a stool, set up your camera, throw in a few props, and watch your family fun begin. I have a feeling you’ll LOVE the outcome, whether or not you add them to a photo booth strip or simply add them to your scrapbook. 

Cheers!