Free posing prompts and pose idea cards for photographers, photo ideas for family, couples, and wedding photography

ANNOUNCEMENT!

Updated February 2024

Hi promptographers! Jemma here, creator of this DIY card post. I have started a new prompts blog at promptographer.com, in response to the on-going popularity of these cards. I would love to invite you to join the Promptographers over at the blog. I will see you over there!

– Jemma 🙂

Free posing prompt and portrait idea cards for photographers

Are you ready to DIY up a fun set of posing prompt cards for yourself? I love posing games; they’re a great way to relax everyone at a shoot and make sure everyone’s having fun. I’ve included a huge big bunch of prompts I’ve gathered over the years here, as well as general posing guidelines and ideas for fun portraits. You are welcome to use these for your own photography completely free, including the free posing prompt app (see the link below). Let’s get started!

First, choose your flavour:

I’ve had so much interest in these cards! Thanks to everyone who is sharing the love. Choose how you wan’ ’em here!

  • I want each posing prompt as a separate image file.
  • I want the posing prompts as a PDF.
  • I want the posing prompts as real life cards and I’m keen to get crafty: READ ON BELOW!

DIY time!

What you’ll need:

  • A printer.
  • A laminator.
  • Eighty-five 67 x 99mm laminating pouches – usually they come in a box of 100.
  • Seventeen A4 mailing labels (the kind with one-per-page, i.e. a whole page that’s one big sticky-backed sheet) – usually sold in a box of 100 too but some newsagents might let you buy them one at a time.
  • At least eleven A4 coloured cards (or thick paper) for backing – one sheet per eight cards (there are 85 cards altogether but see note about colour coding below).
  • Scissors.
  • Hole punch.
  • A ring of some kind to bunch your cards together.
  • Backing template PDF
  • Pose prompt cards PDF

How to colour-code the cards:

I colour-coded my cards: red for general portrait ideas, orange for family pose ideas, yellow for kids and baby photo ideas, green for couple pose prompts and blue for wedding photo ideas (I have a thing for rainbows). Have a look at the prompt cards PDF and you’ll see how I’ve categorised each prompt idea.

Now, obviously you can use “couple” ideas for weddings, and some cards are kind of general, or I’ve marked them as both families and weddings… so I am going to leave it up to you how you want to do your colour-coding. Just keep in mind when choosing your coloured card sheets that you can get up to eight cards from each sheet.

There are 85 prompt cards so at a minimum you could use 11 sheets of backing card but there is not a perfect division of my categories into lots of 8. So, like, for example if there were 10 “kids” cards, you’d need two whole sheets of yellow backing card to cover that. I feel like I’m making this confusing. Just cut out your stickers, put them in logical piles, and count up how many bits of coloured card you need. You’ll be fine.

Could I use A4 laminating pouches instead?

Now, I am really going to strongly suggest that the 67mm x 99mm laminating pouches are essential to this being an easy-breezy DIY and not an endless slog of paper-crafting irritation and ARGH why are they all falling together in the laminator and OH GOD now I have to go print them all again and WHY DID I EVEN START THIS PROJECT and NOW MY BABY’S AWAKE FROM ALL THE SWEARING AT THE LAMINATOR. Please trust me. I love laminating stuff and I implore you to believe me that the tiny pouches are so much easier than trying to lay these cards out in an A4 laminating sheet and cutting them out one by one.

What to do:

Step 1. Download the backing template and the free prompt cards PDFs.

Step 2. Print the prompt cards on your A4 mailing labels. Cut each sticker out around the outside and along the grey lines. Make sure you keep the front and the back of the card together so that you don’t get your example photos mixed up (it’s meant to have the prompt on one side of the finished card, the example on the other). Now’s a good time to count up how many coloured sheets you need for your chosen category system (see above).

Step 3. Print the backing template onto your coloured card/paper. Ignore the printer’s warning that content might get cut off. The lines are just guides for cutting along anyway. Print and cut out all your backing cards.

Step 4. Peel and stick each set of two stickers onto the front and back of each coloured card.

Step 5. Slip each completed card into a laminating pouch and laminate.

Step 6. Punch a hole in the top left corner of each card and thread onto your ring. All done!

Get out there and photograph!

I hope you enjoy this DIY! I’d love to see your cards and hear how you use the prompts.