Ideas for Sister Missionary Photos
Deciding to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a huge decision. I actually went on an 18 month mission when I was 21 and served in Zürich, Switzerland. It was a beautiful place and very humbling for me.
I studied German since I was 14 but Swiss German is nothing like high German. I had an easy time at the MTC but once I got to Basel, I had seriously no idea what they were saying and only understood my companion. Good times.
Props
Book of Mormon
Back to 2025. Natalia's dad is Italian and she is going to Milan, Italy! Amazing right? She speaks it at home and her dad was born in Italy. At our session she used her dad's Book of Mormon that he gave to her. It can be fun to add a Book of Mormon to your session. It can be in English if you're going English speaking. Doesn't matter, it just gives some variety to your photos.
Flag
Another prop I like to use is a flag of where you're going. It can be a state or country flag. You can hold it various ways and hold it with the Book of Mormon in your shots. I even had Natalia lay down on the flag and a guard came and said you aren't allowed to have flags on the ground at the temple. (anyone know that was a rule?)
Here are some shots using props:
Sister Missionary Pictures
I think most of the images were with the flag and/or the Book of Mormon, since that's what makes missionary pictures different from just a graduating senior picture.
Portraits
I like to have some headshot type of shots without props for the missionary to put on a plaque also. I took some traditional portraits and some walking and moving around a bit just with the missionary alone.
flat lighting
One thing I had no control over was the weather. It had snowed a few days earlier and then warmed up, but it was cloudy the whole time so I couldn't get any backlit or golden light in the sky. Really it worked out ok, and we had a variety of pictures.
Another thing is to be courteous to the people going in and out of the temple. At night the grounds are really busy so we tried to not draw too much attention and I photoshopped people out of the images (kind of a pain).
family members
One thing you could do is have your parents there. When I took my daughter's missionary photos 5 years ago we had some with her dad and some with me which I'm really glad we did. I didn't know how much I would miss her!
At Christmas I was dividing up the candy and made 4 piles: one for each of my kids. My husband said, "We have 3 at home, not 4." It made me sad not to have her there for holidays, but a mission was where she needed to be.
A mission is such a life changing event and you never know what to expect until you're there, out talking to people about Jesus Christ. Some people make lifetime friends, have wonderful miracles, and love it, but everyone will say it's hard work and life changing.
Did you know the church has old photos of missionaries? Click Here
Make sure you have photos to record all these memories!
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