Spooktacular Photography: Capturing the Magic of Halloween | by Abi Coop and Samantha Deakin

Oct 24

Halloween can be such a fun time for a photographer - costumes, props, colours and lights galore. You could choose to embrace the spooky side with creepy outfits, moody lighting and a chilling atmosphere, or maybe you prefer to keep things lighter with colourful autumn nature, delicious treats and silly family games. Either way, the creative possibilities are endless and we’re here to help you make the most of this “fa-boo-lous” celebration.

1. Atmospheric Light  

Lighting is important in all photography, but it becomes especially powerful when you want to evoke a specific mood. Shadows and contrast can be used with intention to create a dramatic, eerie feel, whilst coloured lights could be used to add a supernatural, mysterious ambience. Take advantage of nature’s elements—early morning fog for a haunting effect, the soft glow of golden hour for warmth, and the earlier nightfall to enhance the mood with deepening darkness. Together, these factors can transform your photos into captivating scenes of Halloween magic. 

2. Seasonal Colour Palette 

Halloween is very much an orange and black occasion. This time of year the trees are turning orange and pumpkins are a key component of the festivities. Black is a colour often linked with darkness, death and eerie creatures like spiders! Retailers jump onto this and use the colour schemes to influence our purchasing choices. As artists we also use colour to evoke emotions and paint a picture for our viewers, so in any genre, colour combinations like orange and black are likely to provoke thoughts of Halloween.

3. Crafting the Frame  

Draw the viewer into the scene and tell a captivating story with strong use of compositional elements. Add depth with layering, guide the eye with leading lines and create suspense with negative space. Use doorways, windows, branches etc… to frame your subject. Consider intentionally breaking the rules for heightening tension and creating a sense of unease.

4. The Devil’s in the Details

Halloween is filled with intricate details that can make for great storytelling or close-up images. Immortalise all those precious little details of your children that you know you’ll want to look back on in years to come. The delightful array of colours they choose to decorate their pumpkins, the expression on their face as they try to lift the biggest pumpkin at the patch or the lacy details of the wings they’ve been waiting all year to wear.

As you’re out and about, stop notice the details of nature, the tiny elements that add to the depth of the season. Capture the meticulously built spider webs glistening with dew drops, the bed of crispy leaves on the floor of the forest or the bare trees silhouetted against the crisp blue sky. Be sure to look up, down and all around as these tiny details can be easy to miss!

5. Expressive Portraiture

 After weeks or even months of costume planning, plus the hours spent perfecting the ghoulish make up, it’s only right that some time is taken to record the efforts with some emotive portraits. Encourage your subject to fully embrace their persona, using exaggerated poses and gestures that bring their character to life for the camera. Try a classic central composition or create tension by putting the subject off to one side. Put into practice that dramatic lighting discussed back at the start. Here, I illuminated her face using only light from a mobile phone.

6. The Digital Darkroom 

Elevate the mood and drama of your images even further in your post-processing. Play with the contrast sliders to deepen the shadows, add a vignette to draw the viewer’s attention to the centre creating a closed-in sensation. Selectively enhance the colours to make the seasonal palette pop, or perhaps convert to black and white for an additional level of mystery.

Overlays can add the final flair to your images. A layer of smoke weaving through your image, a border of creepy cobwebs or a magical sparkle coming from your son’s wizard wand. You’ll find a wealth of overlays on the internet, and always keep a watch out for freebies. We love to use the site https://fixthephoto.com/free-photoshop-overlays. Further to this, Halloween offers the opportunity to push beyond the boundaries of real-life. Use composites and generative AI to add extraordinary elements to your scene. Have your subject encountering a ghost in the woods or even flying through the air on a broomstick.

Let’s Celebrate!

 Putting all these tips together, you’ll be well equipped to create some truly magical images this Hallowe’en—and that's just the beginning! The up-coming months are filled with festive occasions, offering countless opportunities to hone your skills and explore a variety of photographic ideas and techniques. Delve further into all of the aspects mentioned here, plus so much more in our brand new course “Let’s Celebrate: Photographing the Festivities”. 56 pages packed with way more info than we could include within the scope of this blog, along with behind-the-scenes videos and editing tutorials (plus the raws for you to follow along), creative exercises, a festive photography project and a selection of overlays!