Planning to have a photo booth at your event? The best place to start is by deciding on the type of photo booth. There is now a wide variety of experiences to choose from—ranging from the classic photo booth to an automated, robot option.
Nov 06, 2009 This story, 'Add More Effects to Photo Booth and IChat' was originally published by Macworld Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. As you can see in the image at right, Photo Booth (and iChat) will add additional effects pages to accommodate your added effects; I’ve added eight effects, so Photo Booth is showing them all on.
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Next, you’d want to think about how to make your photo booth stand out.
Coming up with your own ideas might be challenging; that’s why we’re sharing the 30 best photo booth ideas for your next event or wedding. You can either copy them, modify them or use them as inspiration for your own ideas.
Let’s go!
1. Neon Lights Installation
Here’s a custom installation that we’ve done, with rows of neon light tubes. Use different colours on each side to create a cool two-tone effect.
It’s a fantastic way to attract a crowd to your photo booth, because of how it stands out. It’s a versatile concept that can work with a wide range of events, from corporate dinners to product launches.
2. Chalkboard Backdrop
A chalkboard backdrop is a creative and affordable way to add a personal touch to your event or wedding. If you’re artistically inclined, you can create the drawings yourself; if not, bring in an event or wedding stylist to help.
3. Multiple Hanging Frames
You can incorporate photo frames into your photo booth with this concept. Hang several smaller frames from an arch, to create interesting photo opportunities for groups.
4. Large Vintage Frame
The alternative to the multiple hanging frames is to use a single large photo frame—a vintage style works best! Decorate the frame with beautiful blooms, place it outdoors, and you have a wonderfully romantic wedding piece.
5. Giant Moon Backdrop
This giant moon backdrop is absolutely magical—it’ll certainly become the statement piece of your party.
Use it to create a romantic fairytale vibe, perfect for weddings or any celebrations of love.
6. Kaleidoscope Photo Booth
A kaleidoscope effect can be achieved either digitally (by processing the images) or with physical mirrors, which are placed in front of the photo booth. We tend to recommend physical experiences—it’s just so much better to have something you can see and touch.
Use this with a GIF photo booth to provide a highly interactive and unique experience.
7. Infinity Mirrors Photo Booth
The infinity mirror photo booth is the bigger brother to the kaleidoscope photo booth. With some well placed lights, you get a wonderfully striking effect.
While it looks like you’re in, well, infinite space, the setup is actually fairly compact. It’s a small room with mirrors on all sides (including the floor and ceiling), which you walk into for your shot.
8. Popcorn Balloon Backdrop
Balloon garlands are an affordable option for decorating your party; just head over to your local gift store.
They are really simple to put up as well! Just tie the strings to a little hook, or tape them down if you’re feeling especially lazy.
This popcorn balloon garland is great if you’re planning a birthday or children’s party, or even a movie night.
9. Dyed Fabric Backdrop
Here’s a simple fabric backdrop with a bohemian, artsy vibe; perfect for weddings and outdoor parties. It’s so simple to create—just hang the fabric from a copper pipe. Mix up the colours and arrangements to create your own style.
10. Floating Confetti Backdrop
Confetti and GIF photo booths are like peanut butter and jelly—they go together perfectly. However, it’s a real hassle to clean up the confetti each time. With this photo booth idea, you don’t have to!
Instead of popping the confetti, make it float in mid-air with fishing line. It’s an eye-catching backdrop for any photo booth.
11. Curtain Backdrop
If you have any curtains or drapes around your house, you can easily turn it into a beautiful photo booth backdrop. In fact, it’s a simple trick that’s used in many professional photography studios!
For weddings, look for white or pink drapes, and pair it with simple floral decorations.
12. Vintage Light Bulbs
Often, the best photo booth ideas are the simplest ones. In this example, you’ll simply need to purchase several vintage light bulbs. Hang them from an arch, fence or any kind of support; while making sure to vary the heights to create visual interest.
You can easily match this with a simple fabric backdrop for a more elegant and polished look—that can work even for formal corporate events.
13. Swing Booth
If you’re planning to have a GIF or video booth, you’d want to create opportunities for interaction—so that it’s easy for your guests to move and dance around. What better way to do it than to provide a swing?
Style the swing according to your event; this photo booth idea is fantastic for gala dinners and other formal events. However, it’s easy to adapt it for a vintage look or to create an outdoorsy vibe.
14. Green Wall Backdrop
Green walls are a popular motif these days, and you might want to integrate one into your photo booth. Some venues might even have one, so you just have to locate your photo booth in front of it.
If a plain green wall is looking too simple for your tastes, you can decorate it with signs or floral arrangements. For weddings, you can create a sign with your names, which you’ll hang in the middle of the wall.
15. Neon Signs
There’s no better way to add an artistic and hip vibe to your photo booth, than a neon sign. While these can be custom made (say, for your product launch), you can also find off-the-shelf options. It’s an eye-catching way to attract a crowd to your photo booth.
16. Photo Guest Book Photo Booth
Here’s a great photo booth idea for weddings—get your guests to stick their photo booth prints in a guest book. It’s a fun activity for your guests, to fill up the blank pages with their photos and messages. In the end, you’ll get a priceless and personalised album that you’ll treasure for life.
17. Vintage Telephone Booth
The vintage telephone booth may no longer be of practical use, but it can still serve as a unique set up for your photo booth! You can usually find one off eBay or AliExpress. Alternatively, get your event stylist or production company to construct one from scratch.
18. Old Doors
These old doors are the perfect backdrop for an outdoor wedding. You can either create one yourself, or get one from a prop rental company—there’s usually one in every city, with a wide range of props to choose from.
19. Wooden Pallet Backdrop
Wooden pallets are inexpensive and provide an amazing rustic, worn look. You can create a backdrop with these, and combine them with chairs and old boxes, to produce a beautiful setup for your photo booth. It’s like a set from a play!
Even better, you’re doing your part for the environment by upcycling.
20. Instagram Frame Photo Booth
Create a custom Instagram photo frame that your guests can pose with. It’s so simple to make—just print it on a foam board or thick paper, and cut out the shapes. If you’re a brand, this is a great way to bring awareness to your Instagram account and gain followers.
21. Rainbow Backdrop and Carpet
Here’s a cool photo booth idea that we’ve never seen before—a backdrop that also serves as a carpet! It’s like a red carpet experience but way more colourful—imagine walking down a long stretch and finally posing in front of it. What a perfect way to draw attention to your photo booth.
22. Ball Pit Photo Booth
We can never outgrow ball pits; bring back your childhood with this interactive experience. Just jump in, have fun and pose for the photo booth!
A ball pit photo booth works perfectly with GIF, video or slow motion photo booths, because you can capture the moments when you’re jumping in or just throwing the balls around.
23. Silver Shimmer Tunnel
Here’s a custom installation that’s sure to turn heads. The silver shimmer tunnel is made of sequins or tiles, and create a lively, interactive element. It’s a great feature wall for any event type, and can be customised to include any branding.
24. Trick Eye Photo Booth
Trick eye museums are popular tourist destinations and for good reason—they provide wonderful photo opportunities! You can bring that same experience to your photo booth, by working with a production company to build a set.
25. Upside Down Room Photo Booth
The upside down room photo booth is really a type of trick eye photo booth, but we thought it deserves its own mention. Just like the trick eye effect, this type of photo booth works by creating a mind-bending visual illusion.
There are many opportunities for creating a branded experience, and this can easily become a permanent installation—say, as an attraction to your store.
26. Rotating Room Photo Booth
The rotating room photo booth is a gravity-defying experience. Both the room and camera will rotate together, creating the illusion that you’re crawling up the wall and ceiling. You can customise the room to match your branding, by adding your logos and brand colours.
27. Fisheye Photo Booth
As an event planner, you’re always looking for fresh photo booth ideas to keep your events interesting. The fisheye photo booth is a twist to the traditional photo booth—it distorts your photo for an interesting effect, and is great for fitting large groups of people in a small space.
28. Drone Photo Booth
If you’re expecting a large crowd at your event, a drone photo booth is a fantastic way to get everyone into the shot. Unfortunately, not many photo booth companies will offer this service. However, it’s inexpensive to buy your own drone, and easy to operate too!
29. Treadmill Photo Booth
With a treadmill photo booth, your guests will be walking or running on a treadmill while they take a shot. This is perfect if you have a fitness themed event, or even a fashion themed event—where the treadmill becomes a runway!
Consider using a green screen to digitally insert them onto the virtual runways of their choice.
30. Augmented Reality Photo Booth
One of the newest experiences is the augmented reality photo booth. Using the latest technology, it allows you to take photos with celebrities—as if they were really there! There are so many possibilities for creating branded experiences, such as for TV shows and movie casts.
Conclusion
More Videos For More Effects For Photo Booth »
There are so many different experiences that you can create with photo booths, whether you’re planning a gala dinner, product launch or even a permanent installation.
Use these photo booth ideas as a starting point for your own projects, and start your planning by reaching out to us!
As you know, Photo Booth includes a collection of image-altering effects you can use to distort your photos; just click the Effects button to see the collection of 24 effects, and to apply them to your photos. A subset of these effects (16 in all) are available in iChat, too, for use in creating some truly strange looking iChat image icons. But in case that’s not enough effects for you, here’s a way to add over 20 additional effects to both iChat and Photo Booth.
To use today’s hint, you’ll need a text editor that can handle binary plist files—Apple’s own Property List Editor (included with Xcode), or BareBones’ free TextWrangler, for instance. There’s a bit of editing to do, but it’s not hard.
To start, open two Finder windows. In the first, navigate to /System -> Library -> Compositions. In the second, navigate to your user’s Library folder. If you don’t see a Compositions folder there, create one, and then navigate into it.
Next, copy a number of the compositions from the first (System-level) window to the second (your user’s Library -> Compositions folder). Note that there are many entries in the top-level Compositions folder, but not all will work well with iChat and Photo Booth. So how do you know which ones to copy?
Thankfully, Mac OS X Hints reader Anthony Saxon has done the hard work for you. He reports that the following effects work well:
ASCII Art, Blue Print, Blur, City Lights, Color Controls, Color Invert, Compound Eye, Concert, Crystallize, Dot Screen, Exposure Adjust, Gamma Adjust, Kaleidescope, Line Overlay, Line Screen, Monochrome, Neon, Pixellate, Pointillize, Posterize, Sharpen, Tracer, Zoom Blur
Copy as many or as few of those as you’d like over to your user’s Library/Compositions folder. (If you’re running 10.6, you’ll see a preview of each effect in its icon, or you can use Cover Flow view to see a larger version.)
Extra Effects On Photo Booth
Before proceeding further, please note that some users who have tried this have reported crashes with Photo Booth or iChat after adding some new effects. I have removed the known troublesome effects from the list, but that doesn’t mean there might not be more issues (particularly on Snow Leopard machines).
If the thought of some possible short-term application instability is a concern, you should probably not read any further—although I do provide instructions below on how to recover from a crash if you experience one.
Once you’ve copied over the files you’d like to use, you’ll need to edit each one, and delete a few lines. Launch TextWrangler, and use File -> Open to open one of your copied files. These files will all look relatively similar, especially near the beginning of each file, which is the part you’re interested in editing. Look for these five lines:
You want to delete all five of those lines, then save the file.
Once you’re sure a given effect works, repeat the editing with the next file you copied across, and test again.
As you can see in the image at right, Photo Booth (and iChat) will add additional effects pages to accommodate your added effects; I’ve added eight effects, so Photo Booth is showing them all on one additional page.
So what happens if you have a crash after adding these effects? Say Photo Booth or iChat quit then refuse to launch, or maybe your machine kernel panics (gray and white screen appears, telling you you must reboot)?
If this happens to you, the fix is thankfully simple—just don’t try to launch iChat or Photo Booth until you fix the problem. The actual fix is what you might have guessed: simply remove the added effects from your user’s Library/Compositions folder, and all will be back to normal.
While crashes are never nice, I haven’t experienced any after adding eight of the above effects to Photo Booth on my MacBook Pro—and my daughters love playing around with the Tracer effect, so I think these added effects will stay around for a while!