The Onion
July 28th, 2009
This is what we like to call a “choose your own adventure” family photo.
(submitted by Nathan)
Tags: babies, brothers, matchy-matchy, sisters
The Onion
This is what we like to call a “choose your own adventure” family photo.
(submitted by Nathan)
Tags: babies, brothers, matchy-matchy, sisters
Thanks so much for posting. I laughed until I cried! (A little awkward at work!)
this is what happens when you have 7 photographers screaming look over here say cheese! Everyone turns in a different direction, except for the deaf couple in back consoling their baby from the flash.
I’ve seen candid, unposed portraits that worked before, this one does NOT. No offense to the family, there is just something about this photo that screams awkward. Not in an overt explainable way, but…it just feels really weird, imbalanced, awkward. Off. The tagline was the best, though. Perfect caption!
I love this photo. Reminds me of the look on the faces of hurried Macy’s shoppers at Christmas crammed together in the elevator.
Or random people waiting to be seated at Applebee’s.
lol!
ELEVATOR!! that’s what I was thinking!
Reminds me of that Sesame Street song: “One of these is not like the others…”.
These people could have a show on TLC now that Jon and Kate are over.
And again, the only thing funnier than the picture is the caption. I nearly peed my pants this time!! Good stuff…. good stuff
Best.Caption.Ev-ar!
I loved those books.
It’s a great picture! If this were my fam – I’d buy the largest they have in this one – it’s fabulous!
I totally dig this photo. It’s SO much more interesting than your standard posed seating.
Awkward, yes. But also quite cool.
Norman Rockwell, move over.
It looks like they took random poses and photoshopped them together
I agree, this is photoshopped
Awkward family photos are the best. I love this site!
my fave
Love it!
Too funny! Anyone notice how the only ones paying attention to the camera didn’t have children?
that pretty much sums up life!
I actually LIKE this picture. Not awkward, but interesting. The faces are interesting, the relationships are interesting and there is so much motion in the picture. Not kidding I like this. I’d like to see a couple of other takes, maybe, but the concept is interesting and it, strangely, works. Sorry I can’t be funny about this. It’s a nice family picture that quite probably captures the family dynamics.
Loving the Spock reference, I was thinking Jim baker but that was me… I like the pic because it is real, not all say cheese and look like you are a family that get get everything in order at once. Life is messy so is the picture!
I wonder if the children were having a hard time keeping still or looking at the camera, so the photographer suggested they all look in different directions. Could be.. cute idea.
it reminds me of when you are having a picture taken in a group but there are too many cameras and you don’t know which one to look at…
The problem was the camouflaged photographer.
That made me pee a little!
I love it! This is funny, but shouldn’t be awkward….it’s cute!
I looks like this was taken at the wrong time. Like there was some interesting stuff everywhere, then the back baby started crying and the dad tried to soothe it.
i actually love this photo. most family portraits are so posed and forced everyone seems so fake. i like the realness of this, even if this wasn’t the final product they went with. Reminds me of a pic of me and my mom
Who ARE all these people?
My comments are never posted! Humbug…
Neither are mine.
This picture looks horribly posed.
Nothing posed about this. It was impossible to get a good picture with our fam in the session, so the photographer just started snapping away. When we were reviewing the pics we had to get this one cause it totally represents our family.
So, you’re saying this WASN’T photoshopped?
Good call, Nathan. I’d rather see the “fun” put back into “dysfunctional” than a picture of what a family ISN’T. This might be the most honest family photo ever.-G
Oh so English-speaking people really use the word “humbug”? I just read it in “the Wizard of Oz”, never heard it before
I know! Mine either … and the one I posted about this family was NOT derogatory. I referred to ADHD, which my husband’s entire family has .. they all get distracted very easily and a pic of them would look a lot like this one! It’s actually quite endearing. But whatever. Whoever moderates needs to be a little more flexible. (and I mean that in the nicest of ways, Moderator)
Wow, amazing, look over there! No, there! There! THERE!
There is so much going on here! A little reminiscent of the O.J. photo-op shot.
Agree, many layers of awkwardness. Doesn’t seem to be a theme or message, just alot of randomness that doesn’t work together, IMO.
I love this pic! This is what families actually look like.
This is the funniest comment on one of the funniest/most awkward family photos ever! I about died laughing when I read, “choose your own adventure.” So true! Bwah!
What a strange picture.
It’s giving me a headache. I don’t know where to look.
I must give them credit on their wardrobe. Everybody is wearing something different but basically “earthtones”, and nothing too loud. Did Marnie raid their closets?
Anybody else thing Grandpa looks like what it would look like if William Shatner and Leonard Nemoy had a baby?
I see it! And I can’t unsee it….
Me too! ha ha. This looks like a cool family.
Wow. A little too spot on for my liking, actually.
That is highly ilogical
-praying I got the Spock refrence right
you did, alyse, you did.
HA! I see it, too!
perfect description.
Now there’s a photographer with a sense of humor….
“OK, everyone, on the count of three, ready? One…”
CLICK!!
lol! good one!
Laughing out Loud!!
Grandpa, the two in the upper left are the little girl are kinda looking in the same direction, maybe at a mouse running along the floorboard.
I think they are the parents of the little ones in the front.
Don’t understand the title. Someone help!
onion = lots of layers
this picture = so many different layers of awkwardness / family of different layers
get it?
…woulda preferred “The Lettuce Head”.
Oh! is that what it is? I was puzzling over that myself and was about to ask until I scrolled down and saw that someone already had. Thanks for clearing that up.
Someone needs to watch Shrek.
Dynamic!
I wish I’d grown up in this family.
I think they were attempting a matrix-style shot here – with cameras in every direction.
LOL.
when I say cheese it will be too late!
Photographer: “OK, everyone look this way…everyone?…please?…can I have everyone’s attention please?…ok, ladies on the right thank you…mom?…mom?…Ok, people in the back?…anyone else want to look at the camera?…anyone?…Bueller?…Bueller?”
as a Portrait Photographer I feel like that everyday and it’s hilarious you bring up the Ferris Bueller reference I’ve actually done that once at my wits end, but it did get them to look at me
I’m so confused! It must have taken some serious pre-planning to get every single person in this photo to look in a different direction…But why??
Actually, this was totally random. I was trying to help my wife console our older daughter, dad zoned out, my bro and sis in law were looking at their son in the front and my mom was just off track or something…. not planned at all
Jordan,
This is your family? Awesome!
So the truth is, the only two people in the picture who were doing what they were supposed to were the girls in the middle.
As a former Professional photographer, I can tell you one thing; it’s nearly impossible to get people to do what these two young ladies did. Keeping your face forward and ready for the shot while chaos ensues is quite the feat! Good on them!
Favorite caption!
WORD!
Multi-cultural, multi-generational, and everyone looking in multiple directions! I love it! I’d like to see the family tree that connects all these folks together.
Me too!
…YEAH, LOOOL. that fits. GREAT.
Why are they all looking in different directions?
Sometimes the shots you take right before or after the “real” portrait are the best ones.
The relationships are all on display. Who turns to whom for support? Who resents grandpa’s grouchiness? Each posture, each set of eyes, is a story.
So true! And all in all they look like a cool family.
were they distracted?
I don’t know if they are, but I sure am! I can’t figure out where to look or what the focus is. I can’t see how to execute this type of photo with success.
this one is actually kinda awesome. im gonna do this with my next extended family photo, i think there are 12 of us now.
My family attempted something like this a couple of years back with semi-disasterous results (it really could be on this site!), and I have one piece of advice for you – seat the children last. The stupid photographer insisted in seating the youngest children first, and then she had the nerve to get mad at the fact that the kids lost their patence and wouldn’t sit still!
Cee, I must insist that you submit your family’s disastrous photo. The world would be a better place for it. At the very least it would surely prompt laughs for AFP readers, and wouldn’t that be nice???
I must concur.
And when you go to a generic store for photos there are about 2987130 different options… meanwhile, the toddler is starting to melt down. Sometimes too much is just too much.
I agree.
Cee, please send in the pic!
thats funny
I cannot stop looking at this photo!