I’ve photographed hundreds of seniors over the years. I’ve watched moms tear up behind me, dads suddenly get a little quieter, and kids walk into a session nervous and leave feeling like they could take on the world. And after all these years, I can tell you that senior pictures matter. But probably not for the reason you think.
They aren’t just something you need for the yearbook. They aren’t just another box to check off during an already ridiculously busy senior year, and they definitely aren’t just pictures to post on Instagram.
Senior pictures are almost like a pause button. Because if you’ve ever had a senior, you know just how fast this year goes. One minute you’re taking that first-day-of-school picture you’ve taken every year since kindergarten, and the next you’re ordering graduation invitations and wondering how in the world you got here.
As a photographer, I’ve always known this season was important. But as a mom, I feel it completely differently. There’s something about senior year that is hard to explain until you’re actually living it. You look at them and still see the little kid who used to need you for everything, but standing in front of you is this almost-grown person making plans, thinking about college and becoming more independent by the day. Somewhere in the middle of all of that, you realize there aren’t many firsts left before a whole bunch of lasts start happening. The last first day of school. The last homecoming. The last season of a sport they’ve played since they were little. The last prom. The last time they walk out that door for school. And suddenly all of those little things you thought would happen forever have an expiration date.
That’s what I think senior pictures really capture. They capture this weird, beautiful little space between who they were and who they’re about to become. They’re still your kid. They’re still leaving shoes in the middle of the floor, eating everything in your house and making you wonder why their bedroom looks like an actual crime scene. But at the same time, they’re becoming adults right in front of you. And whether we moms are ready for it or not, they’re getting ready for a life that doesn’t happen under our roof every single day.
And I know the chaos of senior year can make it hard to appreciate any of that while you’re in it. There are games and practices and banquets and applications and deadlines and senior events and approximately 4,000 things someone forgot to tell you about until the night before. Sometimes you’re just trying to make it to graduation without losing your mind. But someday the house is going to be quieter. The sports bag won’t be dumped by the door. Their friends won’t be eating all your food. You won’t be yelling, “WHO LEFT THIS CUP IN HERE?” for the hundredth time. And as crazy as it sounds right now, I think we’re going to miss some of it.
That’s why I want senior pictures to feel like more than just pretty pictures. I want them to look like your kid. If she lives in jeans, let’s photograph her in jeans. If she loves fashion and wants to go all out, I’m here for it. If he would rather have a football, baseball glove or fishing pole in his hands than stand in a field smiling at me, then that needs to be part of his session. Quiet, loud, athletic, artistic, glamorous, country, edgy, simple, weird, funny—I want all of it. I don’t want to photograph some perfectly styled version of who your senior is supposed to be. I want to photograph who they actually are right now.
And I want them to remember the experience too. Being 17 or 18 is such a strange age. Everyone is asking what you’re going to do, where you’re going to college, what you want to be and basically what your entire life plan is when half the time you’re still trying to remember where you left your AirPods. So when they’re with me, I want them to have fun. We laugh. We move. We try things. Sometimes we try something that looks absolutely ridiculous and we laugh about that too. Eventually they stop worrying about what their hands are doing or whether they’re “photogenic,” and that’s usually when I get my favorite images.
One of my favorite things will forever be watching a senior who started the session telling me, “I’m awkward in pictures,” look at the back of my camera and say, “WAIT. That’s me?” Because yes. That’s you. You just needed someone behind the camerawho knew how to show you what everyone else already sees.
And moms, I’m going to say this because I need to hear it too: get in the picture. You don’t need to lose ten pounds first. You don’t need the perfect outfit or freshly done hair. You don’t even have to show anyone the picture. Just take it. Because someday your senior will be the one looking through these photographs, and they are not going to care about whatever it was you were insecure about that day. They’re just going to see their mom. And they’re going to be really glad you were there.
So yes, I think senior pictures matter. Probably more than I ever realized when I first picked up a camera. Right now they’re senior pictures. Next year they’ll be pictures from before they left for college. Ten years from now they’ll be pictures of your baby at eighteen. And someday they’ll be part of those photographs your family pulls out and says, “Look how young you were.”
We don’t get to keep them this age. Trust me, I wish we could. But we do get to keep the photographs.
And maybe that’s why, after photographing hundreds of seniors and raising boys of my own, this job means more to me now than it ever has before. I’m not just photographing what your senior looks like. I’m documenting a tiny piece of who they were before they went out into the world and became whoever they’re going to be next.
And that is always worth remembering.
CONTACT ME HERE to get all the deets for YOUR session.
April Wetzig Photography
Central Texas Senior Photographer + Destination Senior Photography
Now booking the Class of 2027
