Odd title right? 
Many guys LOVE to wear baseball hats and wear them most of the time.  (My hubby is one of them.) So it would seem natural that they would want to wear a hat at their session.  But I want to share and show some example of guys wearing hats and some pros and cons for wearing baseball hat to a photo session.

(Just a note, all of these sessions were awesome and I’m not picking on them at all. I loved each one of these session and had so much fun with them! And there are photos in each session that are some of my favs I’ve taken but did required a little bit extra editing.)

So here are some cons for wearing baseball hats:

1. Con: We want to see his face!

This is the number one reason I don’t recommend a baseball hat during photos. There’s not much we as photographers can do when his face is totally hidden by the brim of a baseball hat. We want to see his eyes and how he looks at you! We want to see the sparkle in his eyes when he looks at the women he loves!  A lot of those intimate moments will be cover by a baseball hat brim when he looks at you.

Yes, there are poses that I use that you will be able to see his face, or he won’t block her face, but with more romantic and intimate ones where their faces are close together, it usually does block his face.

The reason why this rule doesn’t say “no hats” is because some hats can work. Wide-brim hats can always be tilted up to reveal more of the face but sometimes that doesn’t look “quite right”, or another hat like a beanies can look super cute. But there’s something about the shape and curvature of a baseball hat that just blocks his face.

You can see in the images below that were taken just minutes apart the difference the placement of the had. You can see the different emotions that can or can’t be seen, and a solution too if he wants to wear a ball hat. (And remember all three of these images are adorable and so fun, and I sent them all three, but my fav is the most right one where I can see both of their faces. These are just some things that I notice if the guy is wearing a hat and will try to capture a variety of poses to get a variety of angles.)

2. Con: Hats can block the light and create shadows

As a natural photographer, I rely heavily on lighting. If your man wears a ball hat, the brim will block some of the much needed light on his eye area making it darker than the rest of him or you. You can see in the example on the left that his face was darker/ more shadowed compared to her face.  On the image on the right, his face is brighter (that is because the snow was reflecting some light back onto his face), but his now fiancee face is a lot darker because of the brim of his hat.

There are ways to get around this with some extra editing – called spot editing on the “problem areas”. I take a brush and color the areas that need brightening and then in Lightroom I brighten that area. On all of these images I had to do a little extra editing under their hats to help make the lighting between their faces more of the same.  It’s doable but it does take longer to edit your photos especially if he wore a hat the whole time.

3. Con: Hats can be distracting

In my “What to Wear” guides, I say to stay away from logos on shirts because they are distracting to the image. It can be the same with base ball hats. If they have a logo on them, it will take away from the image – especially on those more romantic or intimate photos. To get around it, I try to get angles that I can’t see the logo – but that can be limiting.

Some pros for wearing a baseball hat

Now with all this being said, rules can be broken. Here are a few tips if he does want to wear a baseball hat.

1. If you man wears a hat most of the time, I would suggest starting the session without the hat and then at the end do some photos with the hat.  Wearing the hat for part of the session will help him feel even more comfortable and show off his personal style.  And if we do it this way, the hat won’t flatten or mess his hair.

2.  Some men wear a hat to cover a receding hair line or balding areas.  If this is the case and he wants to wear a hat the whole time, for sure!  In your questionnaire, please let me (or your photographer) know this so we won’t ask him to take off his hat.

3. Consider wearing the hat backwards.  That way he will have the confidence of wearing a hat, but without the brim covering his eyes. Or wear a hat that has a shorter brim like the hat on the right.

Looking for more tips on what to wear for a photo session? Check out this post!

In the end, these are your photos.  I want you both to be comfortable and confident! We will work with the hat or no hat, and get you a ton of variety either way. I want you to be aware of the pros and cons of baseball hats during a session and some possible outcomes.