There is nothing worse than the typical staged group photo.
Reporters and editors despise them, because they're boring, and it means a giant cutline has to run beneath the photo that identifies everybody in the shot.
Photographers hate them, because it's hard enough to take 30 shots of a single person and get one or two frames where they look great.
Add three more people, or ten more, and it's almost impossible, with somebody blinking and somebody else looking off-camera at the convertible that just drove buy and another person with their mouth open because they're talking.
Then you need everybody to freeze for a second while you put down the camera and get out your notebook to make sure you've got all the names, correctly spelled, and where they were in the photo.
So: group photos will give you heartburn, and the Typical Staged Group Photo is usually not worth all that trouble. Readers don't really care unless their son, daughter or neighbor is in that photo. They want a great photo to look at; anything else, they'll skim or skip.
Here are three ways to make group photos interesting and useful:
(1) Turn group photos into action shots.
Make those people DO something. If they're scientists, shoot them in the lab, holding bubbling beakers and looking through microscopes. If they're rock stars, don't take the usual shot of four band mates trying to look tough in an alley. Shoot them on stage, as they play and interact with each other.
If they're office workers, at least get them at a conference table, when they're actually having a meeting -- not a staged fake meeting -- and wait for the meeting to really get going before you start taking shots.
(2) Focus on one person
One person will naturally be the focus of any good shot. Maybe TWO people, if they're right next to each other and interacting. The whole group will not be equally prominent in a photo. So when you shoot a group, and pick the best shots, look for ones that feature the person who's most important to whatever story the photo goes with.
Maybe the best photo from the whole shoot is where a man is laughing as he gives somebody a playful hug -- wonderful. If he's a second fiddle, though, and doesn't really play a big role in the story you're telling, pick a different shot that does feature your main actor. Movie posters highlight the star, right? Don't highlight a walk-on or an extra. Put the spotlight on your star.
(3) The arms-length test
What looks great on your computer monitor at full resolution may look cluttered and terrible when it's printed or put on a web-site in a much lower resolution.
Hold the photo out at arms length. Can you tell what it's about? This is hard with action shots. It's even tougher with group photos. Crop the photo to cut out anything distracting in the background and play with the contrast and levels until it's clear what the photo shows even when you're looking at it from far away.