What is the Picture Game?
The Picture Game is a slumber party ritual about photographing ghosts. Bermudez says the Picture Game is a séance-style party game that’s “meant to be eerie, playful, and perfect for a slumber party thrill.” She explains that in the game, players use a flash camera to take photos in the dark, then look at the photos afterward to see if they photographed anything paranormal, like mysterious shapes, shadows, or ghostly figures. Nobody knows where the Picture Game got started, but that’s the case with many slumber party games, and also part of what makes them special. McElliott tells us that people like ghosts and the paranormal because of the mystery and intrigue, and that people can’t help but be curious about things you can’t explain. Meet the wikiHow Experts Sydney Bermudez is an urban legends expert, Mexican folklore expert, and horror content creator. She shares horror stories, paranormal cases, and internet mysteries with her over 400k followers on TikTok and Instagram. Dylan McElliott is a YouTuber and paranormal activity expert based in Auburndale, Florida. He creates content focused on investigating paranormal activity and currently has over 1.3 million subscribers on YouTube and 137K followers on TikTok.
Playing the Picture Game
At midnight, make a rope or string circle on the floor. The game starts at the stroke of midnight. To begin, get a length of rope, string, or twine, and tie it in a circle, then place it on the floor in the center of the room where you’re playing. The rope circle can be as large or as small as you like, but it needs to be big enough that you can place a drinking glass inside it, and that you and your friends can hold hands around it. If you’re playing with just a couple or a few people, make the circle small. If you’re playing with several people, make it larger.
Place a drinking glass in the rope circle and fill it with liquid. Get a regular drinking glass and set it in the middle of the circle. Then, fill it with a beverage. Alcoholic drinks work best for this ritual, but you can also use other beverages like sodas or juices. The beverage is an offering to the spirits and helps attract them. Legend has it that they like alcohol the best. Only use alcohol if you’re of legal drinking age.
Gather at least 2 people and sit them evenly around the circle. You need at least 1 other person to play the game, but there’s no limit on how many people can play, as long as you all fit around the circle. Sit evenly spaced, and with about 1 ft (0.30 m) of space between you and the rope circle. If you have more people than can fit, they can sit out and watch, but tell them to stay silent and motionless.
Give each person a mirror and turn off the lights. Each person sets a face-up mirror in front of them, between themself and the rope circle. The mirrors help you see the spirits in the photos. Use hand mirrors, compacts, or any other sort of mirror you might have hanging around. Once everyone is in position, turn off the lights to ensure the room is completely dark, says Bermudez. The game begins! In a pinch, turn your phone completely off and place it face-up in front of you so the screen acts as a blank mirror.
Say “I trust you,” then, “The door is open, please come in.” Hold hands with the person next to you and close your eyes. Go around the circle and take turns saying “I trust you.” Say it one at a time. Once everyone has said it, recite the next part of the invitation all together, in unison: “The door is open, please come in.” Once you’ve finished the invitation, open your eyes, but be aware that you may already be in the presence of a paranormal entity.
Take turns saying, “I caught you,” and taking a flash photo. Here’s where the camera comes in—Bermudez says you “take turns passing it around while focusing your energy on summoning a spirit.” You can use a phone camera with flash, but the ritual works best with an old-school camera, like an instant film or digital camera. The first person says, “I caught you,” then points the camera straight ahead of them and takes a photo. Then, pass the camera counter-clockwise around the circle and let each player do the same thing. Repeat this until everyone has taken 3 photos. Don’t use a traditional film camera, since it takes time to develop the photos, and you’ll want to see them right away. Do not peek at the photos.
Send spirits away by saying, “It is time to go home,” with your eyes closed. Once everyone has taken 3 photos, join your hands and close your eyes again. Send the spirits away by saying, altogether, “It is time to go home,” 3 times. This part is crucial. If you don’t send the spirits home, some say they might linger and haunt you.
Turn the mirrors upside-down, cut the rope, and empty the glass outside. Now comes the cleanup. First, turn all the mirrors upside-down to close the gateway to the other world. Then, use scissors or a knife to cut the rope circle and dispel the energy. Finally, pour the beverage onto a patch of bare ground outside. You can also turn on the lights at this point, or keep them off if you want to maintain the spooky vibe.
Look closely at the photos you took as a group. “The belief,” Bermudez explains, “is that when you…review the photos, mysterious shapes, shadows, or even ghostly figures might appear.” Browse through the photos with your friends, and look closely. If you’ve been visited, you’ll see strange things in the pictures, like orbs, weird shadows, blurs, smudges, or even… faces! Take an especially close look at the mirrors in the photos, behind your friends, and in the dark corners of the room, where spirits are most likely to lurk.
Picture Game Warnings
Stop, say the farewell chant, and restart if something goes wrong. The spirit world is nothing to mess with, and if you somehow mess up the ritual, stop and restart it. Send the spirits away by joining hands and saying, “It is time to go home,” then flip the mirrors, cut the rope, drain the glass, and start over. If someone gets scared, stop playing and respect their emotions. Also watch out for these mistakes or red flags: Someone sees the photos before you send the spirits away. Someone enters the rope circle during the ritual, after the spirits are invited. Someone speaks when it’s not their turn, says they’re afraid, or panics.
Is the ritual real?
The ritual is just a game, and there’s no official proof it works. Like many paranormal slumber party games, there’s no scientific evidence that it actually summons ghosts or spirits. If there was, it’d be all over the news. Like those games, it takes advantage of your own headspace, and how you want something spooky to happen, to convince you that something spooky has happened. The dark conditions, weird light provided by the flash, and reflections in the mirror all add up and provide the right conditions to see something spooky in the pictures, but it’s probably just a trick of the light.
Many people do believe in ghosts and say they’ve witnessed them. While the game is probably all in your head, spirits, ghosts, and other paranormal beings are widely believed to be real as part of many cultural and religious traditions, McElliott explains. Sure, science tells us that it’s impossible, but that doesn’t invalidate people’s lived experiences, and sometimes science can’t tell us everything. So, is that smudge in your photo actually a ghost? We may never know, but you might find out…
More Spooky Games
Play these creepy games with friends for more spooky fun. The Picture Game is just one paranormal slumber party game, and there are a whole lot of them! Bermudez says, “These games are usually played for the scare-factor and bonding experience, rather than taken too seriously, but they always add a thrill to the night.” When you’re done playing the Picture Game, check out one of these seriously spine-chilling games: Bloody Mary, where you summon a spirit in a mirror. Just turn off the lights, spin around, and say “Bloody Mary” three times, McElliott says. Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board, which is “a group chant-and-lift game where friends try to make someone levitate,” says Bermudez. The Ouija Board, where you use a Ouija Board “to ask questions to the beyond,” explains Bermudez. Hide-and-Seek Alone (Hitori Kakurenbo), which Bermudez says is “a creepy Japanese ritual involving a doll, often adapted into storytelling rather than actually playing due to how unsettling it is.” The Sandman Game, which is “a story-based game,” explains Bermudez, “where someone narrates as if filling your body with sand, creating a weird floating sensation.” The Midnight Game, which Bermudez says is “a ritual where players try to avoid ‘The Midnight Man’ until 3:33 AM.” The Dry Bones Ritual, where you invite a demon into your home and wait to hear the rattling of its bony body. The Baby Blue Game, where you summon the ghost of a baby. Sara Sarita or Charlie Charlie, where you ask a ghost questions. Take a look at our list of 38 horror games to play with friends after dark.
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