We make photo keepsakes at Memory Gleam, so we have a stake in this — the honest thing is to say so up front rather than pretend otherwise. It also means we can tell you exactly where the limits are, including the ones that send you somewhere else.
Here is the answer people search for and rarely find stated plainly: a hinged photo locket holds one photograph per side, so one or two in total; a photo projection piece holds one image per lens, so a single pendant holds one. No piece we make holds four or five children's faces. Everything below is about choosing the right form for the number of photos you actually have, then making a two-photo piece feel fair to everyone who is not in it.
Searching for multiple kids' photos in one necklace gets you product pages and nothing that answers the real question. The real question has a number in it: two.
How Many Photos Fit in One Necklace
A photo locket holds one photo per side — one or two in total. A projection piece holds one image per lens, so a single pendant holds one image; a bracelet built with two projection charms holds two. Projection ornaments and projection keychains carry one lens each.
Both mechanisms sit on the same old idea: a small hinged or closed casing, the object the jewelry trade has called a locket for centuries. The capacity is what differs, and it is worth a table because almost nobody publishes one:
| Form | How many photographs | Where each one sits |
|---|---|---|
| Photo locket — necklace, bracelet, keychain, ring | 1 or 2 (single-frame and ring styles carry 1) | one printed photo in the frame on each side of the hinged casing |
| Projection pendant — necklace | 1 | one image micro-engraved in the lens |
| Projection bracelet with two charms | 2 | one image in each lens |
| Projection keychain | 1 | one image in the lens |
| Projection ornament | 1 | one image in the ornament's lens |
Two photographs is the ceiling, and it is a mechanical ceiling rather than a design preference. A locket frame is cut to the size of a small print, one per half of the casing; a lens carries a single image micro-engraved into it. If you are asking how many photos fit in a photo projection necklace, the useful version of the question is: one, or two, and which two?
Most of the language people search with points at the same two slots. What a shop lists as a multi photo locket or a multiple photo locket holds more than one photograph — sometimes two, sometimes four, depending on the maker. A two photo locket, or its 2 picture locket spelling, is the smallest version of that idea and the one most families end up buying. Lockets with multiple pictures come down to one thing: how many frames the inside of the casing has.
Some shops sell 4 photo lockets and 4 picture lockets, and lockets that expand as your family grows. Ours do not — we make single-photo projection pieces and one-or-two-photo lockets — so if four faces in one piece is a hard requirement rather than a preference, that is a genuine reason to look at those instead of us. Being clear about that now saves you a disappointing unboxing later.
If you own both a projection piece and a locket, or you are weighing them, they differ in how the photo is kept rather than in how many fit: projection necklace vs photo locket walks through that difference in detail.
Match the Form to How Many Photos You Have
Work backwards from the photos you want to send.
One child's photo → any single-lens piece works. A round projection pendant puts one image inside a lens that reads as a plain dark stone from the outside: nobody who glances at it sees a photograph. You look at it up close; or you hold a phone camera against the front; or, in a dark room, you shine a phone light through it from behind and the image lands on a wall. That privacy is the point for a lot of wearers.
Two children's photos → a hinged locket or a two-charm projection bracelet. This is the branch most multi-child families land on, and the two options behave quite differently. If you have seen the term double sided photo locket, this is what it describes: a casing with a frame on each of its two sides.
- A hinged photo locket is the open-and-see version. There is a frame on each side of the casing, so a printed photo of one child sits behind each half, and you unclasp it and they are both there. No light, no angle, nothing to set up.
- A projection bracelet with two charms does the same job with two lenses. Each child's image is micro-engraved into its own lens, and the bracelet carries both. It suits someone who wants the photo hidden rather than displayed.
Two photos, but nobody wears a necklace → the same forms exist elsewhere on the body. A photo bracelet with kids' photos carries either one or two images depending on how many charms it has, keychains are the lightest way to keep the photo moving with you, and a locket ring is the smallest version of the hinged design.
What does not exist is a projection ring — the lens needs a housing with room behind it for light, which is why projection pieces are pendants, charms and keychains and the ring form only exists in the hinged locket style. If you have been searching for one, that is why you keep not finding it.
Choose One Photo Per Child — Then Crop It for the Piece
The single most common mistake in a multi-photo piece is sending a group shot when you meant to send each child. It sounds efficient and it fails for a reason you can measure.
Take a head-and-shoulders crop of one child — the kind of framing portrait photographers use for a face: head, neck and a little shoulder, nothing else competing. In the smallest projection pendants, where the round piece is barely wider than that crop itself, it uses the entire frame. Now put four children side by side in the same frame and each face gets roughly a quarter of the width and a quarter of the height, so about a sixteenth of the area. You have not put four children in the piece; you have put four thumbnails in it.
So, for each child:
- Pick the photo where their face is the subject. A birthday group photo, a beach shot from thirty feet away, a picture where they are third from the left — these all work technically, and all come out smaller than you picture them.
- Crop toward the head. Head and shoulders reads better in a small frame than a full body, and this is the standard advice for any portrait, not just for jewelry — see portrait photography for how conservative that framing usually is. Cropping is a normal, detail-preserving step here: an image file carries far more detail than the frame it is going into can show.
- Center the face, because the lens is round. This one catches people out. The lens on a projection piece is circular, so the subject has to sit in the middle of the frame; if you send a photo where the child is off to one side, the edge gets cut by the shape rather than by a crop you chose. The same logic applies to a heart-shaped locket, which is close to round but with a notch.
- Check the light before you check anything else. A sharp, well-lit original is the single biggest factor in how the result reads. Evening indoor shots and screenshots of screenshots lose detail that a small frame cannot recover.
- Send the original file, not a social-media copy. Messaging apps resize images on the way in. The version in your camera roll is the one to send.
If you want the longer version of this — file types, how much detail survives, what to do about an old or soft photo — choosing the photo file goes through it.
There is also a preview tool for projection pieces on the site: upload a photo, move the crop, and see how it sits inside a round lens before you commit to it.
When There Are More Kids Than Frames
Four children and two frames is not a dead end. It does change what you buy, though, and the honest options are these.
Send a group photo, knowingly. This is the right answer if the piece is about the family as a unit rather than about each child individually — a photo of all four on the sofa, in the locket, works. Put it in a locket rather than a lens if you can: the hinged casing is simply the much bigger frame, where a round projection pendant is not. A family picture necklace built around one frame is the version to buy. The trade-off is exactly the arithmetic above: everyone is in, and everyone is small.
Split across two pieces. A two-frame locket and a two-charm bracelet cover four children with every child photographed individually. Two pieces also means two things to wear, or one to wear and one to keep in a purse, a car or a bedside drawer.
If you are searching for a three photo locket rather than a two-photo or four-photo one, the honest position is the same: three-frame versions are made by other shops, and from us three children means either a group photo or two pieces.
Give each child their own piece, at their own moment. If the point is that nobody waits their turn, one piece per child — a photo locket keychain is the lightest version, and it carries one or two photographs like every other locket — spread across a birthday, a holiday, or no occasion at all, gives everyone a day. This is the only version where nobody shares.
If you are buying for a grandmother with many grandchildren, the arithmetic changes again, and the piece is usually chosen around her rather than around the count. That case is written up separately in gifts for grandma with the grandkids' photos rather than repeated here.
One thing that is not an option: rotating the photo later. The image in a projection lens is micro-engraved into the lens and cannot be changed, and in a locket the print is fixed inside the casing. Whenever you buy a fixed-photo piece, you are choosing once. That is a feature if you want permanence and a constraint if you want flexibility — but it should not be discovered after you order. Permanence is also the part that makes it a keepsake rather than a photo you keep meaning to update: the piece holds the child at that age, and it holds them the same way next year.
Keep It Fair Between Your Kids
Fairness is the part that makes people hesitate, and it has an operational answer rather than a feelings answer. These are the four habits that do the work.
Use the same season for everyone. Not the same year — the same shoot. Four photos from four different school portraits will look like four different families; four photos from one afternoon at the same park look like one piece. If you have a photo of two of them and none of the third, either take one photo of all three, or wait for the same setup.
Crop everyone the same way. Same head-and-shoulders framing, same distance, same amount of background. If one child gets a tight crop and another gets a wide shot, the mismatch reads as emphasis, even when it was accidental.
Order them deliberately. Birth order left to right is the convention most people already expect, and it means the arrangement itself carries information rather than implying rank. If the frame sits on two sides of a locket, the same rule applies through the hinge: whichever order you choose, choose it once and keep it.
Say what the piece is for. If only two of four children are in it, the way that works is by naming the reason rather than leaving it to be inferred — the two who were there for a particular week, the two who are at home, the two whose photos came out well. A piece is not improved by pretending a choice was not made.
One addition that helps: the front and back of a hinged locket can carry text as well as the photo inside, so both children's names can go on the piece even when one side's frame is the only one facing out at any given moment. A name, a date or a short message is enough.
Worth separating two different purchases that share a word. Sibling necklaces for 3 usually means three matching pieces, one per child — a different thing from one piece holding three photographs, and often the more practical answer once you are past two children.
What Happens After You Send the Photo
This part is short and it is the part people get anxious about, so here is the sequence without decoration.
You send the photo files with the order. Between ordering and the point where your piece enters production there is a six-hour window in which the photo can still be changed — after that the piece is being made and the image is locked in, because a micro-engraved lens cannot be re-engraved. If you are gathering photos from three different phones, do that before you order rather than after.
Making and assembly take 3–5 business days, and standard shipping adds 7–12 business days on top. Pieces travel in a brand gift box with no price tag and no invoice inside — useful if the piece is going to someone whose birthday you are not attending. Timings and policies are the ones in force today; check the shipping and returns page before you order if a date is tight.
Because every piece is made to order, custom work is not returnable for a change of mind about the design. If the piece arrives damaged, or the custom work is wrong, report it within 48 hours and it gets fixed. There is more on what the window covers, and what it does not, in the photo change window before production.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can you put two photos in a locket?
Yes — lockets are commonly made with a frame on each side of the casing, which gives you one printed photo per side, two in total. Some are made with a single frame instead, so if two photos is the requirement, check that specific piece rather than assuming.
Can one projection necklace hold two photos?
No. Each lens carries one image micro-engraved into it, so a single pendant holds one image. If you want two photos in a projection piece, the form to look at is a bracelet built with two projection charms — one image per lens, two lenses.
What are these necklaces with pictures inside called?
Two different things share that description. A photo locket opens on a hinge to show a printed photograph fixed inside. A photo projection pendant looks like a plain dark stone from the outside and hides the image inside the lens until you look at it closely or shine a light through it. The words are used interchangeably a lot, which is why the capacity answer surprises people.
Do I need to get a print made before ordering?
No — you send the digital file and it is prepared for the piece. If you are filling a locket you already own and want a physical print to place inside, any print shop or pharmacy photo counter can produce a small print; bring the photo on your phone and ask for the smallest standard size, then trim it to the frame. Small prints are a well-established format — photographic printing covers the sizes and how they are made — and your local shop's current services and turnaround are worth checking with them directly.
Do I have to put the photo in myself?
No. For a piece made here you never handle the photo at all — you send the digital file, and the print is prepared and fixed inside the locket, or the image is micro-engraved into the lens, before the piece ships. If you have been reading how to put a picture in a locket guides, those describe a different job: filling a locket you already own, which you do open yourself.
Can I change the photo after I order?
Within six hours of ordering, yes. After that the piece enters production and the photo is locked in — the print goes into the casing and the image is micro-engraved into the lens. Neither construction is made to be reopened or changed later, which is exactly why the window exists.
Should I put all my children's photos in one piece?
Only if a group photo is the thing you actually want to own. If what you want is each child, individually, the piece that does that is two pieces — a two-frame locket plus a two-charm bracelet covers four children with every face at full size.
The Two Photos to Send First
If you have read this far, the decision is smaller than it looked at the start: pick the two photos, and pick them from the same afternoon so they match.
Start by laying out the candidates and asking one question of each: is this child the subject of this picture? The ones that survive will hold up inside a frame the size of a thumbnail. If two children survive it and four do not, you have your two.
The rest of the pieces, if you want to see the forms side by side, are in the gifts for mom board — and if what you actually want is a single image with everyone in it, that is a real choice too, and it is easier to make once you know the number.