Riverbank High School has come up with a local way to solve a professional problem involving the Class of 2021 and their senior portraits.

RHS English teacher and yearbook advisor Mary Lopez remodeled her classroom, turning it into a makeshift photographic studio so she could take the portraits. She set it up with a “green screen,” complete with formal lighting. The green screen allows a professional style digital background to be easily edited into the photos.

Normally, Lifetouch Studios is contracted to do the formal senior portraits, but the COVID pandemic has prevented them from doing the work the way they usually would, with some close contact with the students.

So Lopez stepped in, with a local solution, not wanting the seniors to miss out on their class yearbook photos because of all the turmoil this year.

She set up a rigorous schedule for the students of the senior class, having them come to her classroom during the school day last week, one at a time, at 20 minute intervals. They were also socially distancing and wearing their masks. Materials used to make a title board with their name on it, as well as any paperwork were continuously sanitized.

And each pen or marker was discarded after it was used, to be cleaned later.

Students only took off their masks during the photo shoot.