Well, don't forget that taking pictures back then wasn't painless like it is now. You had to buy film, take pictures, have no real idea if the pictures will come out until you submit the film to the developers and wait a week or so to get pictures you could look at. So people would see picture taking as a special event and get dressed up for it.
As for "portable" we had this tape machine
which had a handle but weighed about 50 pounds...