Happy Happy-- in the States, you need white background for the passport. The photos are also slightly larger. In fact, thank you for bringing that up, as it reminds me that I'll have to cut the photos down a bit. Better do that today...

Here is how I solved the problem.

I'm a Costco member, and they have a non-white background screen they use to take membership photos at the desk. In fact, the background is a nice light blue, as I remembered. I called into Costco and went to the one-hour photo desk. I explained what I needed and suggested the membership photo backdrop. As the one-hour people use a digital camera you can carry, it was no problem to walk over to the membership counter and take the photo.

But as the States uses white, I just wasn't quite sure what the other default color for 'non white background' was, or if there was a color I definitely shouldn't use (black, puke orange, whatever).