GETTING READY FOR A PORTRAIT SESSION AT YOUR HOME

PLAYDATE PORTRAIT SESSIONS

Play Date sessions document your family interacting and playing in and around your own home. Like all our sessions, these images tell your story, in pictures and customized for your family. Do your children have a special place in the attic where they play? Love to work in the garden together on weekends? Have a favorite snack that you prepare? These are the kind of things that tell the story of your family.

Play Dates are portraits done on location in and around your home. Your home serves as the backdrop and gives context to the photographic story of your family. Children are often most comfortable in their own environments, and the small details of the built environment are important to capturing and telling the story of your family. We can take breaks for snacks and water. We can absolutely take some posed images with everyone looking at the camera – but the majority of images will be candid and spontaneous.

GETTING READY FOR A PORTRAIT SESSION AT YOUR HOME

Don’t stress about mess.

It’s normal to have extra things around and to be in the flux of major life change. For our portrait session, we don?t need much space (especially for newborns). I might want to move some furniture around to make room for me to move, but everything goes back to it’s place when we are done.

LIGHTING FOR FAMILY PORTRAITS AT YOUR HOME

We will want to harness as much natural light as possible. Open your blinds, draw back your curtains so we can immediately source the best light coming into your home. Natural light is ideal but I will also have lighting equipment as back up.

When I arrive, I will ask for a quick tour to scout the best light and that is where I will set up to do most of the shoot. We can make a little natural light studio in small corners for kids.

PREPARING CHILDREN FOR FAMILY PORTRAITS

The goal is to document and honor your family at this moment in your lives, authentically. I will engage and talk with your children to get to know them as individuals. Getting comfortable in front of the camera, and engaging in play is the best way to capture this stage in their life and capture their genuine expressions.

Explain what is going to happen. Have activities and lay out a time frame and expectations. As a parent myself, I am not opposed to offering a reward at the completion.

NEWBORNS

Most newborns prefer being swaddled and held, staying warm and cozy. Keep the temperature up on the day of the shoot, so changing clothes or any of those classic naked bum images won’t be too cold and upsetting. Our goal is to keep baby happy and warm. If you have a dryer, we can pop a blanket or two in for a few minutes to have something toasty for baby to snuggle into.

If the baby needs to eat, let them. If you can, get them milk drunk before I come over.

WARDROBE

Simple is better. I always gravitate toward neutral colors and mid tones – but if you are a family that wears bright colors, by all means do! Just make sure everyone is dressing for the same party.

For a baby: Blankets, onesies, etc. You may have some adorable gifts from grandparents already. We can do come naked baby images (and if you would like that, I suggest keeping a loose diaper so the skin doesn’t get marks)

Collect anything (heirlooms, toys, monogrammed gifts) that you may want to have in your family portraits.