Children change faster than anyone photographs them. A family session is not really about a portrait for the wall — though you get one — it is about having a proper record of a particular summer, a particular height, a particular way of standing. Sessions are run at the pace of the youngest person there, which is the only pace that produces anything worth keeping.
All of them run the same way: unhurried, mostly outdoors or in your own house, with as little posing as the picture will tolerate. Children who are being arranged look like children who are being arranged.
The whole group, in a park, on a beach, in the garden or at home. Usually about ninety minutes, which sounds long and is not: the first twenty are spent letting everybody stop being self-conscious, and the pictures start after that. A handful of arranged group frames — the ones grandparents want — are done early while attention lasts, and the rest of the session is left to happen.
First birthdays, starting school, a last summer before something changes. Shot at the child’s eye level rather than from adult height, which is the single biggest difference between a photograph of a child and a photograph taken over one. Milestone sessions are shorter, typically forty-five minutes to an hour, because that is roughly how long a small person stays interested.
Brothers and sisters together, cousins, three or four generations in one frame when everybody is in the same place for once. Large groups are photographed early in the session and in open shade, because the alternative is twenty-two people squinting into low sun while somebody blinks. Individual portraits of each child are made in the same session and delivered alongside.
Breakfast, the garden, the sofa everybody actually sits on, the dog that will not be excluded. Available light, no equipment cluttering the room, and no request that anybody tidy up first — the mess is half of what the photographs are for. Especially good for babies, toddlers and anyone who behaves differently the moment they leave the house.
The same family, the same time each year, often the same place. The value compounds: after four or five years you have a sequence rather than a set of unrelated pictures. Framing, distance and treatment are kept consistent from year to year so the sequence reads as one thing, and the notes from each session are retained to make that possible.
The frames people actually book a session for: a face doing something it was not asked to do. Grandparents and siblings, a first birthday, a morning at home, a walk somewhere that means something to the family — sessions run at the pace of the youngest person there, and most of what is worth keeping happens between the arranged pictures rather than during them.
Newborn sessions are the one thing on this site that cannot be scheduled normally, because babies do not arrive on the day they are meant to. A provisional week is held rather than a day, and the session is confirmed once the baby is actually here.
Pay the retainer against your due date and the week is held rather than a day; the exact morning is fixed once the baby arrives. If anyone is unwell it moves, at no charge, however late.
Typical figures, confirmed in writing when the session is booked so there is nothing to interpret afterward. Where a family wants more or less than the usual, it is agreed then rather than negotiated at delivery.
Most of what makes a family session work is decided before anyone picks up a camera, and almost none of it is photographic.
Tell me when they nap and when they eat, and the session is built around it. A tired two-year-old is not a photography problem that can be solved with patience; it is a tired two-year-old.
Children are not asked to look at the camera or say anything. They are given something to do — a hill to run down, water to stand in, a job — and photographed doing it. The frames that end up on the wall are almost always the ones where nobody was performing.
Colors that sit together rather than match exactly, and nothing anybody is worried about getting muddy, because they will. A child who has been told to keep their clothes clean stops moving, and a child who has stopped moving is not worth photographing.
Some children hide, and that is normal and accounted for in the session length. No child is bribed, hurried or made to do anything, and if one wants nothing to do with it for half an hour, that half hour is theirs.
Say so and the session is rescheduled at no cost, however late the notice. This matters more than anything else on this page: a family that feels obliged to bring a sick child to a booking they have paid for gets bad photographs and a bad memory attached to them. It is a session, not an appointment you can miss.
Overcast is excellent and needs no change. Actual rain gets rescheduled, unless the family fancies it, in which case wellingtons and puddles make some of the best pictures anyone gets.
Ages of the children, roughly where you are, and whether you would rather be at home or somewhere outdoors. If a baby is on the way, the due date is enough — the week gets held and confirmed once they arrive.