Facebook Fresh Faces Winners - Raleigh Cary Baby Newborn Photographer

These sisters won our facebook fresh faces contest recently for our baby and toddler categories. They braved the hurricane this morning to come over for their FREE shoot. With daughters the same age difference myself I have a soft spot for this family.
In May I took Nora's newborn photos. You can see that she was born with those adorable curls
Today was the first time I had met her older sister Frankie. She was so well behaved for a toddler, she didn't tear down my backdrops or knock over my lights : ) She didn't even attempt to try to leave the studio. As long as we let her have her lollipop she was game for anything.
At twenty months & five months old they sure gave us a run for our money. Normally I would prefer to chase a toddler around outside to capture their true personality but with a sister that couldn't yet sit up and of course a hurricane outside we made the best of it inside with these two little sweeties : )

"hey you no more photos!"

i have a bunch of props in studio for the toddlers but they always seem to prefer my ladder which i normally use to stand on when i shoot. I'm a firm believer in keep them happy, let them do what they want. It actually works pretty well!



I love this one...hello world!

My Weimaraners - Raleigh Cary NC Pet Photographer

Two peas in a pod, love them

Ryan's First Birthday - Raleigh, Cary, Baby Photographer

I love the first birthday photo sessions. This adorable baby boy belongs to one of my good friends who lives in New York, too far from Raleigh. I've only been able to photograph him twice this year, so sad. He is one of the happiest little guys I know. Unfortunately by the time we got to the cake he was getting ready for his nap. I thought he might actually fall asleep in his cake. He sure did like how it tasted though!

Project Life - Raleigh Family Photographer

So when my kids were babies I had a very talented, creative neighbor that taught me how to scrapbook. I quickly became addicted and pretty soon had invested lots of money into paper, embellishments, tools,etc. My investments paid off because I now have over 20 albums of my daughters' early years.
About 3 years ago as my business began taking off and life became more hectic, I stopped scrapping. I often look at my albums with the girls and wonder where I found the time to create so many pages! I could never do it now.
I still have a closet full of paper, embellishments, tools,etc., and a lot of guilt that I now do nothing with my girl's photos nor do I do a very good job of documenting their life.
So flash forward....I have another very talented, creative neighbor that introduced me to Project Life. Its still scrapbooking but in a much easier, less time consuming, and cheaper way.
Project Life comes in kits such as this but the kits are currently sold out until Oct. So last night I ordered a Project Life binder through her amazon store and the page protectors so that I can use her method with my old scrapbooking materials that are currently collecting dust.
I'm looking forward to getting back into my old hobby very soon. If you've ever contemplated getting your photos organized or were ever an avid scrapbooker you should look into this.
Here are a few examples from her blog. You can do so much more than just scrapbook with this stuff. Very cool!

M Brothers - Cary, Raleigh, Apex, North Carolina NC Family Photography

A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of visiting a good friend of mine in Saratoga Springs, NY. We arranged a quick photo shoot one afternoon of her two adorable sons at the state park. The boys thought they were going to a "real kid park" with playground etc. When they arrived I think they were at first disappointed but by the end of the shoot they were asking to stay and wanting me to "take a million more photos." I think they'd agree that running through the arches, wrestling in the grass and listening to a random guy playing the guitar (all while being photographed) was a fun way to spend an afternoon.











this may be my favorite photo from the shoot.


I have to admit that photographing little boys is very different than photographing little girls! Most boys are very disinterested in the camera. When I have the camera up to my face I can carry on a conversation with a girl and get some great photos while she is interacting with me, the boy on the other hand usually tends to bolt the minute I aim the camera towards him. Girl sessions usually are much faster, and easier, however boy sessions are typically more fun. As was the case with these little guys I had to spend some time watching them play, enticing them to climb trees, silly things like showing me their muscles. Once they have warmed up and become my friend, they give me the opportunity to capture the good shots.
Its work but its rewarding.
Here are some early shots where they were being silly and not interested in our shoot.

In half of the first 20 photos of Ethan he was making this duck face, it was hysterical. Luckily Mom just laughed along with me and pretty soon it got old to him, the duck then turned into more of a smile. Its important for parents to let the kids get away with being silly and play along with their ideas. It keeps the kids in a good mood and lets their real personalities and smiles eventually come out. Telling your kids to pose and act unnatural really makes for boring and fake photos.



how adorable is he?


Mini lesson:
Things not to do... don't tell your kids to go over there and stand next to each other. This is next to each other to them, lol.


Don't tell boys to pretend they love each other. This is how boys show their love by squeezing the crap out of each other. Girls would have hugged/kissed something sweet.


Let them do what they want, In this photo the boys started wrestling I encouraged them and this is what I got.
Love this one!

Photography Lesson: Shooting at Mid-day - Raleigh, Cary, Family Photographer

Read any textbook on photography and you are bound to come across the theory that says you should only shoot early in the morning and 2 hours before sunset. Those are considered the golden hours for photography. Yes its much easier to obtain a better exposed photo at these times of the day because you are not competing with the powerful sun and the shadows it creates. However it is possible to get a great photo at any time of day if you know how to work around the sun.
Here is an example of what I did yesterday to get great photos while on a picnic at 1pm.

This photo shows you what you shouldn't do. Notice the sun is over my(the photographer's) right shoulder. You can tell this because of the sun on the subjects left side of her face. Also notice how she is squinting because she is staring right into the sun. Also look at the background grass how dull and dark it is compared to the other photos below. I always try to brighten up my backgrounds when I shoot.


Second photo, we both spun 180 degrees. I had subject block the sun by holding the umbrella behind her. It created a neat effect with the sun behind it. Of course I edited this one in Photoshop. Photos do not come out of the camera looking like this not even with a $2300 lens! You must know what to do in post processing to fine tune a photo. This is the only photo I edited the rest are straight out of camera so you can see the difference.


The next set of photos I placed her under a tree. There was a large space of shade around the tree. And you can see by the colors in the grass where the shade ended. I shot this one quick standing up just to see it first in my camera.


Next photo I got on my stomach like her and shot straight on, zoomed in to fill the frame with her. Eliminated all clutter of blanket and umbrella. Now she becomes the focus of the photo.



Then I pulled out my really bad jokes to try to get some more natural looking photos. She got pretty silly fast though. She was more interested with playing with her cousins then doing a photo shoot with her crazy aunt


I really wanted a photo of the 3 of them. Knew there was no way they were going to sit for me so we started a contest of hanging on the tree and I got all three of them, no they aren't all looking at me and smiling. But thats not what I wanted I wanted them being the crazy kids they were that day. You just have to figure out ways to make photos fun for kids.