Baby it's cold outside...

With fall sneaking up on us, wedding season is coming to an end and studio sessions are booming. This week I've had 3 newborns in the studio and I predict (and hope for) many more over the next few months. In honor of this joyous occasion, I've decided to offer a special treat with every paid session. Digital Birth Announcements. These days, nearly everyone is online, making paper mail nearly obsolete. Therefore, announcing your little one doesn't have to take 3-5 business days. Instead it can be as quick as a click of the shutter on your iphone and an upload to facebook. If you want to announce your newest member of your family promptly, but in with a little more style than a 4g phone can provide...digital announcements are right up your alley. And the best part?? I'll give you the rights to the announcement so that you may print them at your leisure. Just in case Aunt Sue doesn't know the difference between "facepage" and a browser.

Being an army wife, living in an army town, I obviously do a lot of photo sessions for military families. Being the case, I thought some of my clients might enjoy the following entry. Operation Hi Honey! is a program brought to you by Canvas on Demand. CoD turns your printed photos into lovely works of art at a low cost & Operation Hi Honey gives you the chance to get one in your hands at no cost at all! If your loved one is deployed overseas, they are eligible for the Operation Hi Honey! program. All they have to do is submit a request for a free canvas print and once per week, one winner is randomly selected. If your honey qualifies, and you had a session done with me, I will have no problem releasing a print for such an occasion, just please contact me first. For more information, check out the website.

When Wedding Cake Won't Do

Planning a wedding calls for a lot of work, money, time, and talent. Sometimes when one of these necessary parts are missing or running low we have to settle on alternatives. But sometimes we purposely choose alternatives to age old traditions just to stand out from the crowd, to be different. After all, no bride wants to have an assembly line wedding. If you are having a smaller wedding, going with an alternative cake might be a good idea. In a lot of recent weddings I have photographed, I have seen a common trend in the cake subsitutions. I've had cheese cake (that was to die for), delicious petit fours, & adorable wedding cupcakes. Though I've yet to experience such, I have also heard of wedding cookies, wedding doughnut cakes, and wedding snack cakes. Though these may sound a bit tackyfor the more traditional minded bride, don't be so quick to jump to conclusions. Check out some of the photos below before you completely write them off.

Hostess Snack Cake

Doughnut Cake

Wedding Cup Cakes

Wedding Petit Fours

Patience is A Virtue

Newborn portraits take patience and a lot of time, usually 20-30 mins per pose. Not only does the photographer & the baby need to be calm and patient, but the same applies for the parents. If the mother and father of the baby are eager to get the pictures done and be on their way, you won't be able to get much. Therefore, it's a good idea to make the parents as comfortable as the newborn. It's not always as easy as it sounds. Usually, when you get 2 or so hours into a session, they start getting restless & in turn the photographer tries speeding things along just to get the shots. This is why I love taking pictures of my friend's children. They don't mind sticking around your house for a few hours, just to hang out. Of course, 4 hours in even our good friends get tired, hungry, restless, and eager to go. I can't say I don't blame them by that point. But thankfully, this past Thursday I had a lot of time to get every shot perfect for a friend's session, and I am so proud of the results.

Wedding Wagon Ideas

If you have a little one in your wedding that's too small to walk, you might want to consider having a decorated wagon in your ceremony. Not only are they practical, but they are adorable!

Dress for Success

If you are going to a boutique photographer for a photo shoot, you clearly don't want a photo like everyone else. So why dress like everyone else? With baby photos & kids portraits it's pretty simple to decide. But with entire families, people are often stuck with the choice of khaki pants & white shirts or jeans and polos. BORING! If you want your photos to stand out, you need to dress the part. You do not have to match, but you should coordinate. Pick a general color or pattern and match everyone's outfit to it. Here's a sample palate to get you started:

Weather Permitting

Since my arrival in New York, I believe I've yet to have a photo session run completely smooth. The weather here is less than ideal & extremely unpredictable. Saturday's Senior portrait session was the perfect example of such. I woke up bright and early to set up my studio for a few indoor shots and prepare my equipment. Unfortunately, I also woke up to sprinkles of rain on my bedroom window. I peered out to check the sky and was a bit disappointed when I discovered some heavy gray clouds looming above me. Of course, if the heavy rain held off, cloudy portraits can make for some amazing dramatic shots...so I crossed my fingers. In what seemed like only minutes before my client arrived, the clouds disappeared and the ominous sky was no more. Some would think I would be excited over such occurrence. However, a few days earlier we had to push her session back 3 hours, putting today's shoot at 2 o'clock, and now with a bright sunny sky to light the session. Not only did we have to limit the shoot to shady spots to avoid harsh shadows and squinty eyes, but the wind randomly arrived just in time as well. It seemed as though every time her hair was straightened just right & the lighting was perfected, a huge gust of wind would come through and practically blow us away. But, I am a glass half full kinda photographer. I got some really great candid shots of my senior bursting into laughter over the joke the weather seemed to keep playing on us. And candid smiles are oh so difficult to capture sometimes. So thank you New York weather, you tried to defeat me and again, I won.