One of the questions i get most often is What should we wear for our portrait.  While I will offer a few suggestions, only you know your family.  I Think the most important thing to remember is that you probably do not want a portrait hanging on your wall of people that just aren’t you.  So wear something that best suits you and your family.

Family Portraits.

There are many different looks people are going for in their family portraits, the first being a more casual look.  For casual portraits i suggest, keep it simple.  White shirts and jeans or white shirts and khakis is a very popular look for casual family portraits, and works well in either location or studio portraits.  However I have had some great success with black shirts & jeans, or black shirts & khakis as well.   If you would like to add brighter colors in your portrait, that also works.  It is a little more difficult to pull it all together because you do not want too many colors or shades of the same color in your portrait.  It can be very distracting.  You do want the people in the portrait to be the focus, and do not want the eye to be distracted by the many different colors.  If you would like to put brighter colors in your portraits, remember keep it to no more than 2 colors and if 2 people have on the same color (blue for example) make sure that the blue’s are the same shade of blue.

Formal Portraits is another popular look for a family portrait.  With formal portraits, black is a very nice look.  Guys in black suits, and ladies in black dresses.  However, ladies in brighter more colorful dresses while the guys are in black also looks good,  again, remember to put the ladies in the same color, to many colors are distracting.

Baby’s first year

Babies are tiny, and what you want to remember about them is their tiny little parts, their innocence and beauty of a new born.  With that, try not to put anything to bright or with busy patterns on them.  Simple white or pastel pinks or blues always works best.  As a matter of fact, i prefer newborns in nothing but a diaper and diaper cover or completely naked.  It is almost impossible to find an outfit that is not to big on a newborn, and they get lost in it.

Children

All rules are out the door with older children, the one word to remember with photographing this age is PERSONALITY!  Bright colors, polka dots or stripes are ok when photographing a single child.  Have fun with it.  after all what you will want to see when you look back at these portraits in the years to come is “your child’s personality”   

When photographing siblings, all the suggestions above still apply.  Have fun, however, make sure the kids match.  you don’t want Suzy to be in bright pink and little Johnny to be in earth tones.   You can do a bright pink for Suzy and bright aqua blue on little Johnny.  Or a multi color pattern on Little Suzy and a solid color shirt on Johnny, just make sure johnny’s shirt is the same color as one of the colors in Suzy’s outfit.

Feel free to take a look at our web site, scroll through the galleries and see what you like.  www.YvonnesPhoto.com

As most of you know, Santa can be a scary person for a young child.  As a children’s photographer for over 16 years, I have found that the children that are generally more frightened of the big guy are, 18 months to 2 years old.   Over the past 7 years Santa and I have been working together, to capture the memories of your little ones.  We have found that we have the most successful visits with these age children when,   1. The child doesn’t feel pressured by Mom & Dad to “sit on Santa’s lap”   and  2. The child is given some time to explore their surroundings and feel more comfortable or safe in the present situation.   It is my recommendation that, if you have a child in this age range,  make sure that you are taking them to a place to visit Santa where you do not have to wait for long periods of time to see him, and you do not feel rushed when it is finally your turn.   At our studio, we schedule visits with Santa so that when you get here to see him, the child has time to get acclimated to their surroundings and sit across the room while Mom and/or Dad have a conversation with Santa (he has lots of stories to tell) Santa, will include your child in the conversation until they feel more comfortable with him, with that, in most cases Santa will have your child in his lap, smiling and enjoying the visit.  Remember, Santa has many years experience with children, he knows just the right things to say and do to get your child to trust him.  

 For the older children, Santa spends plenty of time with them talking about what they want for Christmas, or just simply what is on your childs mind at that particular time.  Santa enjoys these visits as much as your children do.  The sparkle in a childs eyes when they see him is pricless.  And to capture that sparkle in a portrait is one of the things Santa and I both love about our holiday season.