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Laguna Beach Family Photography

Each and every year for over ten years I make my entire family get together for a family photo session.  Not just my husband and kids…. but my mom and dad, my sister and her family and my brother and his family.  We pick a color scheme, a location and we spend about two hours creating beautiful portraits, as well as some very funny memories.  I then spend my last spare moments during the holidays putting together either a coffee table book or an album for everyone for Christmas.  Every time we get together as a family, the kids sit down and look through the years of their albums and books and laugh.  I am so very glad that I MADE everyone join me, even if it was a really busy year, even if I had to stay up until 2 AM to finish the albums and that I have these precious memories to enjoy year and after year.

That is why I always encourage all my clients to do the same thing, document their family each year and put together some kind of book or album.  Sometimes in the moment, it seems like a real hassle, or like a large investment, but in the end it is one of the best gifts a family can give themselves.

Here is the beautiful Hawkins family that I documented for the first time last year.  I loved how different all the boys personalities were and how much they all loved each other.  Enjoy!

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Laguna Beach Family Photography: The Potalivo Family

Pam called me up saying she had been dreaming of getting great family portraits for years.  After visiting to her niece’s house and admiring the Blue Sky’s portraits on the wall, she decided to make the call.  She was a little worried as her guys were all grown and had their own ideas about clothing and style, but she decided to go ahead and book a session.

Fast forward a few months to a gorgeous afternoon with huge waves on a beautiful beach in Laguna and we had the perfect day for her family portraits.  After her oldest threatened to wear a vintage hawaiian shirt, she was pleasantly surprised when he showed up in a nice dress shirt and jeans.

My favorite part of this photo session was how much warmth and love this family showed to one another and how willing they were to follow my directions, even when they were a little unsure of the results.  Thanks to the whole family for working with me and I hope you enjoy the portraits! :)

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Anatomy of a photography session: Newport Beach Kids Portraits

Lucky, lucky me that I get to work with these two beautiful gals every year around their birthday.  While I have a lot of advantages when it comes to these two because we know each other really well, they love getting their portraits taken and they are typically up for anything, there are still many things Mom & Dad & I have to collaborate on before we actually start the session.

1) Location, location, location…. When you photograph kids every year, or families for that matter, they want variety.  While it is kinda cool to pick one place and shoot there every year to show how the family has changed, it is not my thing (and I am guessing most of my clients would agree that it isn’t theirs either).  So, when I photograph the same kiddos year after year, it is one of my challenges to come up with new, fun, hip places to shoot them annually.  Typically this is a collabrative effort.  As many of my clients can atest to, we start planning for the following year’s session as we wrap up this years!  My clients have been amazing at coming up with cool themes and new locations throughout Orange County.

2)  Is there a location that best capture the kiddos or the family at this time in their history:  For example, and I know you ALL know this, my family spends all their extra time at the swimming pool.  AND the swimming pool is located at Soka University.  So it just made sense that in 2012 we photographed my family on Soka’s campus.  AND yes, we got one picture with the pool in the background… Thanks to Emily Ivey at Fresh Ivey photography for shooting the session!

When it came to deciding a location for the twins session, we considered a number of factors, such as where have we shot in the past, the age of the girls, what would be a fun spot to capture their true personalities, and where could we get a lot of different “looks” in walking proximity.  We came up with the Fun Zone in Newport Beach.

3) Now, what should they wear- Coordinate but don’t be matchy/ matchy. My mantra.  The clothing should match the location, the age and the story you are trying to tell about the kids/ family.  In the twins case, we wanted bright bold colors to go with the colorful background of the ferris wheel and arcade, more neutral clothing with a pop of color for the beach and denim for the candy story.

Often I also encourage incorporating props or personal items to make the session my client’s unique story.  Since we went to the candy story, the candy made a perfect prop!

Here is the results!  Enjoy!

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Laguna Beach portraits: A Soft Foggy Evening

What a fun, crazy, busy summer it has been so far.  We have been photography families from all over the US on holiday, photographing lots of weddings with Bliss by Blue Sky’s, photographing Blue Sky’s seniors and enjoying time with our family and friends.

I know it has been a while since I shared!   The beaches have been challenging this summer, but we managed to slip in a few sessions.

While fog isn’t the ideal condition for family photography, in the Hardie girls case I think it added a soft, romantic quality to the session!   I love how soft and almost monochromatic these images are!  And these gals are gorgeous!  Enjoy!

Loving our Laguna Beach summer!

Wow, it seems like for the last five years at least half of the summer in Laguna was overcast, and while I think overcast skys can lead to gorgeous photography, there is nothing like a golden sun for beautiful portraits!  So you can imagine that I was excited to take down Ella for a celebration session of her toothless smile!  The tide was a little high and we had to battle the water, but the session was amazing.  That was until I was informed that there were no beach photography sessions allowed on Victoria Beach until after Labor Day.  I am not one to rant, but this seems a little crazy to me.  Isn’t this a public beach???? Don’t families, brides and couples come from all over the world to have their pictures taken in Laguna Beach.  I have to imagine that the wedding industry significantly helps Laguna Beach’s economy.  So WHY would you outlaw all session until summers end?  Totally crazy if you ask me!

Anyway, they didn’t stop us from getting some amazing images!  Thanks to the Taber gals for being so understanding and going with the flow!