One session, built around a whole extended family. We photograph the full group first, while everyone is fresh and the light is best. Then we work through the family one household at a time — each set of parents and their children, the grandparents alone, the siblings together, the grandchildren all at once. Every household leaves with portraits of their own, and the family leaves with the one photograph that has everybody in it.
Planned groupings, a shot list agreed in advance, and a pace that works for a two-year-old and an eighty-eight-year-old on the same afternoon.
The full group, then each family within it. Nobody leaves with only a picture they're standing at the edge of.
Laguna's coves and bluffs, Little Corona, Newport Coast — or your own back garden, which is often the better answer for a very large group.
Beach permits, parking, timing around the tide and the sunset, and where twenty-six people should actually park. That's our job, not yours.
A call to work out how many people, how many households, who has trouble with stairs, who's likely to be difficult about it, and what the family actually wants on the wall afterwards. We build the grouping list from that.
We photograph everybody together at the start, while the children are still cooperative and the light is at its best. The hardest photograph of the day gets made while it's easiest.
We work through the family in a planned order so no one stands around, and so each household gets real portraits of their own rather than an afterthought.
About two weeks later we sit down together, look at the images properly, and design what goes on the wall and what goes in the album. Each household chooses its own artwork.
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Blue Sky's Studio Photography
462 Bent Street Laguna Beach, CA 92651