Posts Tagged: Blowing Rock Family Photography
8 Photographer Tips: What to Wear for Portraits
More from our mini-series of expert advice, and by the way, for those of you with score cards at home,… we don’t run around referring to ourselves as experts. We try to live humble lives where we work hard to be good at what we do. We just happen to have done this for so long, we know “some stuff.”
So today, I’m giving the 8 key pieces of info about what to wear to a professional portrait session. When it comes to what to wear for portraits, pretty much anything goes. But we know lots of Moms and teenagers stress when it comes to planning what to wear when in front of the camera.
1. Don’t be afraid to wear color. Colors in outdoor portraits that coordinate with the season look better than a wardrobe of black and white.
The Arnold family dressed perfectly during their spring, orchard portrait session. And the Church family’s autumn session is coordinated perfectly too.
Complimentary colors and shades work great especially for large families.
4. Wearing black or white along with khaki or denim are best in studio portraits or outdoors if you want a classic, traditional and timeless look.
Keeping it neutral allows personalities to shine through.
Sticking with the white, here is sweet Sawyer in his 6 month portrait session.
5. Shoes can most often date a photo more than any other piece of wardrobe. If the weather and surroundings lend itself, considering going with bare feet or stick with classic solid leather styles for adults and children. Children’s tootsies are so delicious (Ryan and I routinely munch on Finley’s….. his are just right for snackin’), if they can be outdoors and shoe-free, do it!
8. We also have a helpful “What to wear” Pinterest board for inspiration. Bear these in mind and you’ll look brilliant!
We love family portraits whether they are set in the studio, the great outdoors, a specific location like the mountains or high country, or on our property in our outdoor portrait garden. Pixels on Paper photographs, engagements and weddings, brides, and special events and portraits of all kinds in our Wilkesboro, NC studio. We would be honored to meet with you, learn about you and your family and be a part of taking special portraits that will become, we hope, family heirlooms.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License
All photos are ©2018 Pixels On Paper. Do not copy, crop, or remove watermark.
arnold family maternity portraits ~ a surprise gift
The Arnold family is special and so is the impulse behind this photo session. We had the pleasure of photographing Meghan and Jeremy’s wedding and capturing the first photos of their daughter Berklee as a newborn and 6 month old. Our newest session with this family was in February of this year and was engineered on the down low by husband Jeremy. Wife and mom, Meghan is due with their second child, a little boy they plan to name Wyatt and Jeremy decided that he wanted to surprise Meghan with the maternity photo session as a Christmas gift.
Note to wives: I know you know how to drop a hint. Enough said.]
I’ve gotta insert a flashback here. We sort of recreated a moment we captured in an orchard photo session from a couple of years ago. I love seeing Berklee’s little hands touching Meghan’s belly in between her parents. It’s perfectly reminiscent of her seated between them when she was just about a year old.
As they prepare for the newest Arnold to show up, he was included in the shoot – beyond Meghan’s belly. The baseball with Wyatt’s name was one of Jeremy’s while he played baseball for UNC Chapel Hill. We look forward to meeting this little man and seeing his resemblance to his sister and parents and what parts of his personality shine.
It’s hard not to include another photo from the orchard where we tied the two sessions together. Although Berklee is bigger, she can still be tossed in the air and loves it! I saw the same sweet smiles and same crazy joy on their faces.
We just LOVE having them as clients and cannot wait to meet new addition Wyatt. We feel confident that Berklee is going to be a wonderful big sister. Thanks, Arnold family! See you soon, we hope, with member number four.
We love family portraits whether they are set in the studio, the great outdoors, a specific location like the mountains or high country, or on our property in our outdoor portrait garden. Pixels on Paper photographs, engagements and weddings, brides, and special events and portraits of all kinds in our Wilkesboro, NC studio. We would be honored to meet with you, learn about you and your family and be a part of taking special portraits that will become, we hope, family heirlooms.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License
All photos are ©2018 Pixels On Paper. Do not copy, crop, or remove watermark.
Fatherhood ~ portraits and musings
“Beyond the need for sleep, my frustrations come from not knowing what makes him cry. He can be clean and fed and still fussy, and it’s hard as a guy to not be able to fix it. Patience is still top of the list for what we need for both parenting and photographing OUR newborn. You’ve got to be ready at any moment for that one thing to be amazing and on your toes when its time to capture it, whether with a camera or with your memory which will last just as long or longer. Having cameras to capture is great, but sometimes just being in the moment is way better.”
It’s hard – even when sleeping in ridiculously small increments – we’re drowning in grace and gratitude and constant epiphany. This parenting thing surpasses every other thing we’re doing. To Daddies out there – we love you.
We love family portraits whether they are set in the studio, the great outdoors, a specific location like the mountains or high country, or on our property in our outdoor portrait garden. Pixels on Paper photographs, engagements and weddings, brides, and special events and portraits of all kinds in our Wilkesboro, NC studio. We would be honored to meet with you, learn about you and your family and be a part of taking special portraits that will become, we hope, family heirlooms.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License
All photos are ©2017 Pixels On Paper. Do not copy, crop, or remove watermark.
Maddie’s Outdoor Fall Senior Portrait Photography
This wraps up the 3rd senior in the family of three kids – er young adults. We previously photographed Paiton and Quinton. Mom Timberli wanted photos every couple of years to capture the growth and changes in her three kids and you guys. Like her siblings, Paiton and Quinton, Maddie has transformed into a stunning young lady and amazing person.
Below: Maddie 2010, 2013 and 2017. See what I’m talking about? One minute she’s a barefooted girl, cute as the day is long, and now she’s elegance and grace. 
We’ve been planning these sessions all year with Timberli who wanted each of her seniors to be photographed during different seasons. Paiton was Spring, Quinton was Summer and now Maddie in Fall. The Roberts’ family home now showcases a collection of 24″x 36″ canvases of each senior.
Here they are … and parents everywhere sigh at how fast it all goes by. Now we’re hoping to convince parents Chris and Timberli they should do a Winter session to complete the seasons. We love this family and can’t wait to see all the other milestones they have ahead of them and that we hope to photograph.
We love family portraits whether they are set in the studio, the great outdoors, a specific location like the mountains or high country, or on our property in our outdoor portrait garden. Pixels on Paper photographs, engagements and weddings, brides, and special events and portraits of all kinds in our Wilkesboro, NC studio. We would be honored to meet with you, learn about you and your family and be a part of taking special portraits that will become, we hope, family heirlooms.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License
All photos are ©2017 Pixels On Paper. Do not copy, crop, or remove watermark.
A day in the life with the Guerrant family | documentary lifestyle photos
The Guerrant family asked us to photograph them with their 2 children on a single day – documentary style. We LOVE this type of photography, because it translates the desire to take selfies and snapshots and indulge in the every day, but into photos that are professionally shot and set up. You get the best of both worlds – the seemingly mundane with the magic in details and broad strokes, the togetherness, but with a trained pro behind the lens who is keeping an eye on light, shadow, scenery and all the options. 
Ryan photographed Suzie, Matt, Leven and Ira at W. Kerr Scott Lake in Wilkesboro a few weeks ago. We met Suzie and Matt at Merlefest a couple-few years ago and, as fellow photographers and Merlefest team members, we instantly connected with them.
We love their down to earth personalities and they are talented and fun photographers.
We were honored that the two of them would ask us to photograph their family. As photographers, we know so many others they could have chosen, so it was a huge compliment to be chosen for the task. What’s even better is that we knew we would soon be needing our very own family photos. We LOVE Suzie’s documentary style, especially her black and white photography. The timing was perfect for a trade.
This family was so much fun. They were so open and children – with their own curiosity and agenda, their own internal storytelling – made it a fun process. They were happy with the results and we couldn’t be more pleased.
This year Merlefest was like a reunion for us and they both showered us with joy and excitement over our pregnancy. We made sure to stay in constant contact after the fest this year.We spent half a day with the family as friends hanging out at the lake with camera in hand. Documenting the kids running, playing, fishing and eating watermelon gave us, we hope, a preview of what our life will be like when we add our son to the mix. There was very little posing, just natural lifestyle interactions and sugar highs.
We love family portraits whether they are set in the studio, the great outdoors, a specific location like the mountains or high country, or on our property in our outdoor portrait garden. Pixels on Paper photographs, engagements and weddings, brides, and special events and portraits of all kinds in our Wilkesboro, NC studio. We would be honored to meet with you, learn about you and your family and be a part of taking special portraits that will become, we hope, family heirlooms.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License
All photos are ©2017 Pixels On Paper. Do not copy, crop, or remove watermark.