Children
Our portraits of adults are not often, of course, candid shots. They are studies, some made in the studio and some outside, often in nearby Mellon Park. However, with children, we feel it is absolutely essential to limit ourselves to candid — or at least unposed — portraits, wherever and however they are made. Of course, there's no sharp line between children's photos and those of adults, and no reason to exclude parents from photos of children. In fact we encourage parents to be photographed along with the children. We love to make family portraits. We just try to maintain a particularly informal approach to all this work with children.
For lots of photographs of children with and without their parents click on Portfolios at the top of this page and then on the Children thumbnail on the Portfolios page. (The family photographs are in the Portraits portfolio!)
View larger images of Rowan here.
Making natural, relaxed, significant portraits of children demands of us both patience and ingenuity — not to mention fast reactions! We have a good stock of toys and encourage parents to bring a few from home, whether or not those are to appear in the photographs.
If you are interested in portraits of your child or children, we suggest
you call to set up a preliminary appointment.
There
is no charge for this. We will want to meet with you and especially we'll
need to spend some time playing with the child a few days before the portrait
session. We want to get to know you a little, and to understand your needs.
And above all we want to establish a good, easy relationship with your
child, (The studio environment is sometimes surprisingly daunting even
for children who are model subjects at home and we need to make it clear
that this is a fun place to visit.) At the same time, we can talk with
you about clothes, and the choice between color or black and white - or
both and how to prepare the child(ren) for the session – mostly
by doing nothing out of the ordinary!
The Sitting
We'll set up a date and time in advance. When you are thinking of a portrait for babies and young children, think early in the day, probably around 10:30 or 11, maybe a little later because of nap-time.
Sometimes
it's hard to fit this into the schedules of busy parents, but it's very
important to avoid late afternoons or evenings. We have never yet photographed
a child who is more responsive late in the day, after day-care or school,
than they are in the morning or very early afternoon. Even older children
respond so much better on a day when there's no school and they can come
in during the morning rather than when they've been in school all day.
Of course the little ones are often very lively just before bed, but this is misleading. It's virtually impossible to take advantage of that final burst of energy. The mood is so fragile late in the day, and easily dissolves into tears or worse before we can take a single photograph.
Generally, two of us work together to make the portrait. We don't hesitate to fool around on the kids' level; we'll be as silly as it takes. We're happy to play with the subject(s) for as long as is necessary, before we even go into the camera room. But once we start, we work fast even though we continue playing. All photo sessions should be just as short as possible – and that is specially true when children are involved.
Now
a word on postponing the session! Kids often suddenly come down with a
cold, or a fever, acquire scratches on their faces, bumps on their foreheads,
or new teeth in their gums, just when you planned a photo session. No
matter. Call us to postpone. Don't dose them up or paint their faces.
Call us, even at the last minute and we'll happily reschedule! Sick kids
take dismal portraits: medicine inside or makeup outside has remarkably
little effect on the photos. Sometimes the child just isn't in the right
mood when you arrive. No matter. We'll try hard, then if necessary simply
pack up and try again another day. That seldom fails.
Our sitting fee for children is more a retainer than a sitting fee. The
first time you come in with one of your children you pay a fee which covers
the sitting and also a digital proof album.
Some
photographs can be with Mom and/or Dad at no extra charge if you wish.
In addition, the fee covers sittings, as many as you wish, for the child(ren)
who came in for the first sitting, and siblings as well, right up to your
youngest child's sixth birthday. Your children can come in together, separately,
and in various combinations! (If there are more than two children, the
basic sitting fee is a little higher but the same principles apply.) Each
time you bring the child(ren) in, after the first, you will pay only a
per page price for the digital proof booklet that we make from the sitting.
There is never any additional sitting fee. And you are never obliged to
buy any photographs beyond the proofs.
As with our portraits of adults, much of our child portraiture is done
in black and white. We love the results. Abstracting away the color often
seems to allow us to capture something special about the child, which
can be lost in color portraits. However, we mostly shoot both color and
black and white film at a single session, and recommend doing that unless
you are absolutely certain you don&'t want to, for we find we are often
surprised by the color images when we expected black and white to be perfect—and
vice versa.
Proofs and Prints
After
the session, we will prepare the proofs, which are included in the sitting
fee the first time you come. They should be ready to pick up in about
ten days, all printed digitally in an attractive and handy magazine-style
proof folder, which is yours to keep. The black and white images, although
recorded on film for hand enlarging in our studio darkroom, have been
scanned in to the computer and will appear side-by-side with the digital
color images in the proof folder. You will find it easy to order from
this folder, and it is great to keep as well, as a record of the growth
of your children. We have parents who order very little beyond the proofs
but have their children come in often so they now have a pile of little
picture-books of their growing family!
We do not sell portrait packages. In fact you do not need to order enlargements. However, prints are available in various sizes and these can be ordered at any time. Once ordered they will be made for you as quickly as possible.
If you haven't already looked at the section on Portraits, you might want to go there now, since much of what we wrote there is relevant here, too. However, we will repeat some of the main points, in particular those dealing with our black and white portraits.
Our black and white portraits are made on black and white film, properly
processed and printed with great care. 
The
proofs are made digitally from the film we shoot, but the enlargements
are printed by hand: archival prints are made in our darkroom on heavy
fiber-based paper from Europe. After printing they are washed for several
hours and toned with selenium to enhance the tone and increase permanency.
We will not generally "desaturate" our digital files of color images, printing these in black and white using inks or dyes unless you specially request this. Despite what is now sometimes claimed, we do not believe that this approach is satisfactory: the photographs lack texture and are always less intense than a true black and white negative printed on fiber-based paper containing lots of silver. In addition, they will not last as long as our prints.
For more on our use of both digital and film-based capture and printing,
see the opening paragraphs of the Weddings page,
and also About Us: Our Photography.
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