Category Archives: family photography

On Location With Old Friends In The Chicago ‘Burbs!

by
1 Comment

We were recently in Chicago for a family event and while we were there we connected with my best friend from college in the suburbs for a family session on a brisk fall day in the park.  It’s fun to photograph old friends and to be able to get their kids and ours together for a visit during our road trip.  We go back over 25 years and it’s always a lot of fun when we get together.

Anyone who knows my buddy Barry knows he’s pretty passionate about his dogs and of course Half-Face and Omar were going to be included in the family portraits.  That’s where we’ll start – with all of the family!

Old Friends Great family and are those dogs beautiful or what?

Next we focused on getting some photos without the pups and if you have been a frequent follower of our work you know Ally is a big fan of the “family hug”!

Old Friends

The kids are getting to be so grown up!  To you they just look like great looking kids – for me it’s different because I’ve known them from the time they were born!

Here is a fun little behind the scenes vine from the session:

Next we focused in on getting some shots of just the kids as you can see from the vine.  Here are a couple of great ones…

Old Friends

So cute right?  Little sister loving on her older brother!  Having a boy and girl ourselves we just know this is exactly how they always get along!!!  Right?

And one more of the two of them just relaxing and hanging out together.

Old Friends

So there you have it – on location with old friends in the Chicago ‘burbs – it’s about as good as it gets for us!  We hope you enjoyed these highlights from the session!

United This Family Stands….and Smiles, and Hugs!

by
No Comments

This beautiful family came to the studio recently for a photo session and they were a pleasure to be with.  One of the kids was slightly under the weather, but I won’t even reveal which one because the kid was a total trooper and you would never know which one it was!  Meanwhile everyone got along and picked each other up, made each other laugh and generally had a good time, so yes we can definitely say that united this family stands….and smiles, and hugs!

We stayed with the black background for this session which always works well.  Our primary goal to start out with was to get a classic family shot to be displayed on canvas for the wall above the fireplace, so often we try to make the most important shot the first shot.  We had several to choose from but this one is the winner…

United This Family

What a stunning family right?  Next we spent some time on just the kids, individually as well as some group shots and that’s where we captured one of Ally’s favorite family poses – the family hug!  See what I did there?  You knew that was coming from the blog title….  ha!

United This Family

So cute!  Just great kids and we had fun with them.  Here is our fun behind the scenes vine of the morning with the family hug in action!

Next let’s take a look at this combination of just the mommy with her babies!

United This Family

And lastly let’s celebrate where this family all started – with the happy couple responsible for all this love!

United This Family

 

So there it is – our wonderful united family!  They are totally worthy of being the subjects of the first blog post on our brand new website!  We hope you enjoyed the photos!

 

A Frameable Fun Fall Session With A Family Of Three!

by
No Comments

We have been buried in seniors from the class of 2015 lately which we love, but a frameable fun fall session with a family of three was a nice change of pace especially at the height of fall colors!  What a fun couple with what Ally would refer to as a squishy yummy little boy named Josh.  Josh gave us great smiles and we had much fun!

We went to one of our go-to spots in a neighborhood close by and the conditions were just right!  There are trees and bridges and just a lot to work with there.  We started with the bridge:

Frameable Fun Fall Session

How cute is the little man?  Cute enough that we moved on to working on some solo shots to give him the spotlight and Ally captured this sweet photo of Josh just being a happy little boy sitting in the leaves…

Frameable Fun Fall Session

Next we looked to get a few more family shots under a tree filled with and surrounded by pretty yellow and orange leaves – it was a great spot which gave us some great results!

Frameable Fun Fall Session

Love the interaction here of the three of them just being a family.  And we have a little of this on our fun behind the scenes vine of the morning!  You’ll see here that when we went back to the house afterwards to try to get a few more with the dogs that Ally got a little surprise…  haha!

As mentioned in the vine this part of the session with the dogs was a bit more challenging but we did get one last family shot on the deck that we’ll share here!

Frameable Fun Fall Session

And there you have it!  Highlights from a Frameable fun fall session with a family of three that we hope you enjoyed!

Ayla Is A Sweet Little Angel!

by
3 Comments

Ayla is a sweet little angel indeed and we were thrilled to have her here at the studio!  She is a beautiful smiley little bundle of joy and she brought a ton of style and personality to her session even at only 4 months old!  We have been so busy photographing high school seniors which we love, but having this adorable little yummy smush was a nice change of pace to be sure, and we love her family.

We started off with Ayla in her baptism gown on the red couch.  It is worth noting that Ayla’s grandmother made this gown for her!  How amazing is that?  Such love – so special and so pretty!

little angel

She is so cute!  Next we moved to another fun outfit on one of our chairs for a few photos.  Here are a couple…   First let’s start with the damask backdrop.  We like to call this look the “O” mouth!  🙂

little angel

Such a fun look of wonder on her face!  Then we moved to the brown background:

little angel

Her daddy loves this photo.  Love her smile!  Habibti!

Meanwhile here is a little fun behind the scenes vine of Miss Ayla during her session!

Lastly we will leave you with this precious moment between Ayla and her mommy…

little angel

That’s what it’s all about isn’t it?  As good as it gets.  We loved this session and we hope you enjoyed these sneak peeks of sweet little angel Ayla!

Just A Totally Stunning Family!

by
2 Comments

Just a totally stunning family is the only way to describe these folks.  We were so happy to hear from them since it had been a while since we photographed them for their Debut parties for both daughters a few years ago.  They are just beautiful people – fun loving, nice, and well, stunning!

We were on the road in Chicago when we got the call that they wanted to come in for a family photo session on a day when they were dressing up to go to a gala reunion event.  The event was 4 days away and we had a slot available so it worked out nicely.  When this family does something they do it in style, and in style was how they arrived at the studio for sure!  One of the primary goals of the shoot was to get a family portrait to replace an older one above their fireplace and this one is a clear candidate for that:

totally stunning family

But while we were at it we grabbed some photos of the couple, some of the kids, some of just “the girls” and just “the boys”.  They were changing into outfits with each one more beautiful than the last and the colors just pop against the red background.  What a fantastic session!  Check out the “family hug”!

totally stunning family

Now get ready for some crazy trickery – look at the total reverse we pulled off midway through this vine!  Red on white, white on Red!  Ha!!!

Such A Cute Smiley Shmushy Boy!

by
No Comments

Such a cute smiley shmushy boy was here with his parents recently!  That’s really the only way I can describe him.  Okay I guess you could use sweet and squishy too – any way you put it he was awesome and his parents were really nice too.  We had a lot of fun – lots of laughing and lots of Spanish too!  Ally just wanted to eat him right up.

Smiley Shmushy Boy

See what I mean?  Love this kid!  You can really get a feel for someone’s personality even at this young of an age – he is just a good natured smiley happy little boy, and why shouldn’t he be?  That’s how his parents are.  Peek-a-boo games are fun with the little ones to get them going sometimes and this session was no different with calls of “Donde esta Leo?” from his mom!  If you follow this blog you know I often like to include behind the scenes vines from the session.  This session was notable for producing one of my all time favorites!  Leo was totally in motion while his mom was holding him, and then it was like the little man was completely entranced when he saw that he was on camera – look:

A Family Session With Four At Five And Under!

by
No Comments

A family session with four at five and under can pose a challenge on paper no doubt, and Ally loves a challenge!  Of course we do a lot of planning and take plenty of time to make sure we get the photos we need, and when the kids are well behaved and cooperative that certainly helps.  There is a fine line however – “well-behaved” at a young age can mean “not allowed to be kids and have fun” if you’re not careful, and we do want to capture their personalities.  This particular crew struck the perfect balance – they had plenty of fun, but they also listened and stood where we needed when we needed and we were able to get great results!

Four At Five And Under

Such a fun family!  We would be remiss if we did not mention that we have met Rabbi Yarden before since our daughter has volunteered at Friendship Circle for some time now – an outstanding organization that is doing phenomenal things around the globe.  If you are not familiar with Friendship Circle I encourage you to take a look at the important work they are doing for people with special needs.  He and his wife Bayla are both on staff there so it was nice to have them and their family here.  This vine should give you a little behind the scenes flavor of how this session went…

A Mom and Two Daughters Together Is A Work Of Art!

by
No Comments

A mom and two daughters together is a work of art without a doubt!  We would love to see more sessions just like this one with a mother and grown daughters.  Having them together is very special especially if they are not living in the same city and so are the results!

A Mom and Two Daughters

Meanwhile I’ll apologize if this is cheesy (and she doesn’t know I’m putting this in this blog post) but Amy is the mom and I want to give her a plug.  Part of the reason I worked “art” into the theme here is her business is Artworks by Amy and we love our very own “Frameable Faces Artworks” she made for us which we display here in the studio.  Our business card holder that greets you when you enter the studio and our outgoing mail holder were both made by Amy.  She does fantastic work on all kinds of items.  Here is the vine we posted when we first got ours… as you can see Ally was pretty happy!

Persistence Paid Off With This Happy Family!

by
2 Comments

Yes persistence paid off with this happy family!  Sometimes life, scheduling and various circumstances can get in the way of a scheduled photo session.  What are you going to do?  Sometimes it happens and that is just the way it goes!  This fun family was supposed to come to the studio once before but it didn’t end up working out.  We stayed in touch and ended up getting it rescheduled.   Then, the day before the session a minor sports injury occurred which threatened to “leave a mark” on one of the boys the day before the shoot!  Could the session be foiled again?

persistence paid off

Well as you can see by the fun family photo above the little guy shook it off and we were able to do the session without even resorting to any injury retouching!  I am not even going to tell you which brother it was!  Nothing to see here people!  Nothing to see that is other than just great pictures!  We hope you enjoy these sneak peeks.  Next we have a couple of individual shots of these handsome young men.  We like the way these look in black and white of both little brother and big brother:

persistence paid off

persistence paid off

Next we have a fun behind the scenes vine and as you can see we worked with several cute poses!

A Family Session With A Young Director Firmly In Control!

by
No Comments

This session gave us a chuckle for sure.  The son in this wonderful family was one tough negotiator.  He pretty much ran the entire session!  This little guy is a driver and we are confident that he will be the one to get things done when he gets older!  It was definitely a family session with a young director firmly in control!  First let’s take a look at the family portrait:

Young director firmly in control

It was fun watching Ally go back and forth with him as he commanded Ally to “Take the photo before my eyes get squinty” or “Wait delete that one!” or “Only 5 more good photos – and I’m officially counting” or “That’s not manly!”  Ally loves a fun “challenge” and we had a lot of fun while getting some great photos.  The next couple photos are priceless.  Let’s start with father and son enjoying a good laugh!

Young director firmly in controlBoys love their moms that is for sure.  Ally definitely captured that in the next photo:Young director firmly in control

Last but not least our director got his own time in the spotlight!Young director firmly in control

We hope you enjoyed these!  We certainly enjoyed our time with these folks and especially with our little director!