The Tanager Blog

Last Saturday I did a shoot for the Luellig family up in Thornton. They’re daughter, Mary (pictured above with five-month-old Lorene), works with my friend Caroline, and since the whole group would be in town for Thanksgiving, they wanted to preserve it.

It snowed overnight and it was bitterly cold, so our initial idea of environmental portraits at the nearby park had to be scrubbed. We set up in the Luellig’s family room and got to work. Pictured here are the three daughters and their kids: Mary with Lorene, Jennifer, and Laura with Parker.

Parker is 10-months old and he and his cousin Lorene made for an extra cute scene on the couch.

For 70 minutes of shooting, they were remarkably patient for their tender age. Lots of smiles for the parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents who were standing over my shoulder.

Here are the boys: Danny, Paul, and Hans with Parker…

…and another shot of the daughters: Mary, Laura and Jennifer.

The Luellig’s home was situated with a lot of natural light, which was great. For families, I always prefer the more natural look of soft light coming in the window than the harshness of a flash.

Once we got every combo checked off the list, I set up the white seamless and took a series of fun shots of the grandparents with the kids. Paul was happy to find that Parker and Lorene can still fit in both of his arms, but give it a month and that probably won’t be the case!

The shot on the left below was my favorite from the day…perhaps one of my favorites all year. There is a natural sweetness in how Lorene is resting on grandpa’s shoulder.

And here’s grandma with Parker.

I have two more family shoots lined up between now and New Years. They’re good fun and the families I’ve worked with this year have been a delight. Now I need to get going on marketing my services for weddings, engagement shoots and individual portraits, the latter of which I want to do more of.

Slowly but surely, a business plan is coming together for 2009.