When Denise first emailed me to inquire about a photo session for her three sons, she used the words “fun” and “playful” to describe the feeling she wanted to communicate. I am so glad those are the adjectives she chose, because had she said, “posed” and “traditional,” I don’t think I could have delivered on that promise.
I’ve found that the best photos are those that match the personality of the subjects. Serious people take really nice serious photos. Zany people can pull off wacky poses. It’s all about knowing yourself, and as a photographer, knowing your audience. Denise knows her audience very well. Her sons are very sweet and very handsome–but two out of the three have a hard time sitting still. {I’ll give you one guess as to who’s who.} So instead of sitting and posing, we played and ran around and laughed…and the younger two did a little whomping on their {dazzlingly patient} older brother. All in all, I think we had fun {at least I did} and hopefully the two little ones were worn out by the end of it all.
I’m pretty much in love with this series of images. It’s all fun and games to the middle child–meanwhile the well meaning youngest just giggles.
While the boys were laying on the blanket the little ones were pretending to sneeze–then laughing wildly. I still don’t quite understand why it was so funny. To me the funniest part was that one would go, “Ahh, Ahhh, ahh…” then roll over toward toward Jordan {big brother} and let out a spit-shooting “CHOO!” Then they’d laugh again and roll around, occasionally giving Jordan a solid hit on the head…or kick to the belly.
The moral of the story is, I love people with personality–and I love parents that are eager to let that personality show in photos. That’s the Art of the Moment. I’m sure as time goes on, they’ll learn to sit still–and stop hitting–and smile on command–and stop pretending that they just “fell asleep” with closed eyes and gaping mouth when Mom requests that they look at the camera {yes, that was happening}–but I think these things are precious and worth remembering. Unabashed childhood and confidence to be a full fledged goof ball on picture day are fleeting. I think it’s a stage of life worth freezing and keeping forever.
