Silsden, Skipton and Ilkley based photographer specialising in children's, baby and family photography

Our Trip to Cuba

23/4/2017

This Easter we headed off to Cuba for an amazing week. It had been on our bucket list for years but we never got around to it before having kids so this year we decided we were finally brave enough to go long haul with them (we were also desperate to go before Cuba's improving links with the USA change it too much and it loses its unique character). It was ridiculously photogenic so what follows is just small selection of the photos that I took...

*See below for a few details about the holiday as I've had a lot of people asking!

about the holiday...

First things first, going to Cuba for a week was a lot cheaper than you might expect. Going long haul is never going to be cheap, but it compared very favourably with European destinations because the prices don't get raised so much during school holidays as it's not such a typical family destination for UK families (though it should be!). You can get direct flights there from Manchester which was a big plus for us as it saved the journey down to Heathrow or Gatwick, and flight time is about 9 hours with a very short coach transfer to the hotels once you land. We went with Thomas Cook but there are plenty of tour operators that go there and there's a huge choice of hotels. We chose ours because it offers family bungalows set a 5 minute walk away from the main hotel complex - it was perfect as it was lovely and quiet and we had a living room to spread out into so the kids could go to bed and we weren't trapped sitting in a dark hotel room while they slept!

Our hotel was the Sol Palmeras in Varadero. We weren't sure what to expect from Varadero as it's one of the main tourist resorts on the island (which we would normally avoid!), but we were really pleasantly surprised. The hotels are all spread out so once you're in your hotel's grounds you have no idea there are other large hotels quite nearby. The stunning private beach was for hotel guests only and it looked like it was straight out of a holiday brochure - I've never seen colours like it. Almost all of the big hotels are all inclusive which we've never done before, but we couldn't fault it. It made things so easy with the kids and I have to say I would definitely be happy to do all inclusive again!

We had a couple of day trips out - one to Havana and one in a 4 x 4 jeep safari into the countryside. Havana was easily one of the most stunning cities I've ever visited - the whole place looked like a film set. We were driven there in a vintage American car and shown around all day by a wonderful tour guide. The whole of Cuba is stuck in a bit of a time warp ever since US sanctions were imposed after the Revolution at the end of the 1950s - that's why most of the cars date from that era. The time warp is visible everywhere you go in Cuba but perhaps even more so in Havana. Combine that with it being a World Heritage Site and it definitely makes for a spectacular place to visit. We spent most of our time in Old Havana (which dates back to the 1500s), as well as some of the landmarks from the Revolution. We also requested a trip into a more "normal" suburb to get a taste of real Cuban life and it was incredibly interesting, especially for the kids. It is incredibly safe there and walking around with the kids was a pleasure. I can't recommend it enough!

Our other day trip out in a 4 x 4 convoy was great fun! We (and by "we" I mean my husband as I'm a wuss) drove our own jeep all day (they didn't even check we had a driving licence!) and the kids loved seeing the Cuban countryside. We swam in a flooded cave, had lunch on a farm listening to a Cuban band, and finished the day with a speedboat trip through a mangrove lined river. The kids said it was their favourite day of the whole holiday (even better than the unlimited ice cream by the pool at the hotel which is saying a lot!).

In terms of practicalities, you don't need a visa to visit if you're a UK national - you just fill out a tourist card on the plane which takes 2 minutes and is usually included in the cost of your holiday. You can't get CUC (the Cuban currency used by tourists) outside of Cuba so instead we just took GBP cash and you can easily exchange it at the airport or hotel. Tipping is part of Cuban culture so try to get some small denominations if you can! We all had a few booster jabs before going, though there's nothing compulsory, only recommended. You also don't need anti malarial tablets at all in Cuba which is a bonus and although we took precautions with deet spray we actually didn't see a single mosquito the whole time we were there (but that was partly due to the season). We found Easter to be a great time of year to visit - very pleasant weather in the high 20s, and it's well before hurricane season starts (June - November).

So I think that covers most aspects of the holiday! It really was amazing and if you fancy a holiday somewhere a bit different then I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it!

And finally, if you want to view any of the photos individually, here's the full gallery....

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SleekLens PRESETS - A REVIEW

28/3/2017

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I was recently delighted to be contacted by the lovely people over at SleekLens to say that they love my portrait work and would I mind testing out some of their Lightroom presets on a few of my photos. Of course I was happy to oblige so in exchange for a free set of their "Strike a Pose workflow" Lightroom presets and brushes I agreed to give a completely honest review. I've really enjoyed playing with them so here are my thoughts...

The first thing I noticed was how many presets and brushes are included - it's a lot! I think there are 62 brushes and 69 presets in the pack, all designed to help with portrait workflow. As with any Lightroom presets and brushes they're very easy to install and full instructions were provided with the download so even if you've never done it before it will only take you a couple of minutes.

Once they were installed it was time to get playing! Here are a few before and afters along with my thoughts and which tools I used...

This first image (as with all my "before" shots) is straight out of camera and just converted straight from RAW to jpeg with no adjustments at all...

Here it is using the SleekLens preset Sunset Portrait 2 as well as the reduce reds in their colour/tint adjustments. I have made no additional adjustments at all but the first thing I noticed was just how much it has made the eyes pop and the sunset portrait preset certainly gives the image some extra warmth. It's perhaps a touch warmer than I would normally edit but if you're aiming for that sunset look then it certainly helps...

Next up I thought I would try out one of the black and white presets that are included in the pack. Here's the before shot...

And here it is using the greyscale matte preset, along with the high contrast polish preset. I also added some extra clarity. I really like that although it gives the matte look I was easily able to maintain some depth and I really like how it's turned out ...

Here's the next "before" shot....

And here it is using the SleekLens hide and seek preset, along with the high contrast and sharpen polish adjustments. I like how this combination has turned out as it has kept the colours very realistic and true to the setting, but it has just given it that extra something that it needed. ...

Last but not least I decided to try the presets out on a non human subject to to see how they looked. Here's my before shot...

And here it is using the base - auto tone preset as well as the high contrast polish preset. As you can see I also cropped the image but the presets definitely helped the image the pop and really brought out those highlights in the background nicely...

So, what do you think to the SleekLens presets? There's lots more included in the pack but those were the ones that really stood out to me and fitted in the closest to my usually editing style.

If you want to find out more about SleekLens, their presets and their editing service then you can find out more here...

https://sleeklens.com/product/strike-a-pose-portrait-workflow/
https://sleeklens.com/prod uct/professional-photo-editing-service/
https://sleeklens.com/product-category/lightroom-presets/
https://www.pinterest.com/sleeklens/lightroom-presets/

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"How did you get that weird photo of the stars??"

12/9/2013

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I'm going a little off topic with today's post, as it's nothing to do with child photography, but I've had an increasing number of requests for information on how to take a star trail photo, so I thought an article here would be useful to anyone else who enjoys standing outside on a cold, dark night staring up at the stars and getting strange looks from passers-by....

A star trail photo is basically just a very long exposure of the night sky. The Earth's rotation means that over the course of even just an hour or so, the stars change positions in our view of the sky quite a lot. And you can capture this perceived movement on camera really quite easily.

The photo on the left was a special star trail for two of my good friends who got married recently. I hadn't done a star trail with people in before but I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. Despite their giggling, they managed to stay pretty still!

So, how to go about getting a star trail photo....

First things first - to get a successful star trail photo you'll need some equipment:

* a dslr camera, with manual controls and a fully charged battery
* a sturdy tripod
* a cable shutter release that you can then effectively lock the shutter button down with (you can get these on ebay for about £2)
* a suitable lens, but any will do really. A few considerations come into play here when selecting a lens - composition, aperture, and focal length. The wider the focal length, the slower the stars will appear to move, so to get impressive star trails at 10mm you'd need to spend a lot longer than at 50mm, for example. But 10mm might allow a much more interesting composition, so it's something you'll have to weigh up depending on individual circumstances. And the wider you open your aperture the more light you'll let in - ie the more stars your camera will be able to see (but you'll have a shallower depth of field so you'll need to think carefully about your focus).
* a clear night, preferably with little or no moon (but it can be done if there is a moon - clear nights in England are rare so we can't afford to be too picky!). If the moon is out then you won't want it in your shot though.
* a location as far away from light pollution as possible for best results, but it can be achieved even in cities.
* warm clothes!

The two methods for getting a star trail photo:

1. A single, really long exposure. This is perhaps the simplest way, however with increased length of exposure comes increased noise. You also risk blowing out any highlights that might be in your foreground etc. I tend to avoid this method but have seen some nice examples using it and it can certainly be used to good effect.
2. Using free software to stack a series of 30 second exposures and create your final photo. This is how I do my star trails as it keeps noise down. It's this method that I will detail below.

Getting the shot(s!):

1. Find something interesting to put in your foreground. Make sure it doesn't move or it'll become a blurry mess over the course of the long exposure. The bride and groom above were under strict instructions not to move for the 30 seconds they were in shot.

2. Decide on your composition. You'll want to consider not only what you've chosen for your foreground interest, but also the direction you're facing, as this has a big impact on how the star trails will look. For example, point your camera at the North Star and the stars will appear to move in circles around it while it remains stationary (I am assuming you're in the Northern Hemisphere). Other directions will give different curves but no circles.

3. Check you're happy with your composition and settings before spending a whole evening committed to them! To do this I do two things. Firstly, I take a single 5 minute exposure at a low ISO so that I can start to see a few star trails forming but the image isn't blown out. This allows me to tell if I've managed to get the position of the north star exactly where I want in the shot (of course if you're not pointing north then you can ignore this tip, although it will still give you an idea for the type of curves your star trails will form). Next, I take a single 30 second exposure at all the settings I think I will be using, to check I can see enough stars. A good starting point to experiment from would be a fairly wide aperture and ISO 400. If you can't see enough stars, either open your aperture wider or raise your ISO. I frequently find I'm using ISO 1000 to get plenty of star trails, but I do live in a light polluted area.

4. Check your white balance from your test shots and adjust if necessary, but I find that no white balance setting is perfect for this and I frequently end up making changing during post processing to the final image so don't worry too much about which one you choose. Just make sure you don't leave it on auto or the camera may well decide to change it half way through the series of shots.

5. Camera on manual, set your shutter speed to 30 seconds, and set your camera's shutter mode to continuous burst and attach your shutter release cable. From your experiments above you should now have decided which aperture and ISO works best for your shot. I usually have my aperture as wide open as possible and work my ISO from this depending on how the stars look in my test shot). I always shoot jpeg fine for star trails.

6. Focus. I tend to use hyper focal distances to ensure my whole shot is in sharp focus despite the wide aperture. I usually focus on my foreground object by shining a torch on it and auto-focusing on that spot, then switching it to manual focus whilst it's set on this point. Leave it on manual focus for the rest of the evening so the camera doesn't decide to change it!

7. You're good to go! Lock your shutter release cable button down and have a cup of tea! Stop the shots whenever you decide you're too cold/bored/scared of the dark... I usually find an hour produces nice results, but anything from 30 minutes to 12 hours(!) will produce nice star trails.

8. If you want to, you can also use your first and last shots of the sequence to light up your foreground interest a bit. I do it for both first and last shots and then I can keep whichever I think turned out the best and bin the other one.

9. I also take a couple of dark frames to use in the software for dark frame subtraction. Just take a photo using the same settings at the start of the sequence with your lens cap on, and another at the end of your sequence with your lens cap on. It helps improve the finished result as the software uses this to isolate any hot pixels etc.

Stacking the photos:

I use startrails.exe, which is brilliant freeware designed exactly for this purpose, but it only works on PCs. There's also starstax which works on MAC and PC. And, I haven't used it, but deepskystacker also works for this. All three of these are free to download, and very straightforward to use. You just import all of your photos, including any dark frames into the correct section, and the software does the rest - it really is that easy. They provide various options for blending and automatically filling any gaps etc for you to have a play around with. The whole process takes only a couple of minutes and some even provide you with the option to create a timelapse video of the photos.

I hope this is useful to some of you! And if you discover any great sites to take star trails then please do comment or let me know on my Facebook page as I'm always on the look out for interesting locations!

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The Curse of the Blurry Photo...

21/7/2013

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Sometimes blur in a photo can be a good thing - blurry backgrounds are great, for example. But when the whole photo, including your subject, comes out blurry, it's definitely not a good thing! It's such a common problem - your child is actually smiling in the general direction of the camera for once, you quickly take a photo, only to be really disappointed that it's all turned out blurry. Without seeing specific photos and their data it's impossible to say exactly why it happened, but there are some extremely common reasons, and some very simple things you can try to do in the future to minimise your chances of it happening again. Assuming that the problem wasn't that the camera simply mis-focussed, then the number one reason is almost always....

...LACK OF LIGHT

Lack of light is the biggest problem your camera can face. Without light it can't form the picture, so your camera's shutter will generally stay open until the camera's sensor has received enough light (I am assuming you're not shooting in full manual mode or shutter priority mode, in which case your shutter will stay open for as long as you have told it to). So this means the more light available, the less time your shutter will need to stay open for. So of course if there's not as much light, the shutter will stay open for longer - probably still only for a split second, but in that split second two things can and probably will happen:

1) your subject will move slightly - enough to cause a blur;
2) your hand will shake - not enough for you to notice, but enough to cause a blur.

When photographing children, you will normally need a fairly high shutter speed, as we all know how children have an innate inability to stay still (especially when you really want them to). Even if they're sitting relatively still and not running around, I wouldn't want to have a shutter speed slower than 1/100 second. And if they're actually on the move, well, the faster the better! You definitely want to be thinking of quicker than 1/250 second, but if they're running around then this won't be quick enough either - 1/500 or even 1/1000 would probably be closer to the mark to be on the safe side.

The problem comes if you haven't got enough light to achieve those sorts of shutter speeds, and this is most often a problem indoors. If you're outside, unless it's going dark, it should never be a problem. In fact, I'm betting that almost all of the blurry photos you've been disappointed with were taken indoors? So, here are a few ideas for you to try to get a bit more light and up the shutter speed....

1. If at all possible, for example if you're planning a specific photo, try to go outside for it. 99% time it will be better, for the simple fact there will be more light available. Plus outside makes for nice backgrounds!

2. If you can't go outside, have a quick think about where the brightest spot is in the room/house etc. It's usually by a window, and windows can be great for indoor photos. They act as giant soft-boxes, diffusing the light in a really flattering way. I'd recommend having your subject facing the window (or facing slightly to the side) so the light is falling on their face. You'll be amazed at the difference this can make to the shutter speed as well as to the overall look and feel of the photo.

3. Turn on the lights, even if it's daytime! I know it sounds obvious but every little helps!

4. If your camera allows you to, then increase your ISO setting. The higher the number, the quicker the sensor will be able to expose the photo, therefore the faster the shutter speed. Just be warned that the higher the ISO, the poorer the quality will be of the final photo as higher ISO means increased grain. But if it means your photo isn't blurry then it's definitely worth doing. Try to experiment with your camera and its different ISO settings to see how high you can push it without the quality becoming too compromised - different cameras are vastly different in this respect.

5. If all else fails, resort to using your flash. I usually try to avoid using my built-in flash at all costs, but if it's either that or you getting a blurry photo, flash is probably going to be the best choice for you. If you have the option to dial down the flash's power then you might want to experiment with this to make the photo look a little bit more natural.

Just to show that, given enough light and a fast enough shutter speed, you can avoid blur in even the fastest moving object, here are some photos that I took of my son and his new bubble rocket - the shutter speed here was 1/2000 second, and enough to freeze motion and prevent any unwanted blur...

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Help! I want a nice new camera but don't have a clue what kind!

16/6/2013

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Child, children, children's, family photographer based outdoors in Silsden, Skipton, Ilkley, Yorkshire

In my last blog post I talked about the question I'm most often asked about photography - "blurry backgrounds" - so this week I thought I'd try to address the question that comes a very close second - "what kind of camera should I buy?".

This is often a difficult question to answer as people will be looking for different things from a camera and be looking to take different types of photos. And of course, there's that all important budget to consider too (sadly photography usually doesn't come cheap). The main categories of cameras to consider are:

compact camera
bridge camera
compact system camera
dslr

Which is right for you will depend on a variety of factors, so I'll look at each one in turn, but first I just want to say a quick word about the megapixel myth: the quality of a camera is not just down to the number of megapixels no matter what the camera companies may try to tell you in their advertising! Megapixels are important, they are basically the amount of detail that the photo stores from the scene, so, generally, the more megapixels the more you'd be able to crop a photo and still have a usable image, or blow it up large and maintain a quality photo. However almost all cameras these days have a good megapixel count - anything around 10megapixels or higher is fantastic for almost any use that you'll ever need. Even more is great, but unless the camera's other specifications (particularly its lens(es) and its sensor size) aren't also up to scratch then those extra megapixels will be wasted. Anyway, now that I've got that out of my system, onto the different types of cameras....

Compact Camera

The main advantage of a compact camera is, unsurprisingly given its name, its size. They are significantly smaller than bridge cameras and dslrs, so if you're wanting something that's a step up from the camera on your phone, but still small enough to quickly grab and take anywhere with you, then this could be a good option for you. In general they will give you limited options to control settings - usually you can only choose from auto and various "scene" selections. So if you don't want the hassle of learning the ins and outs of photography then it will definitely do all the hard work for you - you can just point and shoot.

Pros:

small and lightwieght
does all the work for you
decent quality images for day-to-day photos
very affordable

Cons:

no interchangeable lenses
limited controls and no full manual mode
image quality poorer than other options

Bridge Camera

So named as they attempt to bridge the gap between compact cameras and dslrs. They usually don't have interchangeable lenses and but do usually offer (almost) full manual controls, as well as the usual auto and scene modes. They usually have smaller sensors than dslrs, which means that image quality is not as good as the next two categories of camera in my list, particularly in poor light, however it does give them the advantage of enabling them to have incredibly large zoom capabilities. So if you're interested in snapping wildlife or sports then this would be a definite advantage.

Pros:

auto, scene or manual controls
excellent zoom capabilities
affordable

Cons:

quite large
smaller sensor than dslr, therfore images not as high quality, particularly in low light
usually can't change lenses

Compact System Camera

These are relatively new to the market and are becoming increasingly popular. They offer excellent image quality and both manual, scene and auto modes but are much smaller than a dslr or most bridge cameras. They are called a "system" as they have interchangeable lenses, therefore offering you a wider range of options for your photography than a fixed lens. They also have sensor sizes approaching (or even equalling) those of dslrs, which means that their image quality is excellent. There are a few of drawbacks though - depending on the model, you might not have quite the same amount of control over your settings as a dslr will give you. Autofocus is also slightly slower than a dslr, and there is a slight shutter-lag which isn't present with a dslr, however these issues would only really bother very serious users The only other real drawback is that, at present, the choice of lenses is very limited compared to the dslr market. Though if these cameras continue to grow in popularity then I'm sure so too will the number of lenses available. One other point is the price - this quality doesn't come cheap, so expect to pay similar to an entry-level dslr.

Pros:

large sensor means excellent image quality
interchangeable lenses
compact
offer a large amount of control to the user (if desired)

Cons:

expensive
limited (but growing) range of lenses available
not quite as fantastic as a dslr (but very good!)

Dslr

If you're looking for the very best type of camera and you don't mind its size or price, then this is the category for you. Although I should mention that entry-level dslr cameras are becoming more and more affordable and you might be pleasantly surprised by what you can get for your money. They all offer a huge degree of control to the user, but if you want then you can still resort to auto or scene modes. A dslr will usually come with a kit lens (or possibly even two), which will suffice for every day photos and satisfies a lot of dslr owners. However if you're after that blurry background look then you should budget for an additional lens, referred to as a prime or portrait lens (you won't regret it!). You can also buy dedicated macro lenses, huge zoom lenses - everything you can think of you can get. As they have large sensors the image quality is fantastic, especially in low light. They focus quickly and accurately and there is no shutter-lag. Even entry-level dslrs these days will produce excellent results.

Pros:

excellent image quality due to large sensor
wide range of lenses available
the user can control every aspect of the settings

Cons:

large
expensive

So which should I buy?....

That depends - if you simply want a small camera and you don't need professional looking photos, a compact camera will probably suffice. If you'd like slightly better quality, a large zoom and don't mind a larger size then a bridge might be the one for you. If you have a bit more money to spend and are after more professional looking photos then definitely consider either a compact system or a dslr. If money is no object or you think you'd like to get into photography a bit more seriously then I'd definitely always recommend a dslr, but the compact systems are looking more and more attractive to people wanting excellent quality in a smaller body.

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"How do you get your backgrounds so nice and blurry...?"

2/5/2013

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This is probably the number one question that I get asked about my photography, so I thought I'd try to share a bit of basic information about "blurry backgrounds" for anyone wanting to have a go with their own kid's photos.

Blurry backgrounds in its simplest terms means that the background is out of focus. This is sometimes referred to as bokeh. While something being out of focus in a photo might not sound like a great idea, in portrait photography it can be incredibly useful and effective as it means that the eye isn't distracted by the background at all, and instead your eye is drawn to the subject of the photo - the child. For example, in this photo of my daughter the background is completely out of focus, all you can see is a lovely mix of colours.

A shallow depth of field means that only a small plane of the photo will be in sharp focus, and a large amount will be blurred. For my style of photography I almost always use a shallow depth of field, so that often only my subject is in focus (although it should be noted that if you focus on an object, anything that is the same distance from the camera as that object will also be in focus). But if I'm out doing landscape photography in my beautiful county of Yorkshire for example, I would want the opposite - everything to be in sharp focus.

Before I go into more detail about how to get the background nice and blurry, a quick word on focusing, especially when you are aiming for a shallow depth of field. If possible with your camera, I recommend using spot focusing, so that you are choosing exactly what the camera focuses on. I almost always focus on the eyes. If you let the camera decide, you might find that it hasn't actually chosen your intended subject as it's focus. Instead of a nice blurry background, you may find you have a blurry child!

There are 3 main ways that you can alter depth of field - and remember, for the blurry background we are trying to make it as shallow as possible...

1. Open your aperture as wide as possible. This relates to the f number, and the lower the number the wider open the aperture is. On most of my lenses f1.8 is the widest I can go, although on other lenses it is common to be f3.5 or f4.5. Whatever your lowest number is, choose that! This also lets in more light which means you can have a faster shutter speed, which is always useful when photographing quick-moving children! This is the most effective way of blurring the background. If you're unsure how to control your aperture, the easiest way is usually on "A" mode - this stands for aperture priority and allows you to select your f number and the camera does the rest for you.

2. Get closer to your subject. The closer you are to your subject, the shallower the depth of field.

3. Move your subject further away from the background. This extra distance means that the background will be more out of focus as it is further away from the object you are focusing on.

While number 1 requires you to have a camera which allows you to choose your own settings to some extent, if your camera does not allow this you can still use tips 2 and 3 with any camera. Although I should mention that depth of field is also linked to the size of the sensor in your camera, with the general rule of thumb being the larger the sensor the shallower the depth of field you can achieve. So on compact cameras you might find that no matter what you do the background won' t blur as much as you'd like, but you can still follow the steps above and make it a blurry as possible for that camera.

And that's really all there is to it! If you found this useful and would like to see more tips then please head over to my Facebook page and remember to hit "like"! Thanks!

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Hello and welcome to my new blog!

23/4/2013

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This being my very first blog post I'm a bit unsure of what to write! I guess a good place to start is to tell you a little bit about myself and how my love of photography has grown since having children.

I live in Silsden, West Yorkshire, with my husband and our two young children. After completing a law degree and working in corporate law for a couple of years I soon realised that wasn't the career for me and I wanted a rewarding career working with children, so I retrained as a primary school teacher. After several incredibly enjoyable years teaching my husband and I decided the time had come to start a family, so I took a career break to enable me to be a stay at home mum for a few years until my kids are both at school themselves. Seeing first hand how quickly children change made me realise how important it was to photograph all the different stages so that, as my children get older, we will always have the photos to accompany our lovely memories of their childhood. Thankfully my kids are only 3 and 1 so we have plenty of special childhood memories (and photographs!) still to come!

This desire to document my kids' development provided me with the perfect excuse to develop my love of photography. I love filling my house with their photos! It's rare that I'll leave the house for a family trip out without my Nikon! Whilst being a stay at home mum is the best job I've ever had, I do sometimes feel like my brain might turn to mush at any moment, so my photography has been something that I've really enjoyed actively pursuing to keep my brain ticking over!

From this love of photographing my own children the requests from friends to photograph their kids soon started coming, and I have been only too happy to oblige! It has been so much fun, but as word has started to spread the time has now come to recognise that growing demand in the form of this part-time business, which I'm very excited about. I was also lucky enough to be contacted by Getty Images, one of the world's largest stock photo agencies, if I would like to contribute several of my images to their collection for potential commercial licensing. This was a huge compliment as they are notoriously rigorous in deciding which images they want as part of their stock and which photographers they accept as contributors.. To be contacted out of the blue was fantastic and a real surprise!

Part of my motivation behind starting Laura Hartley Photography is to attempt to provide an alternative to studio-based child, baby and family photo shoots. While I've seen some lovely examples from studio shoots, their prices to actually buy photos after the shoot are often very high, largely as they have to cover the costs of running a studio. They also often offer no alternative to a plain white background. Whilst not criticising this approach (it certainly is a popular one and has provided many families with lovely photos), I want to offer an alternative. Shooting solely on location means that I am able to capture memories of the children playing and laughing in natural surroundings, which they often feel more comfortable in. It means that if you have a particular spot that is special to your family, the chances are we'll be able to use it as our location so it will provide a really meaningful set of photos and memories for you. My pricing approach is also different to most studios - I charge a fixed fee which includes a digital set of hand-edited images (usually 15 - 20) so that you are then able to order canvases, prints etc at the bargain prices widely available on the internet. My goal is to enable families to capture really special memories on photography at a reasonable price with no hidden extra costs after the shoot.

My future blog posts will hopefully be useful for anyone looking for tips on taking photos of children and babies - I'll be sharing links to articles and sharing some of my own tips.

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