Lifestyle Lessons

I have enjoyed photographing children for the past six years, and the age that I have really enjoyed the most has been babies ages 6-9 months old. I call this age the discovery period because at this age baby is learning about their surroundings and exploring everything, they are also full of expressions. I have actually thought about specializing in this age but I am still undecided right now, but will make a decision later on next year.

The reason for this post is to bring attention to what baby should wear at this age, and why its important not to over dress them. There are a lot of parents who like to dress their babies up in what I call “big boy/girl clothes” like blue jeans, sneakers, tutus, and lacy type dresses. When babies are over dressed attention is no longer on the baby but the clothes they are wearing, and this is something that needs to be avoided. So as photographers it’s our job to let parents know that simple is best and makes for great pictures, simple attire like layette is great for baby to wear. For those unfamiliar layettes are onesises, rompers, simple undershirts & tee shirts, sleeping gowns, beanie hats, sweaters, and kimonos have also become popular.

I recently photographed an adorable little boy who just turned 9 months old, I last photographed him when he was just a few weeks old and it was great seeing him again.  His attire was very simple but extremely adorable for his age, a baby blue layette with a cable knit sweater, and the infamous Sophie the Giraffe. I also had my dear friend/photographer Janine Winn work her magic and put together a style board with his look, she is awesome and I want to tell her again THANK YOU!!!!!!

This is his look:

When making suggestions to parents layettes can be purchased from Gap Kids, Gymboree, Macys, Janie & Jack, and Carters. Layettes can also be purchased online through a variety of boutiques and upscale retailers.

I am a firm believer in shooting what makes you happy and not what makes the most money. When I decided to become a photographer I promised myself I would not fall into the trap of shooting everything just because it brings in a lot of money. Of course I fell into the trap of shooting portraits because it did bring in steady income, but I was not happy with what I was producing. It wasn’t my style of shooting and it started to feel like one of those 8-5 jobs you dread going to. I had to get back into my mind set from the beginning and shooting what I love which was EDITORIAL!!!! It’s true that editorial doesn’t pay as much, but it does give me the creative freedom and puts your work out there to be seen by bigger companies. When I get hired to do editorial jobs, I am being hired because they like my style and not asking me to change anything. I have also started to really market myself mainly as a lifestyle family photographer and not portraits. I want to be hired and given creative freedom to produce amazing images of children being themselves.

Here is a few samples from a family that hired me for my vision, the first picture shows their daughter playing with her power tools and the 2nd one she was pretending to be a ghost. These pictures have true meaning and feeling because this is how their child spends her day, parents cherish these moments but what could be better than having them in print forever.

This is why I encourage other photographers to shoot their passion and stick with it, don’t let others talk you into doing a particular style of photography just for the money because in the end you will not be happy and it will show in your work.

Everyone should be working towards getting great SOOC (straight out of camera) images, you should never rely on photoshop to save a picture that is not perfect from the start.

In the beginning I did rely on photoshop for everything and didn’t really work hard on getting it right SOOC. I would use photoshop to sharpen one of the eyes if it was out of focus or fix a under/over exposed image. I eventually go tired of spending too many hours in photoshop and eventally started to take my time when shooting to make sure I got it right. The histogram became my best friend, and I always have it up when I’m shooting I never look at the picture for accuracy.

Once I’m finish shooting a session I review the entire session and just delete images that are not good. There were times when I would fight with myself about deleting certain images that could be saved in photoshop, but I would delete them anyway. I am so glad I did this because it has turned me into a better photographer when I’m shooting. I have my mind set on getting great SOOC images and not even dealing with long hours in photoshop. My time in photoshop has went from 2-3hrs on one session to about 30-45min per session, sometimes less than that. I am no longer using a lot of heavy saturation or massive eye pop so this has really taken away from my editing time.

Here is a picture I took a few weeks ago from a portrait session, this image is SOOC and I only sharpened it for web. This entire session is like this and I can actually show them this session without even editing it if I wanted to. When I give private lessons I am always stressing that images like this is what you want to aim for, it makes life so much easier.

After serious consideration I have decided to break my classes down into mini sessions, that way the student will not be given too much information at once and be able learn at a pace that will benefit them. My first mini class will be the basics of photography, the student will go from shooting in automatic to shoot in manual mode. The class will be taught in a online forum, and I will also give students the option to talk to me online through Google + if you don’t have this service I strong advise you to get this, it’s full of inspiration and it allows you to have video chat sessions. I will provide each student with a private one hour video chat session to ask questions related to the current lesson and also do photo critiques. The first class will be a trial run so I will be offering this class for $85 and it’s only open to the first 10 people.

The class will start November 14th-December 2nd

To register please contact me at: tonya@tonyadailey.com

This class is only offered at the moment to people living 75 miles outside of the Houston metro area.

Can’t leave you guys without posting a picture!!