I have been reworking my portfolios and website in a new design (that may go live before the new year) and it’s made me do a lot of thinking about what I value in what I do.  I’m ten years in and it’s no longer about taking “great” photos.  That’s now the easy part.  So I’ve been soul searching what I LOVE about what I do and what I think is “great”.  

This is what I VALUE about what I do and these images are the kinds of images that I want to focus on.  I don’t want to pretend I’m not there.  I don’t want to pretend that I don’t take a photo of all the family together, I love those photos as much as I love the candids and the portraits.  Lifestyle is NOT the same as real.  Real for me is being there, and being part of the family, the day, the event, capturing it intimately.  A friend with a camera and a few directions when needed.  My images are all about the people in them, the varied, diverse, silly, dramatic, traditional, families and friends and who they are together as well as individually.

Kitsie and Tai’s family and our sessions are everything I’m talking about.  I’ve photographed them for years, from engagements to first Halloweens and everything in between and this is what I love to capture.  It’s NOT (just) because of the amazing story the pictures tell, of the family, of the day, of the time or the moment.  You may not know that someone had such a bad back they moved in slow motion, or someone else wouldn’t be in any image without her fairy in it too.  You may see some members of the family aren’t in love with traditional family photos but we can do both and everyone is okay with that.  If I just shared the “portraits” you wouldn’t see the “photobombs” that occurred, first with the littles during the “adult combo formals” (I call them sister pics) if I didn’t share them and you certainly wouldn’t see the parent’s photobombing the “all the cousins” wagon photo, but THOSE are the images that tell us who the Kerners are… THOSE photos aren’t FOR YOU (or ME) they are for the KERNERS and the cousins will have these images (in albums or printed or shared forever on facebook) and their kids will have these photos (printed on the wall!) and they will always be able to time travel back to this summer and not just how they all looked, but who they were together, as a family.

That is what I love to create, a roue of who this family is, time travel, a look back at who and what we are at this moment, in that moment, at that place.  The looking at the camera and the moments, sometimes funny, sometimes serious “behind” it as well.       Thank you Kerners for trusting me and letting me into your lives, you all inspire me!