Over the winter months, when weddings slow down, I really get a chance to look at my photography business and formulate a plan on what & how I want to focus on weddings for the upcoming year. Since I have two children myself and I know how much I treasure my photos of them, I thought I should check more into portraits for babies & newborns. I know I had my work cutout for me as some of the best childrens photographers in the country reside within an hour of me so I did what I used to always do, hit the books.
After studying up a bit on newborns & young children photography, looking at countless other photographers work, I felt I could bring something to the table that would be both different and treasured by my clients. While I love a good portrait as much as anyone, I usually prefer it to have a little more life and honesty. After all, while the baby won’t remember anything about the surroundings at that time, I can show how his arrival affect his parents lives, and that, I believe, is truly priceless.
So, after studying, researching and practicing on my own kids (my cat moves to fast), I felt I was ready but I had one major issue.. no clients. So while I had pondered on how to tackle this minor issue (this is sarcastic, really), I received an e-mail from Liz & Ryan who were expecting their first child soon. What great timing my clients have. :) So after talking a bit with them both and finding out they are, literally, within walking distance of me, we setup a rough time frame and waited patiently for the little guy to make his appearance.
Connor Hourihan was born on May 14th, 2009. As we setup a time to meet, it struck me what an absolute and true honor it was to be the first professional to capture his image & spirit on camera. So as I headed over to their house, I started remembering my own feelings as a father and how I could use that to photograph young Connor in such a way that, in 30 years from now, he can look back and see how his parents adored him so. That, as they say, is why I love doing this work!
