Seal Beach Family Portraits

I met Kelly and Dave down recently for their Seal Beach family portrait session.

It was a freezing cold January afternoon with the ocean breeze blowing everyone’s hair every which way. We wandered up to the pier bundled in layers of clothing, hoping the weather wouldn’t completely overtake our photo shoot.

I’ve known this family for a long time and had the opportunity to photograph the kids, Chris and Brayden, back in 2010. Since they chose the same location for this session, I thought it might be fun to recreate a new version of one of my favorite photos from back then. This shot is definitely one of our new faves!

Of course, in order to get this shot I had to go up the pier, arrange them, and then run back down to take the shot and then up the pier again. By the time this was all said and done my assistant was taking care of the layers of jackets and sweaters that I had peeled off. Everyone thought I was crazy running around commenting on how “hot” it was as they were shivering.

One of the things that Kelly requested during our pre session consultation was how the boys were reaching adulthood and how important it was to her to focus not only on the group but on the boys who are rapidly approaching adulthood. It was important to her to get a few images of them just being a family and enjoying time together, before anyone “grows up and moves out.” Keeping these thoughts in mind, I wanted to get some of the boys together as brothers, hanging out, being silly, etc. Here’s a couple of my favorite shots.

Something that’s really important to me while shooting family sessions is getting not only individuals of everyone, but also getting a couple good shots of just mom and dad alone. Because without mom and dad, there’d be no family to begin with. As I set them up for this shot, Kelly and Dave mentioned that they didn’t really have any romantic shots together, it wasn’t something they’d done. During the previewing session when Kelly saw this image for the first time, it was clear it was one close to her heart. I couldn’t help but slip in a little “I told you so.”

This next one is my favorite from the day of Kelly. She looks amazing! Mom of too grown boys? No way!

Despite the cold weather and wind, this session was great! We got some great photos and made some fun memories! Thanks Kelly and Dave for choosing me as your family photographer for 2013!