When Your Client Is A Great Photographer | Forbes Family Photography Session
/A few months ago (in the fall of 2021), Tim Forbes and I had a photoshoot exchange: He photographed my family, and I photographed his.
Now, for those of you who don’t know, Tim is one of the best documentary photographers this side of Ontario. He’s primarily a wedding photographer, and was actually my mentor. I shot an entire season of weddings as his second shooter in that first year of business, back in 2016.
He’s been in the biz for nearly twenty years, and it really shows! His work is perfect. (no pressure, Tim 😉)
The other thing about Tim is that he was the one that years ago told me I need to put the camera down occasionally and actually BE the subject.
He said, “what are your kids going to remember you by, if you’re not in any of the photographs?”
Now, it’s somewhat ironic that I resisted hearing this. Because, after all, I say this to my clients - and believe it fully - all the time! I Always tell folks (especially moms, who are often the ones taking all the photos) that they need to BE in the photos once in a while.
I mean, that’s my ENTIRE JOB - to make sure that your whole family can be together in the frame, so that one day your kids can have memories of their parents to treasure and share.
Anyway, for some reason I thought I was a convenient exception to the rule. But eventually I realized Tim was absolutely right: if I didn’t start being in our family photographs, my kids would grow up not having too many photographs of their mom.
And that would be very sad.
So we decided to do an exchange: I photograph his family, and he photographs mine.
The day arrived when I would head to his farm to take photos.
Even though I was a bundle of nerves before it happened (because shooting for a photographer is hard, but shooting for Tim? I mean... come on!), it was a lot of fun!
He had recently acquired chickens, and they had a super sweet pup running around.
We took a few posey photos, and of course the rest of the time, I spent shooting candid moments - of the kids playing, mostly.
Here is one of the images I loved from his session: His daughter, happily skipping rope in front of mom and grandma (and the dog).
Idyllic scene.
Photo by Tim Forbes of my own family.
A few days before this session, Tim came over to my place and took photographs of us! That session was really great, too. I mean, not having to think about taking photographs, but rather just living my life, and knowing that someone awesome was looking out for good meaningful moments to capture on camera…
It felt fantastic.
Almost immediately after, I was already wondering when we could do another session :P
The moral of this story is this:
Even if you LOVE taking pictures of your own family, like I do, it’s okay to sometimes put down the camera. In fact, you SHOULD put down the camera.
You should allow yourself to be photographed along with your brood from time to time. Those photos aren’t for you. They’re for the folks who LOVE you.
