When Cassidy reached out, she knew exactly what she wanted and it was a lot in the best possible way.
She wanted family portraits with multiple generations: her parents, her sister, her husband, and her four kids all together. And then, separately, she wanted something just for each child. Not a quick individual shot squeezed into a family session, but a real portrait of each kid; their color, their personality, their thing. So that's exactly what we built.
Before the session day we got on a planning call and talked through everything. Four kids means four very different humans. We talked about who each one is, what they love, how they move, what makes them light up. From there we built a mood board for each child: a signature color, props, a general feel. Nothing over-engineered. Just enough of a plan to walk in with intention.
The session itself had two parts. We started with the full family in the studio using the brick background. It's a backdrop that adds warmth and texture without pulling focus from the people in front of it exactly right for a group this size with this many ages. We worked through the combinations: grandparents with the kids, parents with the kids, all four siblings together, everyone at once. By the time we had what we needed from the family groupings, the grandparents and dad took the kids outside to run around for a few minutes. That's when the individual sessions started.
One at a time, each kid came back in. And because we had already done the work of figuring out who they were before the session, we could just follow their lead. Each session was short, focused, and specific to that child. The result is something I love about this kind of work. Cassidy's family has images that belong together a cohesive set of multigenerational portraits that show the whole family as a unit. And separately, she has individual portraits of each kid that show who they actually are right now, at this age, in this season. Those images don't look like they were taken as an afterthought. They look like they were made on purpose. Because they were.
If you're thinking about a session that goes beyond the standard family portrait whether that means multiple generations, individual personality shoots, or just something more intentional than everyone lined up in the same outfits that's exactly the kind of session I love to plan.
📍Alison Tapp Photography is based in Gibsonville, NC and serves families throughout Burlington, Greensboro, and the surrounding Alamance County area.
