6.00am
Eleanor is a morning person so her day always starts early; good coffee and a view of her garden are the perfect companion as she assesses marketing campaigns and does all the necessary background work to keep the business flowing.
9.30am
School run done and it’s time to open the studio, Holly is straight on the phone to follow up on all the enquiries that have come through and get the new bookings in the diary. We think getting on the phone is much more personal than just sending emails.
10.00am
Georgia is tucked away upstairs hard at work on Karen Taylor’s portfolio. Creating the photograph in the camera is only the start of an image’s journey, using photoshop we painstakingly take away anything that might detract from your chosen images – milk spots, dribble, rashes. It is delicate work creating the fine balance between perfection and a finished piece that looks natural. Georgia is brilliant at it.
11.00am
Our first client, Kasey Shaw arrives. She is here for her final Milestone session; her son’s cake smash. We give her time to settle in and get her son used to this new environment.
We’ve had a gorgeous giant cupcake made for her by our baker, but first she wants a few natural portraits of the two of them together. Our new teepee is perfect for this!
11.30am
We have to work fast with little ones, because you never know when they are going to run out of steam. Now it’s time to head upstairs and start all the messy stuff! We start off with baking – Kailen makes his cake.
And then we set up a birthday tea party which he loves and it all gets messier from there on in! A fantastic finale to Kasey’s set of four photo shoots.
12.30am
Our next client, Kate Downey arrives with her 12 day old baby. Holly gets everything ready for her and makes sure our bean bag is nice and cosy, we pop a heat pad underneath and play white noise so our newborn babies feel right at home.
Sessions at the studio are always run at baby’s pace. We put two hours aside for newborn sessions so we have plenty of time to stop for feeding and cuddles as often as baby or Mummy need to. Kate and Holly introduce her baby to the bean bag.
And she is soon settled in and all ready for her portraits.
1.00pm
Helen Delaney arrives next for the portrait viewing of her three children’s photo shoot. She settles down in our viewing room with a coffee while her little one plays with the toys. To make her viewing extra special, we project her collection and give her a personal cinematic experience. Then with the help of our user friendly software, she is able to compare her favourite images and choose her final collection.
2.00pm
Helen’s viewing finishes and Naomi Jolly pops in to collect her finished work. Naomi has just started coming to us for her daughter’s Milestones. Her sessions will be roughly divided as newborn, six months, first birthday and eighteen months. We’ll mix up these sessions so some will be in the studio and some will be out on location to give her plenty of variety in her portraits.
She chose to create a composite to commemorate her newborn milestones, and the finished piece is gorgeous.
3.00pm
Amy Downham arrives for her viewing. Amy has also started Milestones with us, but she has started with a maternity shoot. She and her mum enjoy the cinematic viewing. Then she has a few questions about the different annual package options. Eleanor shows her all the samples and explains how these could be used in her portrait collection.
4.00pm
On Thursdays and Fridays we often have late bookings, but not this week. We use the last hour to get the studio ship shape again. To back up all the work, and make sure everything is prepared for the following day’s clients.
A big thank you to Karen Taylor, Kasey Shaw, Kate Downey, Helen Delaney, Naomi Jolly and Amy Downham for allowing us to interrupt their sessions to take photographs for this post, and letting us include examples of their work.
