Client Info

Here at Asheville Portrait Company, we value family and we (try really hard to) prioritize having a Healthy Work / Life Balance. We believe that it directly affects our attitude, energy, creativity and ultimately our success. As such, we can only accept 15 Families for Portrait Session Bookings each month. We encourage you to book you session as far in advance as possible to ensure date / time availability for your family!

During your Pre-Session Phone Consultation, we’ll chat about the type of locations that interest you & Brittany will help you to identify a location that will be perfect for your family and our shared vision for these heirloom images! We can shoot in and around Asheville proper, in Downtown, the River Arts District, at your favorite Brewery, Biltmore Estate, the North Carolina Arboretum or the UNCA Botanical Gardens OR we can shoot out IN the Mountains for those Epic Blue Ridge Mountain Views. We’ll chat about your hopes for this session and discuss location options during your pre-session phone consultation, prior to your session!

The softest, most flattering light of the day happens 90 minutes after sunrise or 90 minutes before sunset. With that being said, we can really shoot at any time of day, as long as you understand that the sunlight (looks) different at 1pm than it does at 6pm. If you want to shoot an outdoor or adventure session in the middle of the day, we’ll just have to get a little creative with locations, compositions and angles.

Expect to love on each other, expect to laugh, expect to play. When I arrive, I’ll take a few minutes to get acquainted with your family and to break the ice! Don’t be surprised if I ask you to do an ice breaker activity with me. I’ve been known to start my sessions with a foot race from time to time! 😉 We’ll start with your priority portraits: posed’ish portraits of your entire family, little people together and individually, little people with parents / grandparents, individual portraits and then we’ll move on to secondary groupings and lastly, we’ll shoot some relational portraits of your family (some people call these “candid” or photojournalistic style portraits). I structure my sessions this way because generally, it’s much easier to get the posed portraits out of the way first and that way, if your little people are over it toward the end, it’s much easier to jump and run, dance and play, airplane and kiss and snuggle! 😉 However, I always play every session by ear. If we have a super shy little person, it may be easier for them to (start) with kisses and snuggles and playing — until they warm up to me and what’s happening!

You’ll want to dress in a way that feels authentic. You’ll want to dress in a way that makes you feel comfortable and confident — like the very best version of you! I LOVE it when people incorporate interesting textures, fabrics and accents to their outfits! Leather, Lace, Velvet, Sequinssss and Faux – Fur are my JAM!!!! So, about that: we can’t all wear our best furs for the photo shoot, so one or two people would wear the statement pieces and everyone else would be in supporting / complimentary roles! 😉 Don’t be afraid to incorporate cool accents as well — a hat, cool boots, suspenders, a statement t-shirt, corduroy! The possibilities are endless but the point really is — that these unexpected textures, fabrics and accents really bring an interesting element of depth to your images!

HOW TO COORDINATE YOUR FAMILY: Choose a theme color or color pallet and then find a way to subtly weave that color/s through everyone’s outfit! For example: If your theme color is navy blue — one person wears a navy blue dress, another person wears a button down with a tiny bit of navy blue in the pattern, someone else wears shoes with navy blue accents and another person wears navy blue suspenders. Throw a cool hat or jacket in there and your all set! Whatever you do, please don’t go all matchy-matchy on me! Be sure to checkout my Pinboards below for awesome examples and inspiration!

LARGE GROUPS: Whatever you do, please do not tell everyone to wear white shirts and jeans! 😉 I don’t want you to go all matchy-matchy on me either! Use the same advice found above — Choose a central theme color or color pallet and instruct everyone to find a subtle way to weave that color/s into their outfit choice and then add in some interesting textures, fabrics and/or accents and you’ll be all set! Be sure to checkout my Pinboards below for awesome examples and inspiration!

Check out my Pinboards:

https://www.pinterest.com/HELLO6566/FAMILY-PORTRAIT-WARDROBE-INSPO/

In a word: YASSSSS!! 🙂 We hope you will! Our pets are an integral part of our families! They are our companions and our playmates. They are our comfort and a source of tremendous joy for our families! They love you and are eternally loyal to you… Our pets age faster than our children and (sadly) our time with them is much shorter than we’d like. We are 1000% on board with bringing your family pets to your session! The goal of Family Portrait Photography is to capture your family, as you are, in this moment and your pets are certainly part of that sooooo – bring em! 🙂

Tips for bringing your pets to your family portrait session: Dogs will need a long walk or run before your session — tire them out! You’ll want to bring a leash, poop bags, treats and their favorite squeaky toy! If you have small children, it’s helpful to have someone along who can take a walk with the dog after we’re finished with them so that they’re not a distraction to the littles!

Your session fee covers a “standard family unit” or up to 7 people (but if you have 6 kids, I’m not gonna make it a thing!) 😉 Of course you can bring grandparents for some photos with your family / children! A few years ago, I lost both of my parents — at 34. I would give anything to have beautiful, professional photos of my parents with my family. Please, bring them along!

Here are Asheville Portrait Company, we believe Portrait Sessions should be fun! And, Asheville is Beer City — So, please feel free to bring a beer to sip on while you’re not (in) the shot! You’ll want to bring an alternate outfit if you have small children — but also because I could have you jumping rocks at the base of a waterfall or wading in a creek bed — you could get a little wet or muddy, who even knows! 😉 Most likely, you’ll be fine but an alternate outfit is always a good idea!

GENERAL TO BRING:

• Alternate Outfits (just incase!)
• Lint Roller
• Wet Wipes
• Makeup for touch-ups
• Snacks
• Drinks
• Comfy Shoes (if we’re doing some walking)
• Jackets (if we’re shooting in colder months or at higher elevations)
• A Large Throw Blanket or Quilt (that won’t clash with what you’re wearing) just incase I want sit ya’ll down for some snuggles!

PARENTS TO BRING:

• All of the above listed items + any baby care items needed.
• Your child’s favorite toy and/or comfort item. (I like photographing kids with their favorite toys, it marks the moment in time!)

After your session, your images are uploaded into Adobe Lightroom and then backed up on an external hard drive. We edit portrait sessions in the order that they are photographed to be fair to all of our clients who are patiently awaiting their portrait session galleries. Typical turn around time for a standard portrait session is 2-4 weeks. During peak months (September – December), it is highly probable that we will have an editing backlog / que. During peak months, it could take up to 6 – 8 weeks to return your portrait session gallery. Please refrain from sending status update emails. Responding to multiple emails and text messages daily during peak months occupies a significant amount of time that your photographer could be editing and delivering client galleries and returning yours faster! Please know that we are totally aware that you are excited and anxious to see your session images and we are working as hard as we possibly can to return your image gallery as soon as we possibly can!

Due to the nature of the profession, session fees are non-refundable for any reason.

Your Portrait Session Contract will outline our Cancellation / Reschedule Policy in thorough detail but to sum it up:

I get it, things happen and people get sick! Should this happen, I only ask that you give me as much advance notice as possible and I will give you the same courtesy should I get sick! We will simply re-schedule for the very next available date / time that works for both of us! 

In the event of bad weather, we will simply re-schedule for the very next available date / time that works for both of us!. If possible, we will try to shoot around the rain (before or after the rain is forecasted to come in!)

In the event that (for whatever reason) you can’t reschedule right away, we will issue a gift certificate in the entire amount received at the time of booking for future services, without expiration.