If you’ve heard the term ‘Lifestyle Family Photography’ tossed around or appear on photographer’s websites, you might be sitting there saying to yourself, “ok, but what does lifestyle photography actually mean???”.

Lifestyle is a term that photographers really love to use, but when you’re searching for a family photographer for your family, it can be totally confusing what the difference between portrait, lifestyle and documentary photography is.

Here’s the quick and dirty:

• Portrait or posed photography generally involves quite a bit of direction from the photographer in terms of how to sit/stand, where to look, and how you’ll be positioned with your family. The environment tends to be quite controlled, either in a studio or in an outdoor setting.
• Documentary photography (in the strictest terms) means that the photographer is not involved in the scene at all. You live your life and the photographer captures it, not asking you to do anything special or manipulating the light in any way. You can almost think of this as photojournalism.
• Lifestyle photography is somewhere in between. You have the freedom to really be you and have the interactions with your family that you normally would, but the photographer will communicate with you throughout the session and may ask you to move to certain well-lit areas or to face a different way so that the light hits your face.

My family photography sessions fall somewhere on the spectrum between lifestyle and documentary. They are on a bit of a sliding scale because I’m very comfortable in both worlds, and in the end, my amount of direction and interaction with you generally comes down to what you want from your session.

That’s really part of the beauty of this type of photography – there’s no script or shot list! Your session is as unique as your family is!

Figuring out where your family is on that sliding scale is one of the reasons that I believe so strongly in pre-session meetings in your home. During this meeting we talk about your hopes and dreams for the session and what you are really wanting to come away with once our session is done. Through chatting and giving you examples of images and scenarios, we’ll both walk away with a really great plan for our session that you’re comfortable with and that will capture the genuine relationships you have.

Want to see if lifestyle family photography is for you?

Drop me a line and we can chat about what you’d like from your family photos and how I can deliver that for you.