The ‘Heads’
These have become so popular over the last few months that I’ve decided to give them their own space and explain a little bit more about how they’re created. I’ve made these for whole families, cousins, grandchildren and recently even dogs. I’d like to start by first of all telling you the images are taken individually, a lot of people have concerns about keeping everyone’s attention or that your youngest will pick his nose at the wrong time and ruin the shot, by capturing everyone individually I eliminate any chance of a ruined final image. One of my first clients for one of these was actually a neighbour of mine, she has 4 children, two of which have Autism and a limited attention span. Her words to me when she saw the images I create were “They’re lovely, but I could never have anything like that”. Hearing that was like waving a red flag at a bull for me, challenge accepted. We arranged a date to capture the images and a week later I delivered her a massive 36″x24″ framed print of all 6 members of her family. That now hangs in pride of place in her living room.
The way I capture the images is kept as simple as possible, the equipment used is minimal and the space/location requirements are so refined that I capture almost all of the ‘Heads’ images in my clients homes. I find that not having to transport young children (or grown adults for that matter) out of comfortable surroundings makes the whole process a lot more stress free. This especially helps as a lot of people I photograph do not like having their picture taken, so keeping them relaxed is quite important. After the images are captured the clients have the opportunity to review the images and select which ones they want to be in the final piece, I do this before I leave the clients house. There is always a chance that a client will not be happy with how they look and taking the time to capture images that they love immediately is critical, as these pieces are delivered printed and framed ready to display in their home and if they’re not happy with how the picture looks they’re not likely to display it where others can see it (family portraits do not belong in lofts). So taking the time to fix wandering hair or changing out of a high collared shirt is time well spent. Then after the shoot is completed with everyone happy I retreat to a monitor and put all the pieces together, fire off a preview of the final piece to the client and make any adjustments that they request. I rarely do any retouching on these images unless its something obvious like a spot that you wouldn’t normally have or a nose that refused to stop running during the shoot, I do my best to keep you looking like you.
The thing I love about these pieces is that some one outside the family in the image views it as a whole image, where as the parents will tend to look closer and oddly not at themselves but more towards the children. When family is involved in photographs people become less judgmental of themselves and more appreciative of the love they have for the others in the frame.
If there are any questions you have that arent covered here or you’d like to book for one of these pieces pleases click here and I’ll be happy to discuss more with you.