The Importance of Authentic Family Photos
A couple weeks ago we began to unwrap the idea of authenticity in life and photography. The basic idea, if you haven’t read it yet, was that you have to be true to who you and your family are if you want the best results from your Family photo session. You cannot hope to have a great photo session if you walk into it trying to be someone else. You may walk away with a few decent pictures, but you will have missed out on an amazing experience to bond with your love ones and create an amazing memory that your family can cherish forever. Look, I get it. We all get a bit stuck in the “keeping up with the Jones’” mentality. We get slammed in the face with it every PTA meeting when Debbie from up the street with her perfect family and her perfect house waves her perfectly posed and perfectly adorable family photos in our not so perfect face as soon as we walk through the damn door…aahhhh the frustration is real. But you have to remember, that you are not the Jones’, unless you are in which case *high pitch and obviously fake voice “Hey Debbie, OMG your family is so amazing and perfect. You have to tell me where you got that dress for your daughter!” (UUUUGGHHHH, don’t judge me, you all have a Debbie too).
Aaannnnyyyways, a common theme I often hit on is that you are already amazing as you are. Regardless of any things you are working on or goals you may have, you are today just as you are meant to be. Don’t worry about what the Jones’ are doing. Don’t be envious of what they have. What they have is perfect for them, but you aren’t them so it’s not perfect for YOU. Focus on what you have and what is perfect for you and good things will come, I assure you. This is what it is to be authentic to who you are. If your home life is a bit messy and free and wild, your family photo shoot should be too! If your life is very prim and proper and neat then so should your photos. Ultimately, you want to walk away from your session feeling like you documented a great, but not completely out of the ordinary, day in your family’s life. You want to be able to look back at those photos and recall the fun that you had not just from “that one time we did photos” but from that entire portion of your life. Getting to look back at those moments is a gift, especially when your kids are going though weird phases and you can use it to poke fun at them in a few years HAHAHAHA…I’m a horrible father, but a really fun person, I promise.
So the point is, don’t be afraid or ashamed of who you are today. Don’t allow where others are at in the journey of their lives effect how you view the progress in yours. In 10 years time you will probably not remember what the Jones’ were doing, but you will absolutely still have that family photo session that you tried to model after them. I can tell you that, unlike a fine wine, an inauthentic photo session will not age well. You will look at those photos and not FEEL them. You will thumb through them and smirk once or twice without ever catching a case of the feels. You won’t have that emotional connection to those images because despite them containing the most important people in your world, YOU won’t be in them! However, if you go to your next photo session and be authentic to who you and your family are, you will look back at those family pictures and be flooded with the memories of the day. Those memories are what we are ultimately after, are they not? By being your authentic self you will walk away from your session knowing that you captured the essence of your family. When you get them back you will have a true representation of who you and your family are. And, hey, they may not be all perfectly posed with perfect smiles but you know what? They will be perfectly YOU. Ultimately, perfectly you is the the best kind of perfect there is. Then you can go and shove your perfectly you pictures in irritatingly perfect Debbie Jones’ face at next months PTA meeting and see how she likes it!
Do you have a Debbie Jones in your life? Are you a Debbie Jones? I would love to hear all about it in the comments!
-Dan
