jan michele photography

I just love capturing families as they grow!  It all began with an engagement pictures, followed by a wedding day, then came newborn and family photos.  Such adorable kids!  You may remember Savannah from her baby pictures last fall.  Now, just before she’s crawling well, was the perfect time for family pictures.  Two active small children. and my job is 10x harder!  I find that babies who can sit up well are pretty smiley too – and they can’t get away. 🙂

We planned an evening session when the light is prettiest and met at Meadowlark Gardens in Vienna, finishing in time for the kids to get home at bedtime (though they both fell asleep before getting out of the parking lot – we wore them out!).  Meadowlark has a small permit fee and the gardens are extensive and beautiful.  Flowers for the baby girl and ponds for the adventurous boy.

Digital photography is so complicated it’s hard to explain all the steps that go into a finished image.  Here’s a quick example of what the image looked like as it came out of the camera.  The middle picture has been globally edited in Lightroom (with the addition of a head swap in photoshop).  This is how I present images to clients.  The final picture has had more individual tweaks in Photoshop to polish up the portrait and prepare it for printing.