Family Photography in Newcastle – Just One – Ella

I had a hard time picking a Just One for Ella – I have so many great pictures of this wonderful little girl. In the end I chose this one as I love the patterns and the busy exuberant feel to what is in essence a lovely simple portrait. It’s an image where pattern is important – spots of light, spots on clothing, bright eyes laughing out at us. All of these combine to make this a lovely portrait and one which I am thrilled to share today.

We spent a wonderful morning together out and about near Ella’s home in Newcastle, a new city for me and a wonderful place to visit for children and family photography. I always love exploring new places and each year I get to visit more interesting locations as my business becomes more national and international in flavour. Already this summer I have bookings for Dorset, Devon, Yorkshire and the Cotswolds so if you are interested in my services and are outside London then do get in touch and I can give you a quote.

But back to this picture and what led me to choose this image from the many that I am looking forward to sharing with Ella’s family (and I’ll definitely be sharing more from this fabulous session on the blog soon so do look out for them). Ella was full of energy for our family photo shoot and I feel that her bubbly personality is captured in this image. Everything is done at full tilt, rushing from one thing to another laughing all the way. I love how she’s got her coat hanging off as if she’s about to abandon it as she rushes off on her next adventure, boring things like warm clothes just holding her back from the exciting things in store.

I love the repeating motif of the polka dots – on Ella’s dress, her coat, even the buttons on the cardigan stand out as these little circles – dark on light, light on dark. In colour, this image would have been a mess of conflicting colours and patterns but in black and white the patterns work together to give a feeling of vibrance. I love how the fabrics are echoed in the polka dots of light shining through the trees behind. A shallow depth of field isolates Ella as the subject of the image but the foreground and background work in harmony to enhance this image. I love the contrast of the dark and light in the picture too, the tree on the left and the path stretching out to the side of the image giving us a feel of a magical adventure that Ella is about to embark on, it almost has a fairy tale feel to it.

Most of all though I love Ella’s expression. One of the things I work hardest at during my photo shoots is to get genuine expressions from the children that I photograph – not ‘cheese’ grins, but natural happy smiles, and serious expressions as well. Over the course of a morning we usually cover a myriad of different moods as we move from location to location and activity to activity and these all work together so well to create a beautiful document of children’s personalities. This is a real expression, and I love it. I hope you love it too, today’s just one from a recent family portrait session in Newcastle.