For more ideas about how to choose a great location for your family photo session, click here.

Roberta has such a gorgeous family and they were an absolute joy to work with.

People often ask if they’re allowed to do different groupings. You definitely are – the session belongs to you and you can choose any combinations you’d like. Extended family sessions are a great time to photograph different groups in your family. Multigenerational photos are the best.

Pulling aside your family for a quick portrait is also a great idea when you’re already dressed for the occasion, and in one place, something that for sure happens less frequently as your kids get older.

And of course the grandparents/grandkids photo is always popular. The youngest was quite the ham for this one! He was a huge fan of the oinky pig.

Thank you so much Roberta for sharing your beautiful family with me! I hope you all have an amazing winter.

It’s not every day that someone asks you to get up at 8 am to photograph their family of young adults, but that’s what we did. It was a picturesque morning at the Glen.

Corbett’s Glen is typically filled to the brim with photographers and with good reason, but is also an equally fantastic place to go on a very doable family hike with young children. They’ve gotten a little bit strict (at least with signage) about sticking to the path, but there are still spots where you can get close to the water without the risk of being fined.

Scheduling is usually a challenge for families – especially those with adult children, so we usually schedule backwards. That is, once your family has settled on a time, I’ll do my best to rearrange things on my end to make your time work. That’s how we roll over here – trying to keep things as non-stressful as possible.

Usually extended family sessions also include smaller family groups. It makes sense while you’re dressed nicely in a beautiful place to make the most of it.

This waterfall is like a little taste of Ithaca. It’s one of my very favorite spots in Rochester.

Thank you so much Mariah for sharing your beautiful family with me!

Lauren’s daughter was graduating from high school and to celebrated they rented a lakehouse on Cayuga lake with their extended family. What an awesome way to celebrate!

I hope my kids do this as adults. It’s also a great time to have family photos taken because you’re all there together anyway. Carpe diem!

A ceiling tile was a place holder for a missing family member – photoshop is always an option if you’re missing someone.

Everyone did a fantastic job with their clothing coordination. It doesn’t have to be complicated – everyone wearing blue is often good enough to give cohesion to a group photo. To read more about what to wear to your photo session, click here.

The cousins had some serious fun.

The adults went a little bit more traditional.

The range of careers the adults had was super interesting from a private practice therapist to a philosophy professor to an oncologist. Sometimes I’d love to just sit and hear about people’s careers.

Thank you so much Lauren for sharing your beautiful family with me!

We first met three years ago when a relative of Jamie bought her a portrait session as a gift. We met at their family’s farm in Victor and had a farm-themed session with her beautiful two boys. It was awesome to arrive at their house and learn they had another – this time a girl!

Their entire family was together and they took the opportunity to have their photos taken.

Jamie and Mike recently moved to a beautiful house in Farmington on a lot of acreage with mature trees and an in ground pool. I might have been a little jealous. They even have chickens.

Common groupings with extended family sessions are nuclear families or couples, the entire group, and then grandparents with grandkids, or separating it out by gender. It’s relatively easy to squeeze it all in in a short period of time – scheduling a time when everyone can come really is the hard part!

Not surprisingly, the older the kids are, generally the faster the photos go. The trickiest ages (depending on the kids’ temperaments) tend to be around 10 months to 3 years old because they are usually mobile, have strong opinions, and aren’t always keen on distractions or bribing. We can almost always get excellent photos, but there might be fewer to pick from and it takes a little longer. Once you get into 5 and up, it’s typically more of a cake walk with more options in a shorter period of time.

Kelly and her family traveled all the way from New Hamshire with five kids under seven including a newborn for a wedding. She deserves a medal!

The matching shirts were amazing. I hope that some day my kids do stuff like this!!!

Thank you so much for sharing your beautiful family with me!

Scott’s extended family gathered in Rochester in March and scheduled an extended family session to commemorate his parent’s anniversary. It’s such a brilliant idea and a great way to remember your time together, but also to take advantage of people being in the same place at the same time.

The Sunken Gardens at Highland Park is a popular photo location for good reason. Parking is nearby at Warner Castle and there are spectacular backgrounds in every direction. If you’d like more inspiration for other outdoor locations, check out How to Choose a Great Location.

October fills up like crazy and March is decidedly less popular – usually because of the weather. We really lucked out this day with warm temperatures. We were comfortable coat-less!

For more extended family location and posing ideas, click here. It’s common for people to rent houses in the area and have extended family sessions on the lake, which is brilliant. Another great option is someone’s house since it’s fewer logistics to work out. Or, if you have the brain space, you can pick a park or outdoor location somewhere.

Thank you so much Scott for sharing your beautiful family with me! I hope our paths cross again.

Tony and Jenna had their beautiful son Sam last April. Then when he was six months old, he came for a mini session in the park. This time, Jenna’s sister was in town and their whole family got together for some Thanksgiving love.

If you ever find yourself wanting to take pictures on stairs, keep in mind that if you do them straight on, some people look huge and some people are really small. If you turn everyone sideways, you can get a lot of different heights and good spacing by using stairs. It almost always pays off to think outside the box when it comes to angles.

Despite having traveled all the way from DC, Nina’s kids were all about some oinky pig action.

And it’s always worthwhile to sneak in a couples portrait.

Sam was a little under the weather but perked up and gave us some Sam-sized smiles.

People often ask about backdrops and where good places are to take photographs in their homes. In general a neutral colored wall (or even a brightly colored one) is a perfect backdrop. If you love your furniture that’s also a great option. Only a very small space is needed since the camera cuts out most of the surroundings.

Afterwards we stepped outside for some slightly snowy winter portraits.

Thank you so much Jenna and Tony for sharing your beautiful family with me!

Walking into Rebecca’s home was like walking into a feel good movie you didn’t want to leave. Cousins playing, kitchen smells wafting and several generations gathered in one place. I’m sure there are drawbacks to these kinds of gatherings but as an only child married to an only child it seemed just about perfect.

Not only did the house smell amazing, but everyone looked fantastic.  You can see here that clothing choices don’t have to be complicated – even just choosing dark blue, dark red, and khaki gave a beautiful sense of cohesion without looking too “matchy.”  To learn more about how to choose clothing for a photo session, click here.

In home sessions are growing in popularity for extended family sessions and for good reason. Around a holiday or special event (and not necessarily a wedding!) everyone is in the same place at the same time and it’s easy enough to hire a photographer for an hour in the midst of all the family love. Not getting in a car and traveling anywhere makes for less chaos – you don’t even have to put on your shoes.

Rebecca and Tosh both work in medicine and have three beautiful children.

Tosh’s brother and sister in-law and their beautiful baby Maya flew in for the holidays. Maya was a great sport despite being out of her element.

Toward the end of our time together Tosh started bouncing Maya, which made her incredibly happy and everyone piled in around her for a family shot.

People often ask how long sessions last and my typical response is that it’s up to the youngest family member. We are all about keeping the littlest happy! But even happy babies eventually decide it’s time for some cheerios.

Thank you so much Rebecca and Tosh for sharing your beautiful family with me. It was a pleasure to meet you all!!!

Darcy started out by wanting absolutely nothing to do with the whole idea of sitting and smiling at adults making fools of themselves. She was 18 months and that’s a tricky age because they really just want to move all the time. Don’t tell anyone but we cheated and gave her a lollipop and then edited it out of the photo. #whateverittakes

People frequently ask if this or that combination of people is allowed or how many people can be included in a session, etc.  Life is too short for rules.  The way I have it set up is that the time belongs to you and you can include whomever you like for whatever reason you’d like. You say jump, I say how high.

I’m not positive but I think Cheryl was behind the color scheme and everyone did an amazing job. Choosing clothing colors can be very simple, even for large families, and makes a big difference in the final outcome. To learn more about how to choose clothing for your photo session click here.

This image makes me feel happy. It’s also my favorite pose for couples – women generally prefer when they take up a little less real estate in a photo and men generally don’t care. This pose also is very affectionate and that’s what we’re going for in a couples photo.

Thank you so much Cheryl and Lance for sharing your beautiful family with me! I hope you enjoyed the rest of your time together.

Trudy hopped out of her truck with several arm fulls of blue sweatshirts and started passing them out like it was happy hour. She called me several months ago to schedule this session – she was flying in from Montana for her parents 60th wedding anniversary and was committed to the extended family portrait experience. Her family was along for the ride (and they were great sports!).

They weren’t really sure how they felt about the idea, which I think is pretty normal. If you’re not used to it, being at the front end of a camera isn’t the most natural thing.  This crowd was a little bit old for oinking pigs and rainbow lollipops but think they had fun anyway.  It turns out they all have some very creative nicknames for each other.  I didn’t catch them all but it made me think that our family needs to ramp up our nickname related creativity.

The two on the left are getting married in a year.  Congratulations!!!

Trudy’s choice of clothing is a great example of something simple that you can do for large family groups. What everyone is wearing is really important to the cohesion of the photos and can make a big difference in whether the images look professional or more like snapshots. To learn more about how to choose clothes for your portrait session, click here.

One brother “ruined” the photos but not flying in from Alaska, so he’s missing. They’ll have to photoshop him in or get a cardboard cutout for next time.

It turns out that the Sodus Point Lighthouse is a really tricky lighting situation in the late afternoon on a sunny day. The worst type of lighting is dappled light, which typically comes from the sun shining through trees. It creates uneven lighting on faces and makes people look like they have skin problems. So we took images both in the shade, and then later on with backs toward the sun.

This image is brought to you by off camera lighting. By turning away from the sun, you get that beautiful backlit sunset look, but then the faces would be too dark so we add light back in on the front for an evenly lit image.

When I told two of them to snuggle, Trudy said, “He’s my brother!!!” Oops. I should definitely get in the habit of asking who’s married to whom.

Trudy with her nieces.

Thank you so much Trudy for trusting me with your family and for being such a blast to work with. I hope you had a great trip back and are enjoying your prints!

Ellen and John purchased a session bundle and are making the rounds with their families.  The first time I worked with them, we photographed John’s extended family on a beautiful summer day at Charlotte Beach.  This time, it was Ellen’s family’s turn.  Generally session bundles are great for maternity, newborns and milestones, but this is an equally fantastic way to use them.  For more details about session bundles, click here.

Extended family photos are, of course, a fantastic way to document your family. The drawback for me is not getting to know anyone very well. I did learn that this brother earned some fame for himself by eating a meal at the White House recently.

And also that they got a new puppy.

And we figured out that Ellen and John’s kids smile best when they’re thrown into the air. There’s a bit of technique to this smiling method – you throw the child up and then catch them and pause for a second and hope they don’t look like you just threw them. This is where that 1/160th of a second camera exposure and some shutter pressing reflexes comes in handy.

Sometimes people hesitate to schedule photo sessions in winter because they worry about the weather – and for good reason. The best solution to this is having a place where you can either do the entire session inside (and there are some fantastic indoor photo locations in the Rochester area), gear up for an outdoor winter session, or have a place where you can take some images inside and then head outside for some fresh air.

Ellen’s parents have been married for many years. This image almost didn’t happen – it was a bit of an afterthought and the kids insisted.

Thank you so much Ellen and John for sharing the other side of your beautiful family with me! I hope you all had a lovely time together.