Family Storytelling, Upper West Side. Book Layout

My ultimate goal is to become a visual biographer for you family, when each annual session is a new chapter to the book that we are writing together (well, writing with images). And of course the most logical beginning to this book is when your first baby is born.
While Meaghan’s due date was in November, she contacted me to schedule a newborn session back in July! I was thrilled that capturing this milestone was as important for the family as finding a good pediatrician, buying the crib and adding their names to the wait list for the best daycare (yes on Upper West Side, you actually have to do it before the baby is born). We all know – kids grow fast, but when we are talking about babies they change literally every day. Booking your newborn session early means one less thing to worry about when the baby arrives! Plus you actually have the time to do the research and find the best person for the job.
Family Storytelling is a 2 hours family session with 20 minutes devoted to the more posed directed portraits and the rest is documentary based on your regular routine or activities. While it’s easier to understand this approach with older kids, it might be confusing when thinking about newborns. What kind of activities are we talking about with a 1 month old baby? Sleeping, eating and changing the diapers? These are definitely top 3, but it’s not about it. With documentary family session, it’s never about the activity itself. It’s all about the love and tenderness that goes into taking care of your new baby. It’s about the transition from a family of two to a family of three. It’s the way you look at your sleeping baby and touch her tiny hands. All these little moments – this is what we care about. The way it feels to be new parents and the way it feels to be a newborn baby, not just how it looks.
I’d like to share an email that I got from Meaghan after sharing the images with her:
“Polina! We cannot express enough how wonderful these photos are!!!!
We absolutely adore them and are so blown away by how you’ve captured everything from Ellie’s adorable (and sometimes hilarious) expressions to the love and enjoyment we have as a new family of 3.
I am so so so thrilled!”

All of my packages include 3 components: Captured (the session fee) + Printed (the way your story is presented in print) + Downloaded (your high resolution digital files).
For their Printed component Meaghan and Kevin chose a stunning Photo Book with 50 of their favorite images. The digital files came on a USB drive in a custom box. And I’ll share another email from Meaghan, just because i won’t be able to say it better than she did:
“We received the book and USB this morning. Stunning!! The book is just perfect. We’ve looked at it several times already and cannot wait for Ellie to be able to look at it when she’s bigger and see what a cute little peanut she was!
And the USB – what a gorgeous surprise! We absolutely adore the box as a cherished place we can keep the USB of our photos AND display in our home. It’s wonderful!!
Thank you again – it was such a pleasure to work with you and we look forward to working together in the future as our family grows and possibly expands!”

Before posting this I contacted Meaghan to ask her permission to use the quotes from our email communication and her reply was:

“Hi Polina – we are doing well! It’s crazy how quickly Ellie is changing and growing. I wish time would stand still!
Of course you can use whatever you need from our communications to craft your blog post. It’s a little scary trusting someone to capture such an important moment in your life and you really did it so beautifully. I hope our story can help other families in their decision-making process (though, of course, those gorgeous photos speak for themselves!!)”

Want to book a Family Storytelling session for your family? Let’s chat!