Monday night it hit me that I didn’t really have flooring that would provide to be good solution for cake getting thrown around. I then thought that I didn’t have a backdrop that I didn’t like for the session either. If you aren’t a photographer, you might be unaware at how much a studio floor printed on paper or a printed backdrop or cloth backdrop might cost. A 4×8 foot floor can cost around $200 and a backdrop can cost $100, 200, and more. Looking through most of my work, you’ll see I primarily shoot outside, but when it comes to babies, a lot of sessions happen indoors, especially in Winter. However, I just have a problem spending $400 on a couple sheets of paper more or less with a floor and backdrop printing on them. If I want a floor, I want the real thing, same goes for a backdrop. It might be because I’m not primarily a studio photographer, and most of what I shoot is real, but still. To the lumberyard I go. I bought some really nice vinyl plank flooring and a wood to make a real solid wood backdrop, total cost: $150. This is how my mind operates, because let’s say five years from now, I no longer want that backdrop, if it were just a piece of paper, I’d end up recycling it. By having solid wood, I could use it for a project at home, or if I didn’t have use for it say on wall or something, I could always use it to make shelving in my storage closet, because I can never have enough storage.
This brings us to the big day, Dylan’s one year session. We started out with some studio shots of him, and my oh my was this boy full of energy. Crawling around all over the place, he was challenging me to capture a picture of him in focus he was so speedy! Thankfully mom and dad knew how to pause him for a few seconds and bring a smile out, but after those few seconds, it was back to the races! Seriously though, I love this! I know it might be tough for some parents because maybe the expectation is that it’ll be this picture perfect moment like you might see in the movies and the kid will sit still for 30 minutes and be a statue, but honestly, I wouldn’t want this. Sure, a statue of a kid makes for some amazing imagery, but is it imagery that really reflects that kid’s personality? This is what I want to capture. He may have been in mid crawl in some of the pictures, but I love them because I feel like we were able to capture a boy who’s full of energy and curiosity… he was obsessed with the camera!
Then came the big moment; cake smash. These are always hilarious because every kid is similar and different at the same time. Let me explain. They are the same that in the first few moments, they will look at the cake wondering what they are supposed to do. What is this thing set before me? Do I eat this? Does someone feed it to me? Is this even food? Let me poke it. I imagine if a baby could speak, this is what they would be saying. After the initial poke, this is where they are different. Some babies might go to town and throw it all over. Others may play with it for a while. I had one baby who decided to crawl all over his cake! But this makes for some pretty awesome and hilarious pictures. Dylan went more of a play with the cake and throw the icing at the same time. Speaking of the cake, it looked amazing! Holli’s Flour Shop hooked us up with this cake and it went with the theme perfectly! We had a ton of fun photographing Dylan, and I think he had quite a time playing with his cake too!
