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The Power of Portraits in Your Home and in Your Future! | Northern VA Family Photographer
The Power of Portraits in Your Home and in Your Future! | Northern VA Family Photographer
Years and generations from now, long after we are gone, who will tell your family’s story? Will there be a memoir or a scrapbook to say how you loved and lived, to show pictures of what your generation looked like? Will you have beautiful, fine art portraits to speak for you and represent to the next generation how you lived? As a photographer, we believe in the power of a portrait. Our clients across the Leesburg, VA area would probably agree with us about the power of a beautifully crafted image to tell a story – their story.
Our clients rely on our fine art portraits to capture their family’s images as a moment in time as much as they entrust portraits to recount their story many, many years from now to those generations not born yet. Fine art portraits taken by a professional photographer are a legacy our clients create today for tomorrow.
Oral and Visual History
Oral history remains as significant as ever in human history. It is a powerful medium for preserving a family’s history and culture. Stories are handed down through the generations of a family, creating a vital oral history of their ancestors, their roots.
However, we also have become an increasingly visual society thanks in significant part to the advancement of technology. Photography is easier, more accessible, and better than ever, both for the novice and the professional studio photographer.
Digital cameras and smartphones have changed how the general public takes pictures and documents their lives. Photography has also taken on a critical role in how families record their history for generations to come. Now more than ever, you can use photography to create a visual history to pass on in addition to oral history.
Snapshot vs. Portraits by a Professional Photographer
A snapshot isn’t the same as a professional portrait taken by a portrait photographer who is skilled and trained in the art of photography. Hiring a professional produces pictures that transcend ordinary snapshots and that are worthy of display as artwork. These are images that tell and preserve your story beautifully and eloquently well into the future.
When done exceptionally well, they become family heirlooms to be handed down through the generations. For example, think to any portraits you own of your grandparents or great-grandparents. How much do you treasure those images? Aren’t they considered priceless in your family and, thus, worthy of being considered family heirlooms?
Museum Quality Portraits
It wasn’t so long ago that museum and archival-quality papers were only available to, well, museums, archives, and other professionals in related industries. Today’s professional photographers, however, are able to use archival-quality photographic papers either on their own or through professional photography labs to create photographic art to last generations.
Unlike portraits from our great-grandparents’ era, professional portraits today are printed on paper you can trust to last for 100+ years without fading or damage. In the early days of printed photography, that luxury didn’t exist.
Display Your Family Portraits in Your Home
Storing portraits on a hard drive or disk seems practical to many people today. But to the professional photographer, fine art images stored solely on a CD or a USB seems unimaginable! It’s akin to wasting something personally valuable by stashing it away where it could be lost to time.
Why hide your story in a drawer where you won’t be able to enjoy it?!
Here are some points to consider:
• Displaying your professional portraits in your home allows you to enjoy them and reminds you of your family story. There’s more, though.
• Seeing your portraits every day helps create lasting memories – and keeps others in your thoughts.
• As we get older, we tend to forget things long past in our life’s story. The more you look at a picture, the more it’s committed to memory.
• So, those gorgeous portraits you display and walk past each day? The day will come when they are stored in your memory, and looking at them will evoke memories from that time in your life.
• How often have you looked at an old picture and remembered, not just the moment captured in the photo, but that day or the days around the photo?
• Have you ever seen an elderly person look at an old picture and recount the story or memory surrounding the photograph? A photograph can help your memory pull up other images long tucked away into the recesses of your mind. The tangible can help recall the intangible.
(By the way, there is some evidence to indicate that the more you focus on taking pictures during an activity or event, the less likely you are to remember that activity! Get a photographer for those special events!)
Today, Tomorrow and Decades From Now
Portraits in your home can be significant – both for today, for tomorrow, and for decades from now. Can a snapshot have the same effect? Yes, they can. But can a snapshot be enjoyed 50 years from now with the same quality? It’s unlikely.
A professional, fine art portrait, however, without a doubt can be enjoyed 50 or even 150 years from now. And, for anyone who saw it on a regular basis, that portrait will evoke precious memories.
As a family photographer in the Leesburg, VA area, we relish our role in helping our clients capture memories through photographic art.
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Family Photographer, Studio Photographer
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter photography team located in Northern Virginia and serving the surrounding area including Leesburg, VA. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Photographers | Alexa, Carousel Dreams Portrait Session | Northern VA Family Photographer
As photographers located in Sterling, VA, and serving the surrounding areas, including Leesburg, VA and Broad Run, VA, we specialize in family and children photography and in creating beautiful portraits which you’ll treasure for years to come.
Every little girl loves carousels! Watching her eyes light up when she sees just the perfect horse for her to ride is such a joy.
Little Alexa put our carousel horse through its paces during her Limited Edition Carousel Dreams Portrait Session in our outdoor studio! She had a blast, and her mother got beautiful artistic and joyful images of her little girl.
Alexa also had a bit of ride on our flower-strewn swing fit for a princess.
Limited Edition Children’s Sessions
Our next Carousel Dreams Limited Edition Session is coming up in June 2016. There’s something dreamy and sweet about carousels. Young or old, we all love them! Bring your little lady to our outdoor studio for her own ride on our Carousel Dreams horse!
Although we are always available for family portrait sessions, we have special Limited Edition sessions with unique themes. They provide a fun and relaxed atmosphere, and are perfect for the little princess who enjoys dressing up. Check out our Limited Edition calendar and choose a special session just for your precious little girl!
Photographers, Family and Children Photography
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy and Joriana Belcher Anderson, family photographers located in Northern Virginia, near Leesburg, VA and Broad Run, VA. We specialize in candid, emotional and artistic images.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Professional Photographer
Product, Mounted Prints | Northern VA Family Photographer
Product, Mounted Prints | Northern VA Family Photographer
We understand that when you make the decision to do portraits with a photographer, you are investing your time, energy, and your faith in us (not to mention your money). As an experienced, mother-daughter team from the Leesburg, VA area, we won’t disappoint you.
Mounted Prints
We are always respectful of our clients, and we value your business. We believe in developing lifelong relationships with our clients and having them regularly return to us. This is why when you select an Ever After product, we deliver it to you mounted only on the highest-quality materials. We don’t just print out a photo. We have it professionally mounted and finished. We want your photos to last a lifetime!
Gift Prints
As a professional photographer, we have spent years building exclusive relationships with reputable vendors and talented craftsmen to offer our clients the highest quality products. Even our gift-size prints (8×12 and smaller) are professionally mounted on styrene by the top-rated company in the industry. Styrene ensures that your image will not warp with time, unlike standard photo papers. Each mounted print comes with a lustre coating which protects the prints from fingerprints, smudges, and light scratches and provides a slightly matte appearance.
All of our prints are rated to last 100 years in a typical home display, and 200 years in dark storage.
To quote one of our clients: “The quality of the products is like none other that I’ve seen. You can’t get what they create just anywhere and it’s not something that you see every day. I would not know where you could go to purchase what I have because it is so unique. One of the things I loved about working with Mindy & Joriana was the custom nature of the products and how personal the service was.” – Deveney, Alexandria, VA
If you are looking for beautiful family photos from a mother-daughter photographer team in the Leesburg, VA area employing only the highest-quality materials, contact us! We are happy to show you some samples of our products. We are certain you’ll agree on the quality – and the beauty of our work!
Family Photographer
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter portrait photography team located near Leesburg, VA in Northern Virginia. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Professional Photographer
Tip #3, How to Understand & Work with Your Photographer | Don’t Expect Free Photography | Northern VA Family Photographer
Tip #3, How to Understand & Work with Your Photographer | Don’t Expect Free Photography | Northern VA Family Photographer
Tip #3 in our series “How to Understand & Work with your Photographer” is: Don’t Expect Free Photography. From Leesburg, VA to Seattle, WA, photographers would say: Please don’t ask for or expect free photography. If it’s not offered, it’s probably not very considerate to ask. Dozens of hours can go into one client from the moment they hire a photographer through to post-production time. Asking for free stuff is asking a lot of a small business owner. Our livelihoods depend on our ability to produce quality work and be paid for it.
It’s not just giving away a digital picture. When a portrait photography studio puts a photo out there attached to their name, it represents them as an artist and as a brand. They aren’t served well by sending out a quick shot that has not been properly edited. Any pictures we send out to clients, paid or otherwise, would need to be properly edited.
If you are asking on behalf of a nonprofit, some photographers might be able to make time to help, but that really depends on their schedule, the nonprofit’s event date, and any number of things. Everyone wants to support a nonprofit, but it isn’t always possible. Some photographers are able to provide free services for a nonprofit event, while others will do it for a very small fee. Other photographers simply can’t afford to give up a Saturday night wedding to shoot a charity event regardless of how much they love that charity. It really all depends.
Again, going back to our initial analogy of the mechanic and the contractor, you wouldn’t ask them for free services or free work would you? It’s no different for photographers. While photographers chose their careers for a love of photography and working with people, most still have to pay their bills like everyone else. Asking for free photos or photography can put everyone in an uncomfortable situation.
We’ve built some great relationships and friendships throughout the Leesburg, VA area. All good photographers should build close relationships with their clients, and we’re proud of ours. We hope that our clients believe in our work and continue to choose us as their family photographer.
Other tips in this series:
Tip #1, Understanding the Process
Tip #2, Don’t ask for more photos than the ones we present to you
Family Photographers, Portrait Photography Studio
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter family photography team located near Leesburg, VA in Northern Virginia. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Professional Photographer
How to Safely Hang Wall Art – Without Damaging Your Walls! | Northern VA Family Photographer
How to Safely Hang Wall Art – Without Damaging Your Walls! | Northern VA Family Photographer
It doesn’t take a photographer (or a rocket scientist) to tell you that we’ve all put nails into a wall only to realize that it’s either not a good spot for the piece or it is in the wrong place! So now that you’ve spent money on your cherished family photos, how do you hang them without damaging your walls? We’re often asked this by our clients in and around the Leesburg, VA area so we thought we’d put together some pointers! (Keep in mind that our tips are only advice and you should always use your best judgment or hire a professional!)
Location
It’s important to carefully select where you would like to hang your portrait photography. You will want to ensure the portrait fits well into the space. It should not appear as too large or too small in comparison to the wall space. Artwork that is too large for the space will overwhelm and look out of place. Artwork that is too small for the size of the wall will appear lost on the wall and will look even smaller.
Hang the portrait so that its center is at about average eye-level. Average would be eye-level for an adult at about 5’3” in height. People often make the mistake of hanging art way too high!
If the piece is heavy, you will need to insert your nail or mounting hardware into a stud to safely hold the weight. A stud finder is the easiest way to find your stud. Otherwise, the old fashioned method of tapping on the wall will do it!
Placement
Having a tough time trying to decide where to hang the portrait on a wall? Use a mock-up using blank paper. The paper should be the same size as the portrait. Use multiple sheets taped together if you need to. Now you can temporarily place your mock-up onto the wall. Then step back at least two to three feet.
Mounting the Wall Art
Measure, measure, and measure again. Mark where you need to hammer your nail or where your drill holes will go. Keep in mind that if there is a wire on your piece for mounting it will change where your photo actually ends up hanging. In other words, pull the wire to see how long it extends once it hangs from the nail. Build that amount into your calculations when deciding where to put your nail.
Tools and Materials
Use the correct tools! Picture hanging kits are inexpensive and readily available. Lighter prints and frames should be fine with a nail into the sheetrock (also known as drywall). A plastic wall anchor mounted into the sheetrock can be used if the piece you’re hanging doesn’t weigh too much. To be on the safe side, use the stud if possible. If you use a stud, no plastic anchor will be needed, but you should use the proper mounting brackets to ensure a nail doesn’t give way in the middle of the night!
Heavier pieces will need a bracket or picture hanger. Portraits heavier than 25lbs. will need to be hung from a stud. A nail inserted into sheetrock will not hold it! Actually, no nail might hold it. Depending on the actual weight, you might need to use special hardware.
Any photographer will tell you that hanging photos isn’t complicated, especially if they’re not heavy. With a little preparation, you can easily hang your beautiful family photos without leaving your walls with dozens of unnecessary holes! However, if you’re ever in doubt, it’s best to hire a professional.
As part of our exceptional customer service, when a client purchases wall art, we offer hanging services! We know how proud you are of your family portraits and how much you’d like to display them perfectly!
Family Photographer, Portrait Photography
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter photography team located in Northern Virginia, near Leesburg, VA. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Family Wall Art Collection, Lori & Rob | Northern VA Family Photographer
As a family photographer located in Northern VA and serving the surrounding areas, including Broad Run, VA, our photography studio specializes in family portraits. We love to create beautiful portraits which you and your family will treasure for years to come.
We recently introduced you to our clients, Lori and Rob, a lovely couple with a beautiful little girl.
Wall Art
As we mentioned, Lori wanted family portraits with Rob and little Felicity, and she wanted to display them on the walls of her home. Lori and Rob chose a frameless Family Wall Art Collection in Ice, custom sized for a wall in their home. After the display was hung, Lori was kind enough to send us a snapshot, which we’ve shared below!
Now that’s a beautiful family!
After we introduced you to this family earlier, we heard happy news from Lori. They’ve added a little boy to their family! And he’s a sweetheart! We love hearing such happy family news from our portrait clients.
Family Photographer, Family Photography
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter photography team located in Northern Virginia, and serving the surrounding area including Broad Run, VA. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Image of the Week, Divas & Darlins Mother-Daughter Session | Northern VA Family Photographer
This week we celebrate mothers and daughters with Images of the Week from our Divas and Darlins Limited Edition Session! At our Northern Virginia studio, located near Broad Run, VA, we take true pleasure in these special mother/daughter sessions. Being chosen to capture family photos of this bond always brings joy to our hearts. (I’m sure being a mother/daughter photography team can’t possibly have anything to do with that!?)
This Limited Edition session is open to all ages. It doesn’t matter if your daughter is a toddler, a teenager, or if she has long flown the nest. Or, Daughters, what a wonderful way to show Mom how special she is to you! This is a lovely gift for the two of you to share, and the result will be images you will both cherish forever.
Our next Divas and Darlins Limited Edition Sessions will be held on April 8, 2016. We welcome all of you mothers and daughters to our studio!
We have Limited Edition Sessions with unique themes through the year. Visit our Limited Edition Calendar for more info.
Family Photographer, Family Photos
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter photography team located in Northern Virginia, near Broad Run, VA. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Tip #2 – How to Understand & Work With Your Photographer Friends | Don’t Ask For More Photos Than We Present | Northern VA Family Photographer
We hope you enjoyed our first tip in our ongoing series: How to Understand and Work with Your Photographer Friends because we’re back with Tip #2! We can’t remember a client in the Northern Virginia, Broad Run, VA or Ashburn Village, VA areas ever asking us this, but we have heard it has happened to other photographers!
So here’s the next tip.
Tip #2: Don’t ask for more photos than the ones we present to you.
We PROMISE the ones you’ve seen are the best ones there are and you’ll love what you see!
We can PROMISE you (yes, again) that we aren’t holding back spectacular pictures of you! Why would we do that?! We want to show you how gorgeous you look and how great your family photos turned out. We’re showing you the best there is in our professional and personal opinion. Asking us for the ones which didn’t make the cut would likely hurt our feelings (we do have feelings!) and is considered a no-no in the photography world.
Again, remember the mechanic and contractor analogies? Would they hold back on their most beautiful and best handiwork? Nope. And, we won’t either!
Before you come in to your photo session, we can assure you we’ve already done a lot of thinking, a lot of planning, and a lot of strategizing. We are only as good as our work. If a client isn’t happy, then neither are we! We put a lot of work into every single photo we do and every single photo session we have. We will always show you the very best of your images!
Stay tuned for Tip #3: Don’t Expect Free Photography.
If you live in the Northern Virginia, Broad Run, VA or Ashburn Village, VA area, reach out to us! We think you’ll like what you see in our photography!
Family Photographer, Family Photography
Ever After Portraits is comprised of Mindy Belcher and Joriana Belcher Anderson, a mother-daughter photography team located in Northern Virginia. We specialize in timeless and emotive fine art family portraits.
Family means everything and capturing those precious moments to preserve forever will mean family heirlooms for you to share for years to come.
Best,
Mindy & Joriana – Contact Us!
Why Digital Images Will Never Be as Satisfying as Wall Art | Northern VA Family Photographer | Ever After Portraits
Lately, we’ve been thinking about digital versus print portraits. Is there a difference when it comes to value of investment? Our clients hail from all across Northern Virginia, including Broad Run, VA, and they tend to be fairly tech savvy, and they love their families dearly. They often ask us what to do when it comes to their professional family photos. We know the answer, of course, but a recent record-breaking transaction really validated it for us.
The most expensive work of art ever sold was a Paul Gauguin painting of two Tahitian girls. It sold for almost $300 million in early 2015, and was reportedly bought by the country of Qatar. The sale of such a masterpiece had us wondering: Would they display the painting in public, in private, or (gasp) not at all? Surely such a masterpiece would be displayed for the enjoyment of others? And, then it hit us: digital versus print photos. Why invest in family photography to (gasp again) not display it?!
read more…
Family Photography as Wall Art and Its Benefits | Northern VA Family Photographer | Ever After Portraits
Clearly wall art is important if you want your home to feel more lived in, more beautiful, and more reflective of your family. But is family photography as wall art necessarily important? The answer is: Yes, it is! As a family photographer across Northern Virginia, including Broad Run, VA, we are always drawn to any studies or articles on the benefits or effects of photography. (If you find any good ones, please feel free to send them to us!)
Family Photography as Wall Art
Last year we referenced a 1975 study done on children’s self-esteem and the positive impact of displaying family portraits. A more recent article, however, in the UK’s Daily Mail newspaper discusses the psychological benefits to children when families display family photos.
read more…