When was the last time you took the time and effort to print your photos? Do you have family portraits decorating the walls of your home? Even as a professional photographer, I am the first to admit that I am guilty of putting off printing the portraits from my personal family sessions. It is 2020, and in the digital age it is so easy to post compressed and low quality versions of your portraits to social media (facebook is notorious for this) to keep friends and family updated on your lives or have a digital archive of your memories on a hard drive that is likely to crash and unlikely to ever be looked through. It may take a little bit of extra effort and budget to have high quality prints made, but, there is still so much value in a tangible photograph.
One of the main reasons that I have put off printing my photographs is that I talk myself into believing that I will print them someday soon, when I’m not as busy with running my business, taking care of the household, and caring for my children. But, the truth is, it will never be a good time for me, or anyone else. We have all let our busy schedules lead to procrastination. I have lost count of how many of my clients had only saved the digital versions of their portraits from our session and have contacted me over a year later to see if I still had copies of their digital images after they experienced a computer or hard drive failure.
Here are my top 3 reasons to print your family portraits:
Your Memories Become Tangible Heirlooms
Printed Photos become heirlooms that our future children and grandchildren can touch, hold, and treasure. These memories are displayed on walls, desks and inside photo albums. There is no need to cross fingers and hope that the old hard drive is still working and search for hours to find images in archives.
These heirlooms help to show our loved ones what we were like and bring us closer to them. One of my favorite pastimes is visiting my grandma and going down her long hallway of printed portraits and getting a glimpse into my childhood, into her life, and into the lives of our family members. As I grow my legacy, I hope to instill confidence in and show love to my children as they see our loving memories on display every day. I also hope that my grandchildren have the same fondness for walking down my hallway, as my grandma has given to me.
It Creates an Emotional Connection to our Memories
Sometimes when we first see a photo, we may notice things like how we look. With a digital photo, it is so common to add it to a hard drive or upload it to social media and then forget about it as time goes on. But, when we see a portrait hanging on the wall or physically hold a photo in our hand, we eventually see a moment in time and feel the emotions and experiences that we had with the people that were with us. Small things in a photo like an old home, a favorite toy, etc may bring us back to our roots and remind us of our purpose.
It Gives us Strength
When a bad day comes, it’s easy to forget about how fortunate we are. Seeing photos of loved ones on our desks or the walls of our homes can be a good reminder of who we are, our support system, better days, and how we got to where we are now. Our memories are a part of us, they bring us together, and they grow our love. It’s so important to preserve and display these memories as a daily reminder of love.
Ideas for printing and displaying portraits:
Sometimes it can be difficult to visualize how to display treasured heirlooms from family sessions. Throughout this article, I have included some examples from real sessions with my clients to give you some inspiration. All of my clients have the option to order quality prints and wall art from a professional lab directly from their digital gallery and have them delivered to their doorstep! Prints and wall art ordered via my lab are 100% guaranteed for quality and color accuracy, and their archival quality will ensure your images are passed down for generations. My clients also receive a print release for all digital files and are free to print at any lab of their choice. I can only guarantee quality for prints that are ordered through my lab. If my clients would like to print their photos through a lab of their choice rather than through a preferred professional lab, I recommend mpix.com for the best quality.
If you live in San Diego county or will be visiting for a vacation, I would love to document your family memories.
Contact me for information about my packages and to view my booking calendar.
