At-Home Family Photos | Richmond VA Family Photographer

Richmond, VA

When you start planning family photos, it’s easy to assume you need to find the perfect park or popular photo spot. However, one of my favorite locations might be much closer to home: your own backyard.

The Gardner family chose the backyard of their lake house for their family photos, and their property gave us everything we needed without ever leaving a place that already meant something to them. Between the lake, fall foliage, wooded areas, and evergreens, we had plenty of variety throughout their session.

You Don’t Need a Traditional Photo Location

A great location for family photos doesn’t have to be a place you’ve seen all over Instagram. Your home, backyard, family lake house, or another meaningful property can work just as beautifully.

For the Gardners, we moved around the property as the light changed. The evergreens gave us rich greenery, while the wooded areas brought in the warmer colors of fall. Then, we headed toward the lake for a brighter, more open backdrop. Simply moving around the property gave their final gallery several completely different looks.

We also photographed different combinations throughout the session, including the entire family, the kids together, and the parents. Because everything was in one place, we could focus on creating those different groupings without packing everyone into cars or spending part of the session traveling between locations.

As a photographer, I’m always looking at the light first. Then, I look for backgrounds, colors, and little pockets around the property that will photograph well. Sometimes a spot that seems completely ordinary when you see it every day can look very different through my camera.

Family Photos in a Place That Means Something

There’s also something special about taking family photos somewhere that already belongs to your story.

A beautiful park can make a gorgeous backdrop, but a family home or lake house adds another layer to the photos. Years from now, you aren’t only looking back at what everyone looked like during this season. You’re also seeing a place where your family actually spent time together.

That’s one of the reasons I love at-home family photos. The location becomes part of what we’re documenting rather than simply serving as the background.

And you don’t need a major milestone to make that worth preserving. Sometimes having everyone together is reason enough.

Your Backyard Might Be Better Than You Think

You definitely don’t need a lake house or acres of land to make at-home family photos work. A smaller backyard, front porch, garden, tree-lined driveway, or even one beautiful corner of your property may give us everything we need.

You also don’t have to figure out which areas will photograph best on your own. Send me a few photos of your property, and I can help you look at the location from a photographer’s perspective. We can plan around the best light and find the spots that will give your gallery variety while still keeping the setting personal to your family.

Sometimes the family photo location you’ve been searching for is one you see every day.