Down Memory Lane: Picture Perfect

By Jessica Levine

It’s never too early to start capturing your children’s formative stages on film, but you might not always have a camera at the ready. Birthdays are anticipated, but not everyone is prepared to snap a picture of a baby’s fleeting first steps. Italian expat Yvonne Montrone has been taking photos of her daughter, Cloë, since she was a newborn. In the frame of each photo, Montrone places a card detailing a particular event – anything from “Today I am eight months old” to “Today I rolled over for the first time.”

Montrone received the set of 30 cards from a friend, which includes “all big events happening during the first year.” She feels that “it is an easy, cool and fast way to capture Cloë’s first year and its milestones.”

Montrone keeps the cards close by at all times, “as you can never predict the epic steps like walking or sitting up!” she explains. She saves the photos to be printed in future photo albums.

“Also, it is a great way to capture a moment and send it straight to her daddy if he is on a business trip. They’ll always be meaningful to us.”

The challenge these days is keeping up with her growing daughter. “As Cloë is getting older, faster and more interested in everything, the challenge is to capture her sitting still!” Montrone says.

A restless child was precisely the inspiration for barefootportraits founder Don Yap’s studio model. “We love taking photos of our kid in the controlled environment of the studio, but ever since he became a toddler, it is close to impossible to make him sit still,” Yap explains. “We also noticed that he’s super happy when he’s discovering something new or just simply playing, so we created an environment where kids can do just that. “The idea is for kids (and adults) to play, using their imagination while we take photos. This pure, unabandoned play gives us some of our best shots.”

Nowadays, barefootportraits does photo shoots to document maternity, birth announcements, newborns, family portraits, and more, and families can request on-location shooting at their home or at famous Shanghai landmarks.

“We love seeing our clients grow . . . Most come with a big belly, but we have been open for 10 years now, so we’ve seen a lot of babies grow with us.”

Yap says.

Yap’s advice for parents striving for stellar home photography is to “always prepare in advance for the shot that you want,” he says. “If you are going to a new place like a zoo or a park and you know you’ll have great reactions from your kids, why don’t you walk ahead and prepare for your kids to go ‘Wow!’ as they enter the venue. It’s hard to recreate that moment. And, of course, always have your camera handy; you never know when you’ll have a great moment to capture.”