Holiday photoshoots are usually expensive and hard to book, but the advanced commercial photography class took matters into their own hands with a final exam project.

With eleven students and several models, the shoot was focused on giving the photographers an experience they could use in the real world involving real models and responsibility.

“For the advanced kids I really let them give me their opinions at the beginning of the year on what they want to shoot and the stuff they want to learn about,” photography teacher Chanel Henry said. “The majority of them would like to eventually open up their own portrait studio and do family shoots and infant shoots, things like that, so we chose this particular shoot.”

From senior Brenda Saucedo’s point of view, being able to pick out what they want to photograph was the open door to photographing children.

“Advanced commercial photography is an extremely flexible course and since we all are very experienced, our teacher let us design our own curriculum,” Saucedo said. “We all came up with a list of projects we wanted to do and one of them was photographing children.”

There were mixed emotions on taking photos of children from the students.

“My first reaction to hearing about the kids shoot was the slightest bit fearful,” senior Aubrey Choate said. “I love kids and have taken pictures of babies before but I had a feeling that with a group of eleven or so students, the shoot could become rather hectic.”

Saucedo had thoughts on what to expect from the models beforehand.

“Working with kids is a surprise,” Saucedo said. “Some toddlers have a natural instinct to smile and cheese for the camera and others, are very impatient and get distracted easily.”

Being able to photograph in a business-like fashion gave the students experience they will need for the future.

“I really focus on having them ready for the real world,” Henry said. “The last six weeks they created their websites and really started building their business but with this I just really wanted them to get some experience in taking pictures of children and families so that whenever they start working as a photographer they already know what they are doing.”

Before brainstorming began, Henry had to find infant and toddler models for the students to photograph.

“Our teacher emailed the entire faculty, asking if anybody would want to volunteer to bring their kids to the classroom and allow us to photograph them and within a matter of seconds she was overwhelmed with replies,” Saucedo said. “Everyone was jumping at the idea of free portraits.”

Henry chose the models with a first come, first serve tactic to make it easier.

“I got so many responses that I had to narrow it down, kind of pick and choose which models,” Henry said.

The amount of students couldn’t take photos and the models couldn’t come all in one day though.

“We did this project in three different class days and we booked a certain number of kids on each day,” Saucedo said.

All students had to create their own props and backdrop for the shoots as a team which left Henry giving them full responsibility.

“I gave them the responsibility of putting the set together,” Henry said. “I just made sure they had the right equipment and all the cords to use in the studio and that everything would work.”

To Henry, letting them have total control was a decision worth making.

“I think it’s very important for students, not only in my advanced classes, for them to have the sense of responsibility for it because nobody is going to be there out in the real world to do all that for them,” Henry said. “They are going to have to do that on their own so I think that’s good practice for when they get in real world situations.”

The students came together as a whole class and brainstormed different ideas for backdrops.

“To plan for the shoot, we made lists of what we wanted the backdrops and props to be and assigned people to each item that needed to be brought to the school,” Choate said.

Ideas for backdrops sparked through the use of social media and online photography blogs.

“We were looking on pinterest and other photographers’ websites to see what kind of holiday themed photos they were taking,” Henry said.

Even though ideas were thought out and organized, the preparations were still difficult.

“Preparing for the shoot was a long and extensive process,” Saucedo said. “We had to build some of our props and it took a lot of dedication.”

In the end the students came up with two different backdrops, both related to a winter based, holiday theme.

“We ended up with two set ideas,” Choate said. “A blue, silver, and white set with snowflakes and a little white Christmas tree as well as a luxurious stained wood backdrop with bright Christmas ornaments, copper lights, and a furry white throw blanket to cover the mat.”

Saucedo and her father built the second backdrop from scratch which ended up being all of the students’ favorite.

“My dad and I built a wooden backdrop and we hung ornaments from it and even strung wired lights,” Saucedo said. “It ended up looking so amazing, and we were very proud.”

Henry believed the wood prop turned out the best but had an extra benefit to it.

“It’s really great because Brenda will do this as a career and she already has a prop built that she can keep for next holiday seasons and things like that,” Henry said.

When the project days came around, a bump in the plan occurred during the first shoot.

“I got an email during the infant shoot that one of the infants had canceled so I got a little nervous because then we would only have one at that point,” Henry said. “We were supposed to have two babies, one canceled and then we just had the one to work with.”

The final product was more than just a grade for Saucedo.

“I know that these parents are going to love all of the pictures that my classmates and I give them,” Saucedo said. “We are capturing amazing moments that these families will cherish forever.”

The project was an opportunity for real-life experience in the photography business.

“Overall, this was one of my favorite activities in the class and it’s special to be able to have such a real world experience with clients,” Saucedo said.