A Perth Family and Maternity Shoot

OK, this is a very special one! This summer, after two and a half years of not being able to see my sister or meet my baby niece due to covid lockdowns, I finally got to fly out to Perth, Australia with my husband and kids and visit them. Wow, what a precious time it was! Building relationship with my gorgeous niece, seeing my children playing with her and how much they all loved each other, and having some quality time with my sister who is now expecting baby number two!

So, as a wedding and family photographer, it's no surprise that I took my camera along with me! One thing that I knew I wanted to do was a photoshoot with them down at the beach, to document this beautiful moment in their family.

Over in Australia, our summer is obviously their winter, but to us Brits, it just felt like normal weather! Ha! Apart from a few dramatic storms that we did get to witness. But for this one evening in our last few days there, I knew that the weather was looking clear and hopefully we would get a beautiful winter sunset. And those skies over the Indian Ocean did not disappoint. The gentle, pastel colours are just the most beautiful backdrop for these images.

I wanted to make sure that we got photographs of the whole family together and also document some maternity shots of Annika at this lovely stage of her pregnancy.

While we were over in Western Australia, we were were so blessed to experience so much of the coast around Perth and the Margaret River Region, and what struck me was how every beach had its own personality.

We did a coastal walk one day along the clifftops from Cape Naturaliste to Sugar Loaf Rock in the Leeuwin Naturaliste National Park, and saw absolutely wild waves crashing on rugged, awesome rocks and beaches. We even saw some dolphins playing in the waves! The whole scene was awe-inspiring.

Then, about half an hour later, we visited Meelup Beach in Eagle Bay, which is around the corner of the peninsula and so faces a different way, and I couldn't believe how different it was to the other part of the coast we had just seen. The sky was a ombre glow of purples and pinks, the ocean was as calm as glass with barely a wave, the sand was soft and white and it was just as awe-inspiring, but in a totally different way!

So, the beach that we decided to use for this shoot is Bennion Beach, Perth, which is a little cove and provided a pretty and private space for us to just have some fun together. Here are some of my favourites from the shoot! I'm so happy to have captured these moments and I know that our two families will treasure these images across the miles.

#familyphotographer #perth #westernaustralia #familyshoot #familysession #maternityshoot #perthbeacpppp