The Importance of Documenting your Story:
Digital vs Print

This is a debate.  Right?  A topic of interest when anyone searches for a photographer.  You ponder things like; What if I just want digital?  I think I just want digital? Gosh I don't really know what I want to do once I get these images back, but I know my family is soooo overdue for decent photos? 

Let's start with dissecting 'Digital'.

Digital is fluid. Yup. You can store a file, move a file, share a file, and use this 'said' file HOWEVER you wish.  Such convenience!

Digital is searchable.  You can find just about anything using cntrl+F on your computer, right?  Search it by name, store it by name, store it by year.  Gosh that makes tracking my kid’s images year by year so easy & streamlined.

Lastly, Digital is PERMANENT.  Phew! I mean that’s what we are told.  Right?

Well, kind of.   So let’s touch on that last thought for a moment.  I’m a photographer right? I have back-ups for my back-ups right?  Yes, actually I do (clients can now breathe).... at least NOW I do.  But I will be the first to admit back in 2010, I did not have back-ups for my back-ups for my personal stuff.  Years ago, I became a full-time photographer partly because I discovered that digital is not the end all be all.  Here's why.  I had one place in “the cloud” where I had the impression all would be safe.  And for the most part it probably is.  It's in 'the cloud' so we are good to go, right?  Well unless your like me and decide to re-organize ALL of my 2012 and 2013 images and video's.  I start dragging folders back and forth from one drive to dropbox and I walked away to wait for all my re-organizing to sync up.  Guess what, the sync got interrupted.  Poof, 2012 was gone in a blink. It’s still gone in fact.  That’s the year my second child was born.  I can manually and painstakingly grab images and save from Facebook from that year (which is still on my to do list), but that’s not going to save it all.  That’s just a glimpse.  A glimpse of the videos and 1000’s of images I captured that year. So.... 

Lesson learned!

Here’s the thing. Digital is OUTSTANDING. If I don’t admit that then I’m behind the times.  And while most of us are not going to print 1,000 images; if we commit to at least printing or creating something, even one thing, each year, we are at least memorializing SOMETHING from a specific time period.  For instance, gathering 50 of our favorite images into an album, or choosing one to three of our best images from a vacation and blowing them up, ... or choosing a favorite location and making it a tradition to hire someone to make sure ALL of the family members are in the shot instead of the whole family minus mom (who let’s face it, is usually the one behind the camera). The, at least, we have a start to creating a legacy of your family year to year.  We then have something to physically touch,  feel,  look back-on, DISPLAY, and share.  We then have art more priceless than any magazine you could lay out on that coffee table.   The laughs, and the thrill of watching your wee-one sit and flip through an album of their own newborn photos, or their 1st year joining your family, does not have the same effect as asking mom to open her computer and dig through to find "files".  At least personally, this is simply not the same.   Maybe you've already realized this.  Great! So then let's tackle the "Now what?" question. 

Going Beyond Digital 

Step two in fixing this process is HOW to display, and this my friends is where most of the gridlock occurred for me.  Do you feel the same?  We are all good at capturing moments (fancy phones sure make that easy), but how good are we at DOING something with them?  Back in 2008 after my own picturesque Montana wedding, I received GORGEOUS images from a Montana photographer on a breathtaking Ranch.  2500 images, all amazing, yet those images sat on a CD for two years!  I got caught up in the search of the 'perfect' album, then the right approach, and then the daunting task of sorting and choosing my favorites from the 2500 images.   Then life took over.  Things jumped ahead of the album on my to do list.  I kept saying I would get back to it.  And in hindsight I WISH I just purchased my photographers album + Image combo.  It would have been done while i was off honeymooning and probably arrived home the same time I did! Done! But I didn't.   Point being I get it!  We all want to do something, but maybe it's not something that needs to be done by YOU.  Sometimes it's a blessing to decide what you can and want to do, and then let others tackle the rest. In short, don't be that 2008 version of me!  All of what you just read is the reason Burnett Studio was established to create, memorialize, and also FINALIZE your images with so much more than a simple USB of files (fyi you get that too with this photographer).  When it comes to creating memories, the physical end product is so important to us for all of the reason's above.  It's my end goal for all clients.  To make sure they walk away with either prints, an album, or a thoughtfully designed wall from their session.   

I like to show my clients this....   

Floppy Disk PhotographyDon't let your family photos, wedding photos, or years of memories present themselves like this.

Yup, those are floppy disks on the wall (hey, I was an 80's child).  This is kind of what we all do right?  CD's in a drawer is kind of the same as hanging them on the wall?  As a modern day society we don’t personally create art from our images any longer.   And we should.

The launch of Burnett Studio stemmed from a personal desire to grab onto this trend of 'all-things-digital' but combine it with the need for priceless works of art created with your own family memories. So when I am asked why not just do a digital package, you now see why our products go far beyond simple digital files.  The next time you look for or consider a photographer….. think of the image above and below….and decide if a final products in the form of digital, or in the form of art, fit your style, your desires, and your end goal.  After all choosing a photographer is an investment no matter which price point you are looking at.  So make sure the style of photographer you choose, matches your family.  Cheers!

Family Photo Session at North Avenue Beach. Because hanging your memories is priceless works of art all in itself.

Feel free to schedule a 15-minute complimentary consultation to hear if Burnett Studio may be a good fit for capturing your family images.