A large family standing together on the beach at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey, with a framed photograph held at the center of the group

There is a framed photograph in the middle of this family portrait, held down at the front of the group where everybody could reach it. The family brought it, and I did not know it was coming. I want to tell you what it is before I say anything else about the day.

Autumn, 2016

I photographed this family in the fall of 2016. I went to high school with the mom, and we had not spoken in years when she answered a short run of fall sessions I was offering that season. We had to move the date once, because their dog was in cancer treatment at Penn and there was no version of that session that happened without her in it. When we finally shot it, it was one of the best family sessions I did that whole year.

They lost their dog the following spring. About a month after that, Mike passed away in a helicopter crash. He was a pilot, a father, and as far as I could tell liked by everyone. I only knew him a little, but he was kind and funny and easy to be around. I wrote about him at the time, and that June I gave up a full day of sessions for the family, every dollar of it going to them.

The photographs from that fall are the last ones I ever took of him.

Ocean City, 2019

Three years later they asked for the beach.

We met at the north end of Ocean City, on the stretch of sand that runs out from under the bridge. It is one of my favorite places to photograph a family in South Jersey. The sand up there is wide and clean, the crowds thin out, and the bridge gives you a hard line to work against when you want one and deep shade to work in when you want that instead.

Mike’s side of the family came, and the grandparents on the other side, and the children. Three generations on one beach, which is not a group you get to assemble often. And they brought him with them.

A close view of hands holding a framed photograph during a family portrait session on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

That is the photograph inside the frame. I took it that same fall. Mike is crouched down beside their dog with his arm around her. The family carried it out onto the sand, and it is in these portraits with everybody else.

The Kids First

I always open a big group session with the children, for the simple reason that they have a fixed amount of patience and it runs out on a schedule that has nothing to do with my shot list. Get them while they still have it, then spend the rest of the session on the adults, who will hold up.

Four children standing together with their arms around each other on the sand at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

Four children laughing together on the beach during an Ocean City, New Jersey family portrait session

The children of the family close together on the sand, the youngest looking into the camera, in Ocean City, New Jersey

Three Generations

Then the grandparents with the grandchildren, which for my money is the entire reason a family books a session like this in the first place. Everybody in one place, on one day, at the ages they are right now.

An older couple on the sand with the children of the family during a beach portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

An older woman with two of the children on the beach at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

An older man holding the youngest child with a boy standing beside him on the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

Family by Family

With a group this size I break it down and work through it in units. One household at a time, then each parent one on one with each child, then whatever pairs and trios the group throws up on its own. It takes longer than lining everybody up once and firing. It is also the reason anybody has anything worth hanging on a wall afterward.

A family of four standing together on the beach during an Ocean City, New Jersey portrait session

A family of four laughing together on the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

This one loosened up fast. By the third or fourth frame they had stopped posing entirely and were mostly just piling on each other, which I let run.

A woman and two children laughing in a cuddle on the sand during a family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

Then every parent with every child, one on one. These are the frames that get printed.

A mother with her son on the beach at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

A mother and her daughter cheek to cheek during a family portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A father with his son on the sand during a beach family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A father with his daughter during a family portrait session on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A woman with two boys on the sand at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

A woman laughing with two boys during a beach family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

And the two little ones on their own, holding hands, which was not my idea.

Two young boys holding hands on the beach during a family portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

One at a Time

The kids got individual portraits too. You can see the bridge behind them in a couple of these, and I like that. It puts the photographs somewhere.

An individual portrait of a boy on the beach with the bridge at the north end of Ocean City behind him

An individual portrait of a boy during a family session on the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

An individual portrait of the youngest child of the family on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

The Photograph Moved With Us

Here is the part I did not plan and would not have known to ask for. The frame did not stay with the big group. It traveled. Whoever was up next in front of the camera picked it up and carried it over, so Mike ended up in the portraits with each piece of his family, one grouping at a time.

A woman and two boys holding a framed photograph during a family portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A framed photograph held toward the camera by a woman and two boys on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

Everybody was emotional through that stretch. It was also, somehow, still fun. Those two things sit next to each other more often than people expect at a session like this, and the whole job is to not step on either one of them.

We shot the same three again right after without the frame, and that is where some of the loosest photographs of the entire session came from.

A quiet moment between a woman and a young child on the sand at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

A woman laughing with a boy during a beach family portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

Between runs I pulled the other two aside for a set of their own.

Two children hand in hand on the sand during a family session at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

And then the frame came out again.

An older couple and a woman holding a framed photograph on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

Three family members with a framed photograph during a portrait session on the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

Under the Bridge

We walked the whole group down the beach and back and shot it wide, with the bridge running over the top of the frame and the kids out ahead of everybody, because they always are.

A family walking together on the beach beneath the bridge at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

Children running toward the camera ahead of their family on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A large family walking together across the sand during a beach portrait session in Ocean City, New Jersey

Every Single Person, in Black and White

This is the thing I push hardest for at a large family session, and almost nobody asks for it up front. An individual portrait of every person who is there. Same light, same background, same treatment, all of them in black and white so they hang together as a set.

I have built these into wall collections before, a whole family broken out into individual pieces and hung as one arrangement, and it is one of my favorite things to make. But even sitting flat in a gallery, it is the set families come back to. Everybody at the age they were on that one day. You cannot go back and shoot that later.

A black and white portrait of an older man with glasses during a family session on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a young boy smiling at the camera on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of the youngest child of the family during an Ocean City, New Jersey beach portrait session

A black and white portrait of a woman with curly hair on the beach at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a young girl grinning at the camera during a family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a boy standing on the sand during a beach family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a woman laughing during a family portrait session on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a man on the beach during a three generation family session in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of an older man beneath the bridge at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of a woman looking into the camera on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white portrait of an older woman during a family portrait session on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey

And Then They Played

With the list finished, everybody stopped working. I kept shooting.

A black and white candid of family members chasing each other across the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

A black and white frame of the family laughing in a pile on the sand in Ocean City, New Jersey

The Walk Out

At the end I put all of them in one line, hand in hand, and had them walk toward the water while I shot from underneath the bridge. The sun was low over the bay by then and the shadows were running long behind them across the sand.

A family walking hand in hand toward the water, photographed from beneath the bridge at the north end of Ocean City, New Jersey

Then they stopped at the edge and stood there and looked at the water, and I got one more.

A family standing hand in hand at the water's edge in silhouette at the end of an Ocean City, New Jersey portrait session

That is the last frame of the session.

The Film From That Day

We had a camera rolling that day too. This is the same session as the photographs above, the whole thing in about two minutes.

Booking a Family Session at the Shore

This session exists in the shape it does entirely because of the ones that came before it. That is the argument for doing this more than once, and it is the only argument I have ever needed. Then print them. The family could carry that photograph around the beach and put it in every grouping because somebody printed it and put it in a frame.

You can see more of this work in the family portrait portfolio, read about how I approach family sessions, or look at the family reunion I photographed in Philadelphia, which is the same idea at a very different scale. If you want to see how a beach session actually runs before you book one, the film above is that session, start to finish.

Ready to Start Planning?

Tell me about your family and where you want to be photographed, and I will take it from there. Start here.

The Photograph They Brought to the Beach