NEW!!
AUTUMN PHOTOGRAPHY BOOTCAMP!
On Monday 21st Oct we're kicking off our annual Autumn Photography bootcamp, all about photographing our families in this beautiful season!
5 days, 5 lessons, 5 challenges - all free, online and beginner friendly!
Welcome to Photography for Parents
We help parents learn how to make the most of their cameras and learn how to take beautiful, meaningful, natural photos of their children.
We are all about photographing children in their normal environment, being who they are and doing what they love most.
We will NOT be teaching you how to photograph babies in fancy buckets or how to pose your kids in flowy dresses in the fields at sunset.
But we will help you learn how to capture them when they're having fun chasing around the house, how to photograph them when they're having a cuddle with their grandma, when they concentrate hard on that lego construction and when they are having fun jumping into puddles. You know, the regular life stuff - the bits that make them-them
Blink and you miss it
From tiny cute babies to opinionated teenagers, you blink and they're a whole new person. As parents we do our best to record and preserve these stages. Our photos - a record of their growth, personality and love.
But hand on heart, how often have you seen beauty and magic looking at your kids, and when you check the photo you just took it's all a bit MEH???
And I want to tell you now that no, it's not that you need a newer, better camera, it's that you need to learn how to use your camera to make your photos ABOUT your kids, and not just OF them. This is where we can help.
years in business
parents taught
5 stars ON AVERAge in our reviews
How do you learn with us?
The only way to learn photography is to do photography. To actually go and take plenty of so-so photos and learn from every single one until you start capturing the gems more consistently. This is why, all our courses are set up to be as hands on as possible, and we have a few tricks up our sleeve to get you there:
COHORT GROUPS
Our courses have a specific start and end dates and you go through them with a group of likeminded parents which helps everyone learn better. You are much more likely to stick with the learning if you are connected with others!
BITE SIZE LEARNING
We release new materials on a weekly basis, allowing you time to truly familiarise yourself with the learning before moving on to new shiny stuff.
PLENTY OF INSTRUCTOR TIME
From live webinars to personal video feedback, you have someone to turn to if you need help with anything photography related!
VARIETY OF SUPPORT MATERIALS
When you want to FINALLY learn how to use your camera to its full potential and start taking the kind of photos that look like the moment felt - check out our instructor-led courses where you will feel inspired, supported and challenged.
Get started today!
don't know what course is right for you?
Hi,
I'm Ania
I'm a photography educator, award winning photographer and a busy parent of 2 spirited girls. Before I committed to photography full time I was a learning designer so running Photography for Parents combines both of my passions!
Ania Wilk-Lawton, Founder
Frequently asked questions
About Photography for Parents
We are a small company dedicated to family photography education. We are based in the UK, but operate globally delivering online courses and tutorials. We have been around for a while! - since 2010 - originally as in-person courses, having fully transitioned to online classes a few years ago and in that time we have helped literally thousands of parents learn how to use their cameras better and how to take better photos of their kids. Many of our students moved on to working as full time photographers, in various genres - not just family photography. Many, many others simply use their skills to record their family's milestones.
All of our instructors are experienced family photographers, each with many years experience of photographing families in their homes. We are all also parents so we understand the pressures of work/family life and the need to be able to get that precious photo FAST.
Our photography courses are designed as holistic courses, which means that we look at the skills you need as a whole, going beyond just learning about your camera's buttons and dials. Both our Fundamentals and Advanced courses include the key building blocks to photography: technical know how, understanding light, understanding photographic composition and storytelling with photography. All taught with a firm focus on how those skills apply to photographing children. Depending on the course option you choose, they will come with live online classes, personal feedback from your instructor and a support group to really help you grow.
About Our courses and materials
For our instructor-led courses you will need A camera but it doesn't need to be anything too fancy. Your camera needs to allow you to make changes to some of the manual settings (going beyond the ‘landscape’. ‘portrait’, ‘fireworks’ modes). You’ll often be able to tell if your camera has those just by looking at it - if it has a wheel with letters M, A, S, P or M, Av, Tv, P on it you’re good to go. Some modern cameras do not have that wheel though, but will still let you change those settings, so just drop us a line with your camera’s make and model and we’ll happily advise. We even have a few cameras for rent if you need. We do not charge for the rental itself, but we do take a security deposit that comes back to you after you've returned it to us in full working order.
If you want to invest in a camera and not sure what to get, we can help with that too! just get in touch and we'll help you find an option that will work for your level and budget.
In short - no.
Our free courses and downloadable materials are designed with beginners in mind, and for many of them you can do them with just your phone.
For our Fundamentals course, you’ll be absolutely fine even if you’ve never picked up a camera before. If you have, but aren’t 100% comfortable with your settings, you’ll find the course will help you structure your knowledge, plug any gaps and you will quite likely pick up a few new tricks as well.
If you’re relatively familiar with the camera’s manual settings, but want to try out new techniques and develop your composition – our Advanced, Level 2 course is the one for you. If you’re not sure where your knowledge puts you, just get in touch and we’ll be more than happy to help.
Yes, we do. For anyone who's already familiar with their camera functions and basic composition and light concepts, we recommend our Advanced course - in that course we expand on all the key photography blocks and go deeper into composition, storytelling, capturing emotions, working with challenging light etc. Beyond strictly photography, we also help our students expand their skills through Editing ( Lightroom and Photoshop) and Flash courses, as well as creative Techniques Photography course
About your bookings
No problem - you just need to get in touch within the first couple of weeks of the course and we can usually move you to another course that's better suited. If we don't have one that is right for your level, we'll just refund you, no quibbles.
Life happens, we all have unexpected things crop up. If you booked a specific course date and can no longer join it, we can either defer your start (for up to 12 months) or if preferable offer you a refund - please see our terms and conditions as your options will depend on when you request these changes. Same thing applies if we need to change the dates of our scheduled courses - you will always be offered the new date as an option, but if it's not suitable, we will simply refund you.
Ah. The question not many people actually ask, but nearly all want to know. Obviously - I don’t know you or your ability BUT I have seen hundreds of students go through our courses and every single one of them improved. Some improved more than others, some really got the ‘photography bug’ and moved on to start their own photography businesses, some just kept it as their hobby and a way of getting better photos of their kids. Not everyone can become the next Annie Leibovitz but everyone can learn how to use the camera to deliver the kind of results they want (like that blurry background in images or being able to capture your kids on the move - sharp!) and everyone can learn how to master their camera and principles of composition and light which make your photos much stronger. So yes, you will improve, even if you don’t think of yourself as an artist.