“Happy Accident” is a term that is bandied about our house a lot. It defines those occurrences when a mistake happens (usually while creating some form of art) and it turns out to make the piece even better than planned.
When we arranged this portrait, his mom mentioned that she wanted photographs of her son “just being a little boy and enjoying nature… he is growing up so quickly, so I just want to freeze this time in my mind forever.”
I loved this description and excitedly set to work on our concept.
We met at one of their favorite hiking parks and started the session BUT about 20 minutes into it, as we were walking along the creek bed (one with actual water in it) our little guy climbed up onto a sideways growing tree that hung out over the water. (You know where this is going…) I was moving around taking photos, trying to get a good angle, and when he started to climb off the tree I asked him to wait just a second in order to get one or two last shots. Then, through the viewfinder, I saw his head s-l-o-w-l-y sink out of sight. He was sliding off the tree, down the creek bank and into the water!
Aaak!
His mom and I rushed to get him out of the ankle deep water, no worse for wear but definitely wet. What to do?
Ooops! Sometimes sessions don't go as planned.
Luckily, they live around the block from the park so we headed to their house for dry clothes and to finish the session. At their house I met a couple of very sweet dogs out in their great backyard and we ended up with this fantastic little photo story about a boy and his love for his dogs and nature. (I kept thinking about “Where The Red Fern Grows” while editing this.)
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