Deborah Sawyer

When Deborah and her team photograph your family, we capture posed and candid images using flash fill and natural light.

For extended families, we photograph the entire group and each individual family. We also take such images as just the grandchildren, grandparents with the grandchildren, the children within each family group, each adult couple and more. The sitting will last approximately one hour or more, depending upon the group size..

We use professional lighting, either flash on camera or stand alone, for most of our images. This way not only will you look better, the colors of the ocean and sky will look as beautiful as they really are and not washed out. We take natural light exposures as well.

The images, within 48 hours, are color corrected and any beach goers in the background taken out. For the best images, we may open eyes or change a head with a better expression from a similar image. They are placed on Google Drive, high resolution, for you and whoever you invite, to download from the link we send you. These images DO NOT have a Watermark and you own the Copyrights to print as you please. We will provide you with a copyright release to prove you own the images when making prints if you need one.

Once you receive the images, you choose a portrait for an 11×14 print, (included with the full sitting), which we ship directly to the chosen household.

To secure your date and time, a $200 deposit is needed and will be invoiced online through Quickbooks. This deposit is put toward your total. The remaining balance plus sales tax will be invoiced two days before the sitting in the same way.

The best time of day for the portrait is within the two hours before sunset. The lighting is low so you are not squinting your eyes. It is cooler then and there are less people on the beach. Please make your appointment as soon as you can to insure this time frame. If desired, early morning and sunrise on the beach portraits can be taken too. 

Deborah photographs with an assistant that works with puppets for the children. The adults laugh the loudest. Most importantly we use top of the line equipment and professional lighting. We have taken tens of thousands of family portraits over four decades on the Outer Banks and Sandbridge. Not only do the families love their portraits, we always hear how much fun they had during the sitting.

Various colors of blue are the best to wear on top or as a sundress, especially royal and periwinkle! Small prints are fine if they don’t clash with another portrait member. Jeans are great in the spring, winter and fall, and khaki looks best in the summer.

If you need access to a print lab we can help. So many of our customers say the 11×14 print we send them with our full packages is a better quality than the prints they have made from bulk labs. We are happy to handle your print needs. Our per print pricing is listed on our website under Family Portraits. The custom lab we use offers everything from Canvas Wall Portraits, Printing on Metal and Wood, Holiday Cards and Albums.

The Outer Banks of North Carolina has been one of the top wedding destination locations for decades. Couples from all over the world come to exchange their vows on the pristine beaches, stay in the beautiful rental homes, tour historic venues, and experience nature at its finest. 

Outer Banks weddings aren’t just spending a few hours with guests, it is experiencing days with new friends and forever uniting two families with amazing memories.

Deborah and her team can capture your wedding or family reunion, with posed and candid images you will cherish forever.