Butler Beach Family Photos: What to Know When Planning a Vacation Session

If you're planning a family vacation to St. Augustine, chances are getting everyone together is already a pretty big deal. Maybe you're sharing a beach house with grandparents, cousins are seeing each other for the first time in months, or your adult children are all able to make the same trip. That's one of my favorite reasons to schedule family photos while you're here.

Butler Beach is especially popular with families vacationing just south of St. Augustine. With beautiful stretches of shoreline and plenty of nearby vacation rentals, it's a convenient location for family photos without having to take everyone far from where you're staying.

If you're considering family photos during your St. Augustine vacation, there are a few things worth knowing about Butler Beach before deciding where and when to schedule your session.

Why Your St. Augustine Vacation Is a Great Time for Family Photos

At home, coordinating multiple households for family photos can feel almost impossible. Vacation is different because everyone is already in the same place, schedules are a little more relaxed, and you have a reason to document this particular season of your family. All of this is especially true for extended families.

Many of the families I photograph in St. Augustine are here for a multigenerational vacation. Grandparents may have rented a house for the week, adult children have traveled in with their families, and everyone is together in a way that doesn't happen very often.

A family photography session gives you photographs of the entire group, but it also gives us an opportunity to photograph all of the smaller relationships within it: grandparents with grandchildren, cousins together, individual families, siblings, and couples.

Why Choose Butler Beach for Your Family Photos?

If you're staying in Butler Beach or Crescent Beach, photographing your family nearby can make the entire experience easier. You don't necessarily need to get everyone dressed, loaded into several cars, and drive into historic St. Augustine for beautiful photographs. Butler Beach gives us a relaxed coastal setting with the ocean, sand, dunes, and plenty of room for families to move around and this can be particularly helpful with young children or a large extended family. However, the beach access closest to your vacation rental isn't always the best place for photographs, which is why I help my clients choose their exact meeting location.

Not Every Butler Beach Access Is the Same

One thing vacationers often don't realize is how much the different beach accesses around Butler Beach can vary.Some have easier parking and shorter walks. Others require walking farther through soft sand. Some areas also allow vehicles directly on the beach.

When choosing a location for family photos, I consider parking, crowds, tides, the time of year, the backgrounds available for photographs, and any mobility concerns within your family. Sometimes the best option is just a few minutes from your rental rather than the beach entrance directly across from it.

A Note About Butler Beach's Drive-On Areas

Yes, you may see cars driving and parking directly on portions of Butler Beach. It's convenient when you're spending the day at the beach, but it's something we need to consider when planning photographs. Parked vehicles can sometimes line the beach or dunes and limit the directions in which we can photograph. The drive on gates are closed promptly at 7:30 pm and open again at 8 am. So, if you are planning to drive onto the beach for your session, it wont be possible as all sessions are scheduled either at sunrise or sunset.

For that reason, I generally choose our meeting location based on what will work best photographically rather than automatically selecting the closest access to your vacation rental. If convenience or mobility is a priority for someone in your family, let me know. We can take that into consideration when choosing your location.

Traveling With Grandparents? Accessibility Matters

This is something I especially consider for extended family vacation sessions.Walking through sand can be surprisingly difficult for older family members, even when the distance doesn't look particularly far. It's also worth considering if you're traveling with toddlers, babies, or anyone else who may need a little extra help getting onto the beach.

When you inquire, let me know if anyone in your group has mobility limitations. That information helps me recommend an access point that makes sense for your particular family. The goal isn't simply to find a beautiful beach. It's to choose a location where everyone can comfortably participate.

Should You Schedule Your Butler Beach Photos at Sunrise or Sunset?

For most vacationing families, this is one of the biggest questions. Sunrise at Butler Beach can be gorgeous. The sun rises over the Atlantic, the beach is typically quieter, and summer mornings are considerably cooler than evenings. Sunrise can also be a great option during a busy vacation week because you can finish your photos early and still have the entire day ahead of you. Of course, I realize that getting an extended family dressed and ready at sunrise isn't everyone's idea of vacation.

Sunset sessions offer beautiful evening light and are often easier to coordinate. Because the sun sets behind the dunes rather than over the ocean, the look is different from sunrise, but both can photograph beautifully.

When we're planning your session, I'll help you decide which makes the most sense based on the season, your children's ages, your family's schedule, and the size of your group. Learn more about sunrise sessions here.

Don't Let a Florida Weather Forecast Ruin Your Vacation Photos

If you're visiting Florida during the warmer months, there's a good chance you'll see rain or thunderstorms somewhere in the forecast. Coastal weather can change quickly, and a forecast that looks terrible several days ahead can turn into a beautiful evening. I am able to track the forecast more accurately about 2 hours prior to session time. With that being said, even with careful tracking on the radar, storms often appear last minute. Requiring a last minute reschedule or a shift in the start time.

I watch the radar and actual conditions as we get closer to your session rather than making decisions based solely on a rain percentage several days beforehand. If the weather truly isn't going to cooperate, we'll make a plan.

When possible, it can also be helpful to schedule your photography session earlier in your vacation rather than on your final night. That gives us a little more flexibility if Mother Nature has other ideas.

A Recent Family Vacation Session at Butler Beach

This recent Butler Beach session brought together multiple generations of one family who were vacationing in St. Augustine. For a group like this, my priority isn't simply getting one photograph where everyone is looking at the camera. Of course we'll get that one, but there are so many other relationships worth documenting when an extended family is together.

We photographed the entire family, individual households, grandparents with grandchildren, different family combinations, and the interactions that happened naturally in between.

I provide plenty of direction throughout an extended family session so no one has to wonder where to stand or what to do. But I also want there to be room for families to interact, laugh, walk, play with the kids, and actually enjoy being together. Those are often the photographs that end up meaning the most.

Make Family Photos Part of Your St. Augustine Vacation

You don't need to dedicate an entire day of your vacation to family photos.A well-planned session can become one small part of your trip while giving you something you'll have long after the beach bags are unpacked and everyone has traveled home.

If you're staying in Butler Beach, Crescent Beach, St. Augustine Beach, or elsewhere around St. Augustine, I'll help you choose a photography location that works for your family rather than expecting you to figure it out on your own. Click here for an article about mistakes to avoid when planning your session.

Planning a Family Vacation to St. Augustine?

If you'll have your whole family together in St. Augustine, it's a wonderful opportunity to finally get everyone in the same photographs.

Learn more about my St. Augustine family photography sessions or get in touch to start planning your vacation session.