Frequently Asked Questions

Your portraits are not shrines; they are gifts of love.

Portraits of yourself are not for you. They are a loving family heritage for your children and your grandchildren. They are a view of where they come from, not as they will know you then–old and frail–but as you are right now when you are writing a history that will resound for generations to come.

How many people already have pictures of places they have never been and people they do not know on their walls? They have pictures of mountains, oceans, forests…the great works of God.

Yet they have not displayed as elegantly God’s crowning achievement: Their own children. Nothing God has created is as magnificent as your own children. What mountain or river compares? A portrait of your children is not a shrine to them…is a display of God’s most blessed work.

Your portrait is not for you, it is for those who love you. It is for the people who love you right now, just as you are right now. Their portraits are not for them, they are for you, just as they are right now.

Who needs a portrait? Everyone who is loved by someone and everyone who loves someone.

Please remember that a Lord & Darling portrait is designed from scratch to be an heirloom in your family for generations. Your Lord & Darling portrait will be more than just a photograph—it will be a work of art that you will be proud to display in your home or office as a reminder of your affections from this time on.

Your portrait is conceived, planned, photographed, and finished with this in mind at each step. This is why we have a thorough consultation with you to be sure we are working fully toward the same goal and achieve success satisfying to all.

We take a great deal of time—spending many hours on each image—to create the loveliest portrait possible. Your portrait is handled individually. There are no mass-production steps in our work.

The end result is an heirloom that will serve as a token and constant reminder of the love within your family. A smaller print—one that might be shoved into a drawer or into the closet—could never serve the same purpose.

We buy so many things, and so many of them last no more than a season or a few years at best.  The video games for our children are played out within hours.  The newest iPhone is old in a year.  A new computer is obsolete in three, and a big-screen LED television is just an old hat in five years.

A beautiful portrait of your loved ones will be cherished for generations.  It will make your children and grandchildren glow with pleasure generations after that big-screen television has gone to a landfill.  Of all the things you can buy for your home, a Lord & Darling portrait can outlast them all.  Smile for smile, dollar for dollar, year after year, a Lord & Darling portrait the best home investment you can make.

A Lord & Darling portrait is designed from scratch to be an heirloom in your home, something your family will own and cherish for generations. As such, the prices include such things as archival materials, environmental coating, conservation framing, comprehensive retouching, and a liberal policy of repeat photography sessions.

If you are considering an investment of hundreds of dollars in an heirloom portrait, you should expect these to be standard, and in a Lord & Darling portrait they are. Our Satisfaction Guarantee ensures that your investment will not be wasted.

When you compare our services and products feature-for-feature with other studios, you see the value of a Lord & Darling portrait.

An heirloom portrait is not just an investment of money for you–this is something that your family will spend hundreds of hours viewing over the course of decades. It will become part of your lives, perhaps part of the lives of even your grandchildren.

We understand that, and Lord & Darling Portraits will work with you to make sure you get satisfying portraits that you will be thoroughly happy to display on your walls. It’s important to our mission to work hard until we’ve given you a portrait you love.

Sometimes a photography session doesn’t work out well for any number of reasons. You or your family may have had a hectic day, or the children may not be feeling very well. That may mean scheduling a second session, perhaps at no extra cost, depending on the circumstances.

Certainly, if the fault is ours, we will offer a new photography session at no charge to you. In fact, if we aren’t perfectly happy with the results ourselves, we will suggest it first.

Please see our Satisfaction Guarantee for more information.

Our goal is to achieve a timeless image that presents you at your best, so there are two considerations to keep in mind: Clothing that best presents you in a photograph and clothing that avoids fashion trends.

The photography session fee includes consultations, times that we can fully discuss your wardrobe and what we want to accomplish in your portraits. The photographer will help you make selections before the date of your photography session.

With careful planning and communication, we can be sure to create for you work of art that is reflective of who you and your family are.

Yes, we certainly do! We will gladly go on location to your home, business, or any other place under your own control without any additional costs within the Dallas-Ft Worth metroplex.

We do refrain from working in public spaces, such as municipal parks and public streets, because the conceptual nature of our portraits involves a significant amount of equipment to set up. We will, however, travel to your own home, business, or any other place that is under your control. 

We can make plans by online Zoom meetings, if it is not possible to meet in person. There will be mileage and travel charges for sessions outside the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area.

Certification is Your Assurance of Quality.

Certified Professional Photographer is granted by the Professional Photographers of America, the world’s leading association of photography professionals.

As the leading certifying agency and association for photography professionals, the PPA certification program is recognized throughout the industry as a sign of excellence. There are only 3,000 professional photographers in the United States who have passed the requirements of photographic knowledge and excellence of photographic work required to be certified.

Those who have earned the Certified Professional Photographer designation have passed a comprehensive written examination measuring their technical expertise and have successfully submitted a portfolio of their actual work to a panel of judges for review and approval.

Every five years, Certified photographers must renew their credentials by participating in continuing education programs. This helps assure you that Certified photographers maintain their level of expertise and continue to develop new skills and techniques.

When you see the Certified Professional Photographer seal, you can be assured that photographer is among the few imaging professionals who have successfully completed and maintained the exacting standards for certification.

Your professional photographer will record the most important moments in life. And although every situation brings new challenges, you can be assured that the Certified professional has the creativity and skills to deliver the best possible images for you.

It’s nice to know that your photographer has chosen to participate in this rigorous program. It demonstrates a continuing commitment to quality and professional improvement.

Be assured that whenever you engage with studio that displays the Certified emblem, you will be dealing with a professional who is able to provide you with the highest level of professionalism and expertise available.

Here is more reason why professional certification is important to you.

We take the danger of Covid-19 very seriously at Lord & Darling Portraits. We will go above and beyond the Texas minimum standard health protocols.

To see the details of our procedures, please go to our Covid-19 page.

We do have a special zero-interest payment plan available. The way that we spread payments over the course of production, however, should make it unnecessary for most families.

Please ask for details.