This is the single most impactful thing you can do before your session — and we know it sounds a bit mean, but hear us out! A slightly hungry cat is a treat-motivated cat, and treat motivation is genuinely the most powerful tool we have during a photography session.

When your cat is food-motivated, we can use treats to direct their gaze, get their ears perked forward, and capture that alert, engaged expression that makes for stunning portraits. A cat who has just had a full meal has very little reason to cooperate with anything — they'll just want to nap, and that makes our job significantly harder!

Don't worry about your cat being uncomfortable — sessions are designed to be relaxed and enjoyable. We have a full studio treat supply, and as soon as the camera comes out the treat games begin 😄

Cats are heavily scent-oriented — familiar smells are one of the most powerful signals of safety for them. When your cat steps into a new environment, the first thing they do is smell everything. If the whole space smells completely foreign, their stress levels go up and their cooperative levels go way down.

Bringing a toy they love, a blanket from home, or even just a worn t-shirt that smells like you gives them an immediate anchor point — something that says "okay, this might be a strange place but not everything is unfamiliar" 🏠

And yes — we also have a full prop and toy library at the studio, but nothing beats the thing your cat already loves. The studio toys are for the cats who want to explore everything new — which is also a very valid personality type and we love them for it 😂

We know the instinct is to want your cat looking their absolute sparkliest for their big day — but please, step away from the bath! Bathing is genuinely stressful for most cats, and a stressed cat the day before their session means a tense, unsettled cat in the studio 😬

The good news is that cats are meticulous self-groomers. Unless your cat has gotten into something genuinely terrible, they are going to look completely beautiful without a bath. Their natural coat condition and texture also photographs much better than post-bath fluffiness, which can sometimes look uneven under studio lighting.

This one might be the most underestimated tip on the list — but it's genuinely one of the most important. Cats are incredibly attuned to their owner's emotional state. If you arrive feeling anxious, rushed, or stressed about whether your cat is going to "perform", your cat is going to pick that up and mirror it straight back.

We see this in almost every session where a client is worried about their cat — the cat walks in, immediately feels the nervous energy, and goes into alert mode. Conversely, when owners arrive relaxed and just let the session unfold, their cats almost always settle much faster.

Your one job during the session is to be a calm, familiar presence for your cat. Everything else is ours to handle 🐾

Arriving a few minutes before your session start time gives your cat something genuinely valuable — acclimatisation time. When you first set the carrier down and open the door, let your cat choose when they come out. Don't tip them out, don't encourage them, just open the door and wait ✨

A cat who chooses for themselves when to step into a new space is already in a fundamentally different headspace from one who was tipped out onto an unfamiliar floor. That first decision — "okay, I'll come out now" — is a small act of confidence that sets the tone for the whole session.

Our studio is cat-only — no dog smells, no residual animal territory, no scary sounds — which means most cats settle faster here than in other environments. But we always allow the time they need, no matter what 🐾

The most important thing to carry into your session is this: we have done this before, and we genuinely know what we're doing 🐾 Cat photography is a skill that's completely different from photographing people — you can't direct a cat, you can only read them, anticipate them, and create the conditions where the magic happens naturally.

We know when a cat is about to give us that slow blink. We know the difference between a curious ear-prick and a stressed one. We know when to keep shooting and when to put the camera down and just let your cat breathe for a moment. All you have to do is be present, enjoy watching your furbaby be completely themselves in our studio, and trust that we'll capture every meowment worth keeping 📸