About
Jillian Todd Portraits for Women
As Sacramento’s go-to boudoir photographer for over a decade, I want you to know that you are in the right place to have a little fun, be a little sassy, get pampered, and most of all to feel beautiful (you ARE beautiful). I’m really good at that: I know how to show you the parts of you that you already love, while also showing you the parts you don’t love in a new light.
I hope you know that I understand what goes through your head when you look at a mirror. I know you pick each part of your body as you look at it, comparing it to what you see on TV, in magazines, and on billboards. Comparing it to your friends’ and strangers’ bodies. I do it. We all do.
But, honestly, I’m here to put an end to that. I’m on a life mission to help women feel beautiful, even sexy, and like the Goddess they already are. Are you with me?
Get to know me.
Because you’ll be trusting me enough to walk around in next to nothing in front of my camera, here’s a little bit about me:
- I am a shoe collector, roller skater, and voracious reader. I love wine, creme brulee, and most things considered sinful by nutritionists.
- Love to laugh. Love to dance, especially on skates!
- I’m full of so much random information, my friends nicknamed me Jilliapedia. I’ve never won at Trivial Pursuit or watching Jeopardy, though!
- I’m married to my high school enemy (no lie!) and mom to two amazing girls, four cats, and a Frenchie.
- I’m a glamour and girl all the way, but I AM NOT high maintenance or pretentious. I get my hands dirty, break my nails, and don’t cry about it.
- I love the outdoors–basking on the beach, lounging on the hotel balcony, poolside, or on a boat with a drink in my hand.
One of the most important things to know about me is that you will feel as comfortable as possible on the day of your shoot. Get ready to have a new BFF for the day!
“This whole experience was wonderful. It felt like I was just hanging out with one of my best girlfriends. But better!”
Experience yourself in a new way
"She remembered who she was and the game changed."
It's not just photos...
I created my dream business out of (rather than in spite of) my deepest struggles. I shaped the things that almost destroyed me into a mission that guides everything I do..
I was six the first time I heard I wasn’t ok just the way I was. I was told I was fat when I was underweight, “thunder thighs”, worthless because I was a girl and more.
I naturally adopted the beliefs “My body isn’t right,” “I’m not pretty enough,” “I have straight hair, but I want curly.” “All my cousins are so much taller, what the hell happened to me?” The “I-want-what-I-don’t-haves” curse stuck with me for years. It clouded how I saw myself. It distracted me from living my life in an authentic, joyful, powerful way.
As I grew older, I lived in the hallucination that I wasn’t good/pretty/thin enough based on what I saw in the media, which only amplified those old voices in my head. I was consumed by what my friends looked like, what the girl living down the street looked like, hell, what the girl walking by looked like. And of course, I couldn’t compare.
I’d flip through magazines, pulling out photos of what I wanted to look like, what I wanted to be able to “fit into.” I tried every diet known to man to get down to a size even my bones aren’t built for. It almost killed me.
My eyes started to open through photography classes in high school and college–I saw those media images for what they really are.
I also trained as an esthetician and makeup artist. I worked on “everyday women”, models, singers, dancers, and Hollywood stars in a Beverly Hills spa. I’ll tell you a little secret about them—only ONE of those women in the magazines looked like that in real life. ONE.
With airbrushing and Photoshop, anyone can be morphed into the media version of perfection.
Even though I knew the tricks of Hollywood and film, I never really got rid of the “curse”. I longed to feel good in my own skin.
I took a portrait class at Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara — a dream of mine since I was 16. I cried the entire time; the instructor awoke in me a love of women’s portraiture. I dreamed of only photographing women.
On the cusp of turning forty, when I started to feel too old, too mom-ish, and too frumpy, I found someone who only shot women’s portraits.
I immediately booked my own beauty/boudoir photo session and was transformed by what I saw.
An obsession was born…I went down the beauty and boudoir photography rabbit hole and haven’t looked back!
I am so blessed to be creating that exhilarating feeling for every woman who comes to me for beautiful portraits.
This feeds my soul. It fulfills a life purpose of mine: TO HEAL.
I am one hundred percent devoted to making you feel good about the body you’re in, to really see yourself as the living, breathing Goddess you are and how your Beloved sees you. You will see it; it will change your life.