You can define several methods for one relation filtered as you like, for example:

public function photos() {
    return $this->hasMany('Photo');
}

public function photosDefault() {
    return $this->hasMany('Photo')->where('default','1');
}

public function photosRecent() {
    return $this->hasMany('Photo')->where('created_at', '>', Carbon\Carbon::now()->subWeek()->toDateTimeString();
}

Otherwise use photos()->...->get() as it returns Relation object not Eloquent Model/Collection so you can chain it.

And by the way you can easily do it on the fly when eager loading the model:

User::with(['photos' => function ($query) { 
    $query->where('default', '1');
}])->get();

Thanks so much for the reply - will test it tomorrow and report back!