Before I start I have to warn you that this article will be more practical than theoretical, more based on experience than training, more motivational than technical and even at the risk of you s quit reading it, I will tell you that it is also more sentimental than artistic. When you read it you will understand it better, but I will write you by experience and with my heart because there are already many articles of technical advice. Without going any further, here on the blog you have some very interesting ones, like this or this, we even have a complete article dedicated to common mistakes in baby photography (which your little one will never forgive you) and that of course you should avoid as much as possible.
And I say it because it’s not the same to portray your neighbor’s baby, your friend, your nephews . . . that your own baby No, has absolutely nothing to do with it. And I’m knowingly telling you.
- In this article I will not try to teach you anything.
- I will only give you some advice from my humble experience as a photographer of my baby.
- Which is not small.
- Because as you know.
- There is nothing like the experience to learn (good and bad?).
- If you’re still reading this.
- You’re probably expecting a baby or have had one recently.
- So before you go on: congratulations!You’ve entered the hardest but most beautiful stage of your life.
- How can you not represent him?!! Here are my humble tips for this hard work.
It’s not a cross country race, you don’t have to show anyone how hard you shoot. These are the first months of your baby and what you want is to immortalize them, capture every detail, every important moment, because they never come back, they fade as fast as they come and you can’t anymore. touch, the only way to relive or savor them again is through their memory, which is treacherous and leaves forgotten memories in the corners no matter how hard you try to recover them again and again, or through photography, those small pieces of paper that serve like scraps of memory. You love photography that is why you are reading this article and that is why you are not satisfied with just filming and saving memory, and it is going well for you, because if in addition to memory you take a beautiful photo, in time you will enjoy it, but you should not obsess over you and I mean it’s not about getting the photo of the year. If what you want is a professional photo of the newborn, in which the baby sleeps in a perfect position, so well placed, on that beautiful blanket? Let’s go to something like the following picture, if you don’t understand, don’t spank yourself, hire a professional.
How?!!! You’ve probably put your hands on your head!!What item? You may think that instead of telling me how to take the picture, send me a professional!He has a clear explanation. I don’t know if your photography level is beginner or advanced, you can take spectacular photos, but if your baby hasn’t arrived yet, you don’t know what you’re up against!!If you’re the father, you’ll have it a little easier (just a little), but since you’re the mother and you’ve opted for breastfeeding, I warn you that you’re going to have it complicated.
When a baby comes home, your whole world turns upside down, the first few days are difficult, precious, yes, but very difficult and very hard, in this case it’s not the shooting speeds, the focal lengths, ISO and all these parameters you normally talk about, it’s a little person who comes into your world to break all your patterns, routines , schedules and things like that. You need attention twenty-four hours a day, sixty minutes per hour and sixty seconds per minute. And so it is. And the few minutes that can set you free, do you need it for a thousand more things, such as cleaning up, preparing food, picking things up at home, resting?And if you’re the mother, add up the physical recovery from childbirth.
These photos are obtained in the first days of your baby’s life and your role now is to be the father or mother, not the professional photographer, better to relax and enjoy the session, you will have time later to photograph their day after day, it is moments, the most special and important moments. But the first few days are chaos and if you hope to do a perfect job, you may not get it and realize it too late.
I got mad at myself for not realizing the images I had imagined with my baby. I wanted pictures of her in the poses I’d seen a thousand times and nothing, my little girl would wake up every time I felt close, literally. She didn’t like being face down and face up naked at all because she didn’t either, she hears. And look how warm the room was, I had it wrapped in gauze, or a blanket, but nothing, she wasn’t like the other babies, she was special (like everyone else, they’re all her way) so she was frustrated, and a lot. Until I understood that the important thing was to enjoy my daughter and portray her special moments, her face, her daily life. That what he would value tomorrow would be above all to have photos that would tell him his arrival in the world and that’s what I’d like to remember tomorrow. The following tips are in this line, do you want to meet them?
1. Describe the preparations. Don’t wait for birth, you can start photographing the preparations or show the illusion that makes you enjoy.
2. Photograph your baby with the family. Make sure everyone has a picture with your baby, separately, in two or in a group, but that they have a memory of when they met their family and the happy face they looked like. And if you have little brothers or cousins, well, you can not stop photographing them together!
3. Immortalize your birth details. Remember the day and time of your birth, how much did you pess and measure?
4. La importance of details, when they’re so small, their body parts are so adorable!These little feet, their beautiful and tiny hands, the skin (skins) of the first days, immortalize all these details, they go very fast.
5, describes its evolution. Demonstrate growth by representing your baby in the same place or with the same object each month or week, then you can edit and see how it has changed.
6. Cadeaux or “loved” objects. Do you wear clothes that were yours or that a family member has woven with all the love in the world?Or a toy? Well, take a picture of yourself with that, tomorrow these clothes or this toy may no longer exist, but the photo will remain for the memory.
7. Gestes. Each baby has their own gestures and expressions, and these can change for days, weeks or stay for life, if you can catch them, when they grow up, they will be fun
8. Moments. All the moments are special, have their side less and less beautiful, but it is a joy when you spend a little while taking pictures of everyone, the time to bathe, eat, tickle, laugh, sleep by the arm?to do a marathon one day, you always have your camera on hand and one day you photograph it in the bathroom, another day tickling yourself?enjoy your baby and photography, don’t insist that that’s not the goal?
9. Your first time. Will there be a first time you bite your foot, when you crawl, when a tooth comes out, when it claps?If you portray those moments, your photo album will also serve as a graphic diary of its progress (if you set the date, of course?).
10. Projects (one photo a day, one photo a week, per month?). You can suggest projects, such as taking one photo a day during the first month, or one photo a week at different times of the day, which also serves as a graphic diary and personal challenge. Here’s the example of a photographer, her daughter is already more than a year old but she can serve as inspiration.
11. Self-portraits. Mount your tripod, pull the trigger remotely and, while having fun with your baby, take pictures from time to time. If you are the one who normally takes the pictures, you will over time realize that you have hundreds. of photos of your baby and many more of your baby with the rest of the family, but with you, there will be few.
12. Extérieurs. Net you limit yourself to photographing at home, when you walk, the first time you see the sea or go on an excursion, it portrays all these moments, so that when you are older, you can tell them while you see the images.
13. Make close-ups of them. Babies change for weeks, or almost for days, they make many close-ups so that all these faces are represented forever, if you try to remember it it will be impossible, but when you see the photos, you will remember these days perfectly.
Sometimes the important thing is not to look for a good background or study the framing, but to be fast enough to capture a special and emotional moment, that is the advantage that you have in front of a professional photographer, since it spends 3 or 4 hours with your baby. but you’re there all day, every day. It’s your real job, to photograph those moments.
If you’re good at publishing or want to play video games, you can do things like that, we’ve already told you many times that creativity has no limits, don’t put them on your baby, here are some creative ideas to photograph your little one.
Print your photos on paper, don’t accumulate them on your hard drive because one day you may get dizzy by saying that you suddenly print the 1,500 five hundred seven photos you took of your baby and end up without taking any. And if you want ideas to make with photos, here are 21 creative ideas (although they are for vacation photos, do you use them for any theme?)
Do not accumulate repetitive images. If you take ten almost the same photos (yes, it happens often, our finger gets stuck in the shutter), when you download them, save the one you like the most and delete the rest, no matter how much it hurts (I’ll repeat it a hundred times), but why do you want as many photos as this, better not occupy the memory and take more photos at other times or in different situations not?
1. Planifiez. Si you plan to do a session, plan what it will be like, what clothes you want to wear, what blanket or background you will wear and save a reservation in case it gets stained (it’s easy to regurgite or pee). Don’t improvises or you may run out of photos because they’re hungry, wake up or get tired.
2. Seek help. When it comes to having a session with your baby, look for help, it’s a good thing someone is by your side at all times, and it can also help you maintain a background or anything else you need. alone or just makes it much harder.
3. Always keep the camera handy, charged and spaced on the map, or you will lose unique moments.
4. Take care of the funds. Try not to take items in the photo that distract attention and diminish your baby’s prominence. Also try to keep mixing colors or clothing of different colors and prints from diverting attention.
5. Black and white. Don’t forget the black and white photos, they are beautiful, timeless and focus all the attention on your baby, light, color photography and then switch to black and white.
6. Respect your baby. As a mother or father, you know that your baby is the most important thing, if you see that this is not the time to take photos because it is not comfortable to leave it for another time, its well-being is the most important thing.
7. Avoid flash if possible. And I don’t want to say that it hurts, there is a debate about whether it affects or not, I mean, it bothers them. Especially newborns, if an adult is bothered by a flash, imagine a baby, especially a newborn who has spent the last nine months in the dark, if you need to use it because you have no natural light, make it bounce or better use it. continuous light from a bright window.
8. Concentrate your eyes well. Unless you want to be highlighting, for example, her small mouth, make sure her eyes are always in focus.
I hope these tips help you, I wish someone had told me sooner!I wish you all the happiness in the world with your baby and that you take beautiful and pleasant photos. If you think this article may be of interest to someone else, be sure to share it on Facebook, Google, or Twitter. Thank you so much for reading so far and so far!