Since I become a mum, not long ago, I could finally take all the photo shoots I always wanted to but never had the chance to do.
As I tend to, in most of my photography work anyway, I focused on the details of his fingers, face, eyes and feet to capture the delicate and beautifully fragile nature his little body.
Then, of course, couldn’t resist but take some baby elf shots. Surprisingly, taking the shot below was a lot harder than anticipated. To my surprise babies don’t just seat and pose as you ask them to (joking really), but I do not exaggerate when I say that positioning a newborn on a pillow, wearing nothing but a nappy and a little hat is a lot harder than it seems.
Also, the light was very important here – could not use flash or artificial light as this would have ruined the angelic and natural feel of the image. I wanted the baby skin and face to look as natural as possible. Obviously I played a lot, when editing the surroundings, but the baby is almost untouched by my Photoshop brushes.
Another shot I quite like is the image of my boy’s little friend. He’s a great baby to photograph as he’s as cute and smiley as not many babies can be.
For this image I used Canon 550D, the usual natural light approach and some blurring effects. These elements allowed me to capture the atmosphere and communicate the feel for this age: natural, organic, innocent and content.
My advice for children photography is to keep it as natural as possible even if you decide to go for funny angles, places or take days to edit the final image.
Often perception is more important than the photographed object itself. A baby image should have an organic feel to it.
Photographing toddlers is actually easier as they overwhelm you with a variety of creative and playful postures!