Expectations vs reality
I admire photographers that do beautiful newborn pictures. All those cute swaddled
sleeping babies .
Having no experience even in holding such small babies not saying about taking pictures of them, I wouldn’t dare to ask somebody to let my practice on their kid.
Than I got pregnant and thought to myself “that’s my chance to get some practice”. I was really exited about it.
As a first time mom I felt really anxious when my son was born. He cried A LOT and didn’t sleep nearly as much as I expected. You know frase “ sleeping like a baby”? Well, I started thinking that whoever came up with this frase didn’t have kids .
Before I even blinked he turned one month old. By this time I somewhat got used to being a mother and finally remembered about having plan to get practice in newborn picture.
I set up the scenery, placed pretty blankets on the bed. Brought my little boy and started undressing him. I wanted to make Adam suit pictures first.
Well, this is where my plan started falling apart. Alex was slightly unpleased ( read furious ) by my intention to get him undressed. It was begging of March and I assume he didn’t like changing of temperature. So there’s my first advise for you:
TIP 1
MAKE SURE ITS WARM ENOUGH IN THE ROOM.
It may seem ok for you, but imagine being undressed. Would you fall asleep naked in this temperature? If you’re not sure then it’s not warm enough.
Ok, thought I to myself, we’ll skip naked pictures this time. Let’s try on the cute little outfit that I prudently ordered from China few month ago. It was a knitted dear costume with horns on the hat. I’m sure you’ve seen tons of baby pictures wearing those adorable fluffy wool outfits.
Here comes my second omission. The costume was anything else but fluffy. The seller used pretty picture from internet that he’d nothing to do with the real product. They tried to do something similar, but failed. Not only the material was wrong but also the size. If the shorts would somehow fit, although they weren’t made with a thought that babies would wear them, the hat was real trouble to put on.
Results of torture my son had to experience you can see on the picture above.
I don’t won’t you to repeat my mistakes so here’s my second tip for those who get the outfits by themselves:
TIP 2
BUY BABIES CLOTHS IN STORE WHERE YOU CAN SEE AND TOUCH IT OR ORDER FROM TRUSTWORTHY ONLINE STORES.
Finally I got him dressed and he stoped crying. I tried to “fold” him into one of those cute poses I’ve seen on pro newborn photographers blogs. And guess what? He wouldn’t fold! Only little ones can do that antill about 1 month old. I’m sure there are some exclusions and some older babies can sleep through the posing part but my son wasn’t one of them. 6 weeks was too late for him.
Considering this my third advise for you
TIP 3
TIMING MATTERS! ABOUT 2 WEEKS FROM DUE DATE WOULD BE PERFECT.
This age is good for couple of reasons.
First babies are still curly and easy to pose.
Second is that most of them are very sleepy.
And the third is the baby acne that some babies get after three weeks of age.
For me the acne thing was quite surprising. You never now if your baby will get it. By 6 weeks of age my sons acne reached its peak. He’s face was all covered with little red dots. Photoshop will help you can say and I would agree but it’s not omnipotent. When it’s that much to repair on the picture it almost impossible to make it look natural and the face starts looking like a porcelain doll. That’s another reason to plan the photo session before three weeks.
Despite the fact that pictures didn’t turn out the way I imaginedI still melt down looking at my cute little boy. It’s hard to believe he was so tiny just one year ago.
Now I’m waiting for some of my friends to have kids so I could practice on them being more prepared this time
Comment below did you make newborn pictures for your little ones? How did it turn out? Please share your experience with us!
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