“But Mrs Superhero!” you say “you just told us to hire a professional!”  Yes, yes, I did.  I still stand by that.  However, what if you have a friend who won’t listen to me, and you know that the baby will only end up with iphone newborn photos? This is how I ended up doing a photoshoot for my little niece Aspen (okay they had a 4s, but the light in their house is bad).  Isn’t she the cutest baby you’ve ever seen?  After mine, naturally.  I love this kid, and I wanted to do my best to get some good shots of her while she was still itty bitty.  If you find yourself in a similar situation (and if your loved ones start having babies, and you’re the best photographer in their circle, it’ll happen), here’s what I did:

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The Set Up

Sadly, I forgot to take a pull-back photo so you could see my set up.  You want the baby to be safe and comfy.  You want a non-distracting background, and you the best light you can find.  My set up for this shoot was a couch cushion on the ground, with a nursing pillow on top of it.  I had an ironing board behind and draped a big swath of grey jersey (fabric for the mommy’s dress for her mom’s wedding…we put a piddle pad on top of the fabric for the naked shots) over the whole business.  We were in front of a big window but sideways so that I wouldn’t block all the light.  Unfortunately, it was still a bit dim, but it was the best spot in the house.  I stuck a car windshield reflector opposite the window to bounce back more light.  I used a white afghan for some of the shots, and removed the nursing pillow for the swaddled photos.  It worked pretty well!  Make sure the room is warm enough to be comfy for a naked little baby.

Getting the baby ready

I was lucky enough to have my baby first, so I got to watch a team of real newborn photographers in action.  What I learned was: be Patient!  If you’re a mom, you already know how long it can take to get some newborns to conk out.  If you can get them into that rag doll deep sleep, it’s so much easier to get them into cute poses.  Make sure they’ve been fed, dress them in an undone diaper (this is good to do for an hour or so ahead of time, to reduce marks on the skin) and swaddle them up tight.  Let them have the soother if that’s how they sleep best.  Lay them down on your set and use all the tricks you know: white noise, shushing, hand on the chest and head, whatever helps the baby fall asleep.  It’s good to have an idea how to do this, because if it’s the first baby and under 10 days old, the mom might not even be a pro-star yet!   Once it feels like they are really asleep, gently pull back and take some cute swaddled photos.  If they stir, go back to helping them fall deeply asleep.  Don’t be surprised if it takes a while.

Posing the baby

If you’ve spent any time looking at newborn photos on Pinterest (which I totally recommend before you try this), you will see many clever photos of babies in cowboy boots, dangling from branches and sitting up magically on their own.  Don’t do this!  Don’t try to be clever.  These shots are either photoshopped or dangerous.  Leave it to the professionals.  Stick to natural, safe shots of babies all snuggled up or gently resting (with their head supported) on snuggly things.  On the floor.  Seriously, don’t drop your friend’s baby!

If you want to try some naked shots, like the ones above, here’s what to do:  wait until the baby is really, really, totally asleep.  Gently unswaddle the baby and remove the diaper (a waterproof pad or cloth diaper under the fabric to save your couch cushion is probably wise).  Hold the baby tight for a moment (aw, baby snuggles!), and then put them down gently where you want them to be.  Keep your hands on them gently but firmly so that they feel secure, as if they were still swaddled.  Don’t move your hands until you feel the baby relax.  If you need to adjust the pose (moving the legs to cover their little parts, perhaps) do it gently and then keep your hand against them for a minute, holding them in the pose until they relax.  You don’t know how long they will stay asleep, so start simple and get some good shots before you move them around too much.

Ideas for props

I like simple newborn photos, so we went with a special blanket, a few favourite toys, and some pretty headbands.  See what they have around the house.  I brought some hair clips with little flowers on them from Toddler Girl’s extensive collection.  If you have a simple headband, you can clip anything to it (I get my clips cheap at Arden’s…I seem to prefer tween accessories to toddler).  My sister-in-law really wanted some blocks spelling out Aspen’s name, so we stole them from my mom’s house.

Some Photography Stuff

As I’ve mentioned, I’m far from pro, so I won’t try and teach you how to be a good photographer.  Shooting manual is super fun, and not as hard as it seems.  Mrs Bee has done a few posts on the subject and I love learning from sites like Click it Up a Notch.  I have a Canon Rebel XT, and all these were taken with my Nifty Fifty lens — a good starter camera and a good starter portrait lens, nothing fancy.  I shot in natural light with no flash and a fairly wide aperture, because I love the short depth of field for tiny, non-mobile subjects.  I post-processed rather significantly in photoshop, which I’m going to cover in a future post.  I’m just not good enough to get it right straight out of camera, and not in that light.

I’m not just being cute when I say that you’re doing this for a friend.  Don’t plan on being able to take your own newborn photos.  You want them taken in the first week and a half, and if you read my recent postpartum post, you will see that I was in no shape to set up a shoot and spend an afternoon photographing my baby.  This will easily take 3-4 hours, and you will want to be taking a nap while someone else takes these photos.

If you do find yourself nominated as an official baby photographer, I hope this will help!  Remember, I don’t really know what I’m doing, I’m just faking it!