by San Francisco Bay Area Maternity & Newborn Photographer Anna Myers
Whenever a new baby arrives, everyone wants pictures. But when you use a flash camera to try to capture pictures of that beautiful new baby, the baby tends to not look like the baby you see with your eyes. Using window light to photograph your baby can give you the results you are looking for and give you some great images that can be used for an artistic birth announcement.
- Film or digital? It actually does not matter. But if you are using film, try to get some black & white film that is rated at least 400 ISO, preferably 800 ISO. Newborns often have skin coloring issues for several weeks and black and white removes that aspect, and besides that will always be a classic look. If you are using a digital camera, you can turn the image black & white on the computer, or online if you are using an online printing service.
- Make sure the flash is turned off! Using window light will yield a beautiful soft result which is key to capturing the beauty of the newborn baby. To achieve this, find a window that has good light coming through. You do not want direct sunlight, just a nice amount of indirect light. Morning light works great if you have a room with the right exposure, and morning is also a great time to capture the baby.
- Simple is always better, so remove visual clutter. Use a white sheet or solid colored blankets under the baby so that the look is simple, classic and totally focused on the baby.
- Remove the babies clothing down to the diapers. Less clothing is better for newborn photography to really show the baby as they tend to not fit clothing well at this age, and clothing is more of a distraction. If the diapers have cartoons on them, try to cover the cartoons by folding the diaper over, or putting fabric over that area. Or take your chances and remove that diaper! Work quickly at this point if you choose this route.
- Make sure the babies face and body are turned toward the window light. Stand so that the window is at your side and you have a good view of the baby. Take pictures with your camera, trying to fill the frame with the baby and solid colored backgrounds, avoiding other background clutter.
- Take pictures from all different angles. Talk to the baby to try to get them to look into the camera for some of the images, but do not focus on trying to get the baby to smile. Just sing and coo and work on getting different expressions and features of your newborn.
- If the baby falls asleep, no problem – photograph them while sleeping! When they are asleep you can take pictures of feet and hands as they are not moving. Think of the beautiful images by Anne Geddes, who became famous for her sleeping newborns images. When newborns are awake they tend to move constantly which can make it challenging to get still images without motion.
- Take more pictures than you think you need, you never know which ones you will like. Make sure to get come full body, some half body and some close ups of face, hands, feet and other cute, memorable body parts – like the fuzzy wrinkly shoulders, funny hair lines, ears, legs, bottom, etc.
- Develop your pictures at the lab or on your computer, and make sure to look through them with an artistic eye. Find the images that really look like the baby to you – the images that capture their features in the way that you want to remember, and use those ones for a birth announcement.
Anna Myers is a fine art San Francisco Bay Area Portrait Photographer who specializes in San Francisco Bay Area Newborn Photography.
