It may look like an easy job, but trust me it isn’t. All babies are different – you probably already knew that – and therefore every photo session is different. Hooray I say – I’d get bored if I had to do the same thing over and over again.
Fortunately I have had it all in my studio; happy, sad, grumpy, tired, sick, hungry. I’ve learnt to work with it – and generally I head it off, by suggesting parents book a slot that matches their child’s happy time. Strangely the 11 a.m. session is the most popular, which is also the time most first time mothers have worked out how to get out of the house by, and this was with a 5 a.m. start. I love the challenge of photographing babies, watching them grow and their emerging personalities blossoming into toddlerhood.
The most popular baby package I do is a three separate sessions over babies first year – this particular baby promotion has been popular for the past twenty or so years (not that I was there at the beginning). It’s an absolute classic and is so popular because the free gift the parents receive at the end is typically a triple folio/frame, depending who you book through, containing one image from each stage of babyhood really shows how baby develops and changes during that first year.
The reason I mention this particular promotion is for the challenges it presents – typically a baby is photographed at 4, 8 and 12 months. In theory this captures the various stages of lying, sitting and standing quite nicely. Except some baby’s will achieve those stages early or latter than the book says.
I solve that one, by asking the parents whether the baby is sitting yet before I book the second session. I can’t be doing with rigid rules, who cares if this is at 7 months or 9 months? I don’t.
The key to it all is to manage the parent’s expectations. Everyone loves the smiley baby photograph, but the baby may have other ideas particularly when arriving at a new unfamiliar place. If I can keep the parents relaxed and happy, then I usually end up with a relaxed happy baby who may or may not smile.
I can honestly say that in my five years of photographing babies only one baby has come in and truly smiled and chuckled for the whole session. In my experience, and fortunately for me, parent’s love photographs that capture their child’s personality and I know I’ve achieved that when they comment, “That’s him! He pulls that face all the time!” The smiling baby pictures are the icing on the cake really – especially at 4 months old.
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For more information please visit my main baby photography website.
