I've been doing weddings and birthday for so long you get used to the experience and you know what will happen and when. At the weekend I took a job photographing a newborn. Now that might sound like it's not a big deal but its a completely different area of photography I explored. It might sound simple and straight forward because newborns don't do much apart from sleep how could it be an issue. Their different issues you have to overcome which I found out on Sunday.

Photographing a newborn requires a lot of patience and planning. I did research before I took the photos and there were things I'd never of imagined I needed to prepare on the list. Things like feeding the baby before the shoot to make sure they are comfortable and sleeping. Things like what fabrics are made out of, flash or continuous lights, what the mum was comfortable with in terms of posing as babies as we all know seem more fragile that we think.

The problems I had on that particular day was that the baby was blocked up and couldn't lay on her tummy for long before she started crying, also she wanted a feed half way through the shoot. There isn't much you can do about this apart from going back another day when she is feeling 100% and just wait for her to finish feeding. One of the props we intended to use wasn't working because she didn't like to be exposed to the air for too long, so the temperature of the room is vital for a comfortable baby. We had to abandon that idea and keep her wrapped up nice and warm and tight.

I myself had thought it was going to be easier than it was to take these types of photos but to get a baby to look like they're smiling or to pose them in such a way is very difficult. Compared to wedding photography it's much harder without a portfolio of newborn work to convince them it's safe to do some poses and you're not hurting the baby. All in all though it was successful and it looks like we got some great shots. I will ask teh mother if its ok to post a few photos on here so you can see the outcome.