We first met dinky 8 day old Polly for her newborn baby photography back in November. As we’ve been soooo busy fulfilling clients Christmas orders we’ve only just found the time to sit down and pen out this blog post. However, the wait is over and we can now share her gorgeous shoot with you all.
We already knew Mum and Dad through our own children attending the same preschool and then primary school here in Brixworth, Northamptonshire; in fact their eldest daughter is good friends with our Lucy. When Mum said she was expecting her third and that she’d like us to photograph their precious new arrival, we were of course thrilled and honoured to be asked.
It’s funny as many people would presume that it’d be easy working with clients that we’re already acquainted with. To be honest, although of course it’s always lovely to work with friends, it does add another level of pressure/expectation and can prove to be trickier than working with a complete stranger. However Polly’s Mum and Dad were an absolute pleasure to work with and the whole shoot was a really lovely laid back experience, hopefully for both parties!
After having a pre-shoot consultation (posh talk for a coffee and chat), we had a pretty fair idea what Mum and Dad were hoping to achieve from Polly’s shoot. Rather than wanting lots of individual images for a multi-aperture wall piece or album they were both keen for a one-off show piece. We’d already discussed preferred poses and compositions so we knew exactly where to spend the lions share of the shoot.
After a quick feed Polly was ready for action…sleep! The holy grail of all successful newborn shoots is a lovely sleepy baby full of milk and seemingly oblivious to the world around them. We went straight in for the desired shot, a lovely natural and comfortable pose that just looks like baby is taking a nap. Because Polly was so young and under the magic 14 day cut-off point, she let Debbie tuck, mould and shush her into the perfect position.
Any of your who are familiar with our work will know that we’re not big on awkward poses and loathe tacky props, although I do have to pull Debbie away from the cute newborn woolly hats and head bands. Babies don’t need any help to look beautiful and cute, nature does a better job than ever we could. We really concentrate on poses that enhance and flatter the baby and believe that the best clothes are the ones baby were born with, skin!
Composition and lighting wise we also keep it pretty simple. Nice soft but directional lighting that gives the baby form but without adding too much unflattering contrast. Lot’s of soft cosy blankets and warmth, lots of gentle but firm shushing and handling, plus a touch of miraculous womb music, available from all good record shops!
(Please click on an image to see it bigger)
After capturing all the images that we needed, and Polly had proudly presented us with a massive poo (dry cleaning bill in the post Dad), we changed things around a little and went for the more abstract close-ups of her feet and of course her perfect but tiny little hands. By this point Polly had understandably had enough of being pushed and pulled around so she decided to lay there awake for the rest of the shoot to keep an eye on things, which was fab!
Overall a really lovely newborn shoot with a really lovely family, it was a pleasure spending some time with you three. Thank you both for letting us share those precious early day’s of Polly’s life. We trust your artwork has now taken pride of place in your living room and know you’ll all enjoy it for many many years to come!