What to Expect at a Newborn Photoshoot
After more than a decade of photographing newborns, sending prep e-mails about the things to get prepared and instructions for how to get the house ready, I realized I’ve never actually written down what you can expect at a newborn photoshoot!
So today we are changing that.
Here are the main things you can expect at a newborn photoshoot with me:
Structure: The number one reason I’ve never thought to write down what to expect at a newborn photoshoot is because it varies so drastically from family to family. That’s because of something called kid time. Whether you just have one baby or a house full of kids, we operate on their timeline. We go based on the most demanding member of the family at any given moment, which, if you have a two year old, is often that toddler, but it can also be the baby or an older kid who is slower to warm or has a lot of excited energy. I have a list in my head of everything I’d like to accomplish at your session (see below), but how we go about that will change. If you have a shy toddler and the baby is calm when I arrive, we will start with the baby’s solo portraits so your toddler can warm up. If the baby is upset when I arrive, we will make sure to start with all of the standing photos where the newborn is nice and tight in your arms with you rocking gently while I photograph you.
Poses: In lifestlye photography, you can expect to be posed at your session. I often get people who say, we hired you because we love how candid your images are, but that’s definitely not the case! I always start with a pose and then give my families direction to get candid, genuine emotion within that pose, making it all look natural. The pose is to make sure the light is good, your positions are flattering, and that we can see everyone’s faces.
You can expect to have all of the main combinations photographed at your sessions with me. What you can expect at a newborn photoshoot is each parent with the baby alone, each parent with all of their kids including the baby, sibling photos and the family all together. If we have time and everyone is engaged in the photos, I will try to get photos of all of the kids solo and shots of each kid with each parent as well as baby toes, the baby in just a diaper and the baby swaddled and unswaddled (these are my favorites to photograph baby in if you have them!) If the baby is having a hard time, I make sure to rely on that first list and get at least one great shot of each of those photos. I will also always make it a point to ask you in your questionnaire ahead of time what your top photos are to have and make those my very top priority.
Flow and Timing: Everything in a newborn session is flexible because babies, by nature, are unpredictable most of the time. Even the babies with the best schedules can get thrown off the night before I arrive. While I’d love the baby to be fed before I arrive, that’s really the only thing I ask, and I know that’s not always possible if they’ve been napping before I get there. I schedule up to two hours for each newborn session to make sure there is plenty of time for diaper changes, time to rock the baby to sleep if they are tired and fussy, and to feed them if need be. My sessions usually last closer to 1-1.5 hours, but I do leave more time just in case.
Hopefully this article can help you know a little more about what to expect at a newborn photoshoot, and my biggest hope is that you come away with it feeling more at ease about your session. These sessions are as stress-free as possible with lots of flexibility built into my workflow and my goals for each session to deliver you the most beautiful, timeless newborn session possible.
If you are in San Francisco or Marin and looking at an in-home newborn session that sounds just like this one, you can book that here. If you are looking for a studio newborn session in my Sausalito studio, you can book that here. To read about what to expect with a studio session, which is set at 40 minutes and therefore functions slightly differently, click here.
