Newborn photography is about capturing the very first days or weeks of a newborn baby. It’s about creating heartwarming memories from this short period of time. You always have to make sure that the baby is safe. If you keep this in mind, you can implement any of your creative ideas. Here, we collected 20 newborn photo ideas to inspire you!
What You Need For Newborn Photography
You don’t need to be a professional photographer to be able to take adorable and beautiful newborn photos. If you are a new parent, you can even organize your own photo session at home using your smartphone. Of course, if you have a bit more professional equipment for newborn photography, it can make the quality of your images better. But it’s more important to pay attention to the photography ideas, the light, the props, and the poses.
Although such small babies don’t really care about the whole photoshoot, you can add great variety to it. Fun outfits or props can spice up any picture, but natural light and pale colors have their own beautiful effect too. You can involve the whole family or just the parents in the photoshoot and pose the baby diversely – but always comfortably and safely.
Our newborn photo ideas include some specific props, lighting techniques and poses too. You can combine them with each other to create a unique look.
Visualise The Season When The Baby Was Born
You can utilize the season when the baby was born. Use props that are typical for that month of the year. This way you can capture the weather circumstances in your image. These pictures are going to illustrate stories, such as “it was a really hot summer day when you were born”.
Also, it’s easier to find seasonal props and decorations, and you can even shoot outside if the weather is nice.
Build A Photo Session Around Holidays
If the baby was born around a holiday, like Christmas, you should include some holiday decorations or outfits in your newborn photos. This is strongly connected to the seasonal newborn photo ideas. But instead of the weather and nature, you can concentrate more on the typical decorations and figures that are connected to the special event.
Dress the baby for example as a little snowman, as Santa, or as a bunny for the photos. There are a lot of cute and fun options!
Take Candid Photos In The Hospital
The first opportunity to take newborn photos is at the hospital. Try to be invisible and make sure not to bother the parents and the baby. The moments when the parents hold the tiny baby for the first time in their hands or on their chest are beautiful.
The baby having a rest on the mother’s or father’s belly is also worth capturing. You can take natural and intimate candid shots here.
Capture Details In The Hospital
You can start emphasizing details in the hospital. For example, the band with the baby’s name on it is a cute scale to see how tiny the hands are. Or you can photograph the feet or the face of the baby. You can even take close-up newborn images, without making your location visible. This is a good tip when someone arranges their whole photoshoot for the very first moments.
Photograph First Meetings
This newborn photo idea is about how the parents, siblings, or other relatives react to the arrival of the newborn. You can shoot these kinds of images at home, but in the hospital too.
If your shots are black and white, it adds a more documentary feeling to them. Also, it freezes the perfect moments by focusing only on the facial expressions instead of the colors.
Capture The Everyday Activities Of The Family
Bathing newborns is an activity that is part of the family’s daily routine. Although it’s an ordinary scene, it means a lot to the family. You can include feeding or dressing the baby into your photo session too.
It’s their own little bubble where these things happen. So it’s an easy way to show intimacy and how much the parents care about the newborn.
Capture The Sleeping Baby In The Parents’ Arms
Sleeping newborns are cute. But candid shots of them as they are sleeping in their parents’ arms are simply adorable and show intimacy. These images are so beautiful because they represent the connection between the child and the parent.
Also, these can be everyday candid moments from a family’s life, in case they usually lull the baby to sleep this way.
Photograph The Mother And The Baby During Breastfeeding
Breastfeeding is the most natural thing in a new mother’s life. Try capturing the intimate and calm moments the mother has with her baby during this time. You don’t have to show everything in your images. A sophisticated pose and composition can tell more than a thousand words.
This idea is strongly focusing on the mother-child relationship and love.
Try Flat Lays
Shooting from different angles is a great way to add variety to your images. If you are taking photos from above, you can take flat lay images of the newborns. You can add almost any kind of decorations to these compositions.
Also, showing the weight and the length of the baby written creatively on different objects or cards is a good idea to consider. You can take the same image from month to month and document the growth.
Capture Tiny Hands And Feet Under A Blanket
Probably these photo ideas would come to your mind without listing them here, as a baby’s hands and feet are so cute. But still, make sure to take a few close-ups during a newborn photography session.
If you cover the baby’s legs or arms with a blanket, you can enhance how tiny and adorable they are.
Capture The Feet Using The Parents’ Hands As Scale
A quite basic, but definitely necessary point on the list of newborn photo ideas. You can involve the parents in your baby photos by asking them to hold the baby’s feet. You can use them as scales to show how small the baby is. Also, this is another way to point out their connection.
Having a composition like this one emphasises the closeness of their unity.
Capture How The Parents Are Holding The Baby’s Head
As for the hands and feet, babies’ heads are adorably small too. Ask a parent to hold the baby while gently having their head in both hands. This newborn pose shows how parents protect their newborn and it appears like a warm hug.
You can use a wider composition to capture the whole scene. But a close-up, focusing solely on the hands and the head is beautiful as well.
Ask The Parents To Hold The Baby Together
Holding the baby from two sides can symbolise the support of the parents. It shows the trust they have in each other and how they are protecting the baby.
It’s a nice composition with a deep meaning. Also, their hands give a scale to show how tiny the newborn is.
Ask One Parent To Touch Noses With The Baby
This pose brings intimacy to your newborn photos. Ask one parent to hold the baby and touch their nose to the newborn’s. This way they inevitably look at each other, and this eye connection connects them on a deep level.
It’s also a nice way of emphasising their similar traits.
Capture How The Baby Cries
Crying is part of people’s lives. Especially while we are babies. This is not a typical addition when it comes to newborn photo ideas, but it’s worth a try. Don’t get scared when your subject starts crying during your newborn photoshoot.
Use these moments to capture how the parents are trying to calm their babies. You can take sweet candid images this way.
Capture Yawns
Babies are adorable while they are yawning. So try to catch these momentums and freeze them for the upcoming years. These results are going to be fun images and the parents are going to love them.
No matter which one of the newborn photo ideas you like the most, yawns can come at any moment. So be ready to capture them!
Dress The Baby As A Toy
Take adorable images at home or in a studio while the baby is dressed like the toys you surround them with. This adds a calm but fun look to your baby photos. You can include the own toys of the baby, but any other small decoration can be used.
Use Tiny Teddy Bears As Props
If you include a tiny teddy bear in a newborn photo, it’s not only going to spice it up but will also serve as a scale. You can give the bear to the parents and let them keep it. If you are the parent, just keep it for yourself.
It’s amazing to see how big the bear seemed next to the babies and how it disappears in their palm when they grow up.
Take A Family Portrait
You should take a few pictures where both parents are visible and they are holding the newborn baby. A shot like this is the perfect memory to keep. There is a high chance that they are even going to decorate their home with a nice print of it. Many photo compositions can be built around this main idea. But to be more specific, we advise starting with a picture where the focus is on their unity and wholeness.
Ask them to hug each other and look at the baby. This is going to enhance their closeness and love. If you fill the frame with them, it makes the composition even more complete. If you are working with a single parent, just implement the idea while having only one adult in the pictures.
Try Backlighting For An Intimate Atmosphere
If you have the chance to use natural light to light your subject or subjects from the back, go with it. You can do this in a studio of course, but soft natural light is the best. It creates harmony and calmness in your photos. Make sure not to use a too strong light as you want some details to be visible in the darker areas too.
It can be used for a lot of different poses. But photographing side-face makes your subjects more recognisable.
Conclusion
As you can see, the list of newborn photography ideas could be almost endless. You can vary these tips as you wish. You don’t have to be a professional to take these shots. Make sure to collect your ideas before you start photographing, as the baby’s patience is limited.
Try to spend as short time as possible with each photo. You don’t want the session to be overwhelming for the newborn.
Don’t worry if you can’t get the exact props or lightings you see on our list! Sometimes the best pictures are the candid ones.
originally posted on expertphotography.com by Lili Jakobovits
