May
27
2014
I know this little guy gets featured in this series all the time. It’s mostly because he’s going on 5 weeks of limited mobility and is easier to capture being still during this season. :-p Right now he likes to lay right across me prior to bedtime for huge snuggles. I like it a lot.
May
21
2014A couple weeks ago, I talked about judging a photographer’s skill with a camera and retouching software. This week I’m going to show you how to look at their work and judge whether or not they are a Greenville SC Safe Newborn Photographer.
What are the Safety Challenges in Newborn Photography?
Most newborn photographers prefer working with newborns who are under 14 days old.
Photographers prefer this age because the babies have what we call “womb memory”: they are extremely flexible due to their time confined in their mothers womb. This age allows us to curl them into the beautiful poses featured in our work.
But there are unique safety challenges to photographing a baby at this age.
- Newborns have very weak immune systems.
- Newborns are used to an environment that is 98.6 degrees. When unclothed, babies loose body heat very rapidly.
- Newborns have several reflexes for their safety. The following reflexes can cause a baby to move from a prop or beanbag if the photographer is not aware of them: Moro or Startle reflex, the Rooting Reflex, and the Galant Reflex.
- Newborns have poor circulation in their limbs called acrocyanosis.
- Newborns can not support their own heads and have to be supported at all times.
- Newborns have varying levels of flexibility and not all babies find every pose comfortable.
Identifying Safety in a Photographer’s Portfolio
You can ask some questions about a photographers sick plan/vaccinations, how warm their studio is, and how they were trained. But prior to calling a newborn photographer, you can evaluate their skill and safety just by looking at their work.
The first tip I’ll give: Never hire a newborn photographer who shows any images of babies in glass or ceramic props. It’s just not worth the risk to put baby in something breakable!
The second tip: If a pose looks impossible (baby’s head supported by hands, hanging from a branch, or suspended off the ground), ask that photographer how that pose was created. All of these images should be created via a Photoshop composite. Most photographers who do these poses will talk about the “magic” used to create the pose, but some inexperienced photographers actually believe these poses are possible without Photoshop. It never hurts to ask.
I’m going to show you some images from my first three newborn session years ago so that you can clearly see the difference between a well posed, comfortable, and safe baby and one who is clearly not comfortable. These images were taken in my portfolio-building season and before I took my first workshop. I’ve grown so much since then, but I don’t think it’s fair to display any other photographer’s work but my own on this blog.
You can see that this baby is not comfortably through it’s grimace. Perhaps he had gas or perhaps he was posed uncomfortably.
The clearest sign of safety in a photographer’s images is the contentment of the baby. The baby should always look relaxed and may occasionally even smile for the camera.
The baby here is poorly posed. While physically she’s comfortable, this image is not a good one because you can’t see baby’s face.
Here is a better image of a baby lying in a similar pose.
The baby here is cold. You can see how his skin is blotchy from the cold and also that he’s awake. Cold babies rarely sleep. While I had a space heater running, it was not able to keep this client’s home warm.
This is the same pose in my adequately warm studio. One of my primary reasons for creating my home studio was to keep baby better heated and to ensure that I had the necessary light.
This baby has poor circulation. While his hands are not as purple as they could have been, he was clearly left in this position for too long without restoring circulation.
A careful newborn photographer will patiently assist a newborn in relaxing the fingers and re-position the baby if circulation becomes an issue.
Are you as concerned about your baby’s safety as I am? Please contact me today for your free pre-consult and we’ll see if you and I are a great fit in style and budget. If we’re not, I’ll happily refer you to another Greenville SC Safe Newborn Photographer who can meet your needs.
Are you an aspiring newborn photographer or parent wanting to learn more about baby safety? Let me point you to this series of posts on Newborn Photography Safety.
May
19
2014
My kids wake up and beg for “Songs.” YouTube Videos of their favorites like Phil Wickam’s “This is Amazing Grace” or Matt Redman’s “Your Grace Finds Me.”
This morning Bronwyn asked for her new favorite “You make Beautiful Things” by Gungor. Maybe you’ll be encouraged by the song too?
May
07
2014This is the third installment in a series about choosing the best Greenville SC newborn photographer for your needs.
The first post talked about the minimum qualifications any newborn photographer should meet. The second post talked about the qualities you have that might make you a great match for me. This third post is going to show you how to judge a photographers work.
Why Should You Look at the Quality of Work?
There are four things you can discern by the images in a Greenville SC newborn photographer’s portfolio. Just from looking at their images, you can learn the photographer’s…
- skill with a camera and their retouching software
- skill posing a baby
- concern for the baby
- personal style of imagery
Today we’re going to talk about judging the photographers skill with the camera and retouching software. Next week, I’ll talk about the other three things you’ll be able to see in a photographer’s portfolio.
Skill with a Camera/Retouching Software
Are the images well exposed?
Exposure is the quality of capturing the world in the brightness that our eye sees. It’s partly a camera skill and partly a lighting skill.
Under-exposed is when an image is too dark with almost no light tones.
Over-exposed is when an image is too light with almost no dark tones.
A perfectly exposed image should have tones ranging from dark to light and looking very much like your eye would perceive the scene.
How Well is the Image Retouched Using Editing Software?
Photoshop (and other retouching software) can be a tricky subject. It can be used for dramatic effects such turning a piece of pizza into a super model, but more often it’s used for more minor things.
In newborn portraits editing software is used in the following ways.
- to remove red from the newborn’s skin to make it look creamy
- to remove blemishes and peeling skin
- to create the Photoshop Magic that results in those images would be unsafe for baby.
- to apply the photographers own effects that give them their signature style
- to smooth the remaining baby weight from the mother’s middle or face
An Image Case Study
Here’s a little case study. Zoey didn’t have a whole lot of blemishes, but she does have a raspberry angel kiss on her forehead. I personally leave these sort of marks unless asked to remove them. I’m not going to subject any of my mothers to pre-Photoshop scrutiny (because most of them didn’t know I’d done it!), however, every other type of edit was done on this image.
Post-processing can be not done at all, done tastefully, or overdone. It’s easy to see when an image has hand nothing done to it, but it’s not always so easy to see an over processed image so I’ll give you an example. The following image has had too many skin corrections applied making the baby almost orange and washed out and the skin texture looking like a Barbie doll. The range of contrast in the original image has been removed.
Compared to the original, we can see that the over-processed image hides the rich contrast/details and makes the baby look plastic.
I hope that you’ve learned a bit about judging your potential newborn photographers skill with her camera and her retouching software from this post. I’ll be covering the three other areas that you should judge a photographer’s work by in a later post.
If you love what you’ve seen of my work and would love to work with me, contact me today to get your due date on my calendar!
May
05
2014This kid. From the top of his blond head to the bottom of his dirty cast-ed left foot is quite possibly the cutest kid I’ve ever met. He loves his “blank”(et) and his “Baabaa” and he wants the individual attention of bedtime to last for at least half an hour. “Sing my Jesus song, mama.” “Sing great grace.” “Guggle me.”
I pulled out the camera to capture this little one in his dark room so I don’t ever forget and hopped in a few pictures with him as well. The photos are super grainy and slightly out of focus because of the darkness, but to me these are the same qualities that memories have.
