So you want to have a newborn photo shoot

First, you need to decide when you want the pictures to be taken? Do you want to have the pictures taken when the baby is just a few days old? Do you want to have the pictures taken to capture the baby's milestone (1 month old, 3 months, 6 months, 1 year old)?

If you want to have the pictures taken when the baby is a few days old. You need to start planning before the baby is born. You need to research and book the photographer at least 2 weeks to a months ahead. There are so many Covid babies now and the photographer you want may not be available and you don't want to lose that "newborn look" window. I recommend to take the pictures when the baby is between 7 to 10 days old. The baby still has the "newborn look" but the immune system is a little stronger. Also, after a week, you should know your baby's schedule and we can shoot around that. Although babies at this age just eat, poop and sleep, they can still be fussy when there is a stranger in the house. So for a 2-hour session, you should expect to have just about 30 minutes of good shooting time. Plan your session ahead, so we can make sure we capture what you want during the limited time.

Whether the session is for a newborn or a 6-month old, I encourage my clients to start a mood board on Pinterest.  They can share the pictures they like with me and I can plan on how to capture them for their baby. You can get some ideas from the one I have here.

Once you have an idea on what you want, you can start gathering props and clothes for the shoot. You can get pretty much everything you want from Amazon. You can also try your local Target and Walmart or any baby clothing stores. I have a post that talks about what I have, you can check it out here.

The next step to prepare for the session is to create a shot list. Since the time is limited in a session, we want to make sure we don't miss anything during the shoot. You can create a list of shots that you want with the combinations of these items:

• list of clothes
• list of props
  
• list of people
• list of locations

You are now ready, so sit back and enjoy. 

By the way, the mood board, the shot list, etc, are just a guideline. How well the shoot goes depends 100% on the baby and 90% chance the baby will not cooperate. We will use Plan B, C, D or whatever it takes to capture some good pictures of your baby.