Prairie Light Images

A Baby Portrait Session with Emily

The first impression you get when you photograph a 4 month old baby is that the session could go one of two ways: Baby smiles and parents are happy or Baby cries and the portrait session is a bust.  Fortunately, our session with Emily Lynn was of the former nature.  Having just finished her nap and lunch, Emily was in a mood to pour on the cute without mercy.

Our lighting setup was on a white seamless with two Nikon SB-600 lights shining on the background, set to Manual 1/8 power.  The main light was a Firefly Beauty Dish with a Nikon SB-900 set up just to camera left and put onto iTTL.

Because babies of this age cannot sit up yet on their own, I was prepared to take a lot of pictures of her lying or on her tummy.  Fortunately, Emily’s Mommy brought alone a most ingenious device that would have come in handy when my own kids were this age.  It is called a bumbo and it is a high backed chair that basically cradles and supports a baby in an approximate sitting position.  Emily loves her bumbo, so once seated, she began to get into her character.

 

Babies of this age do not last for very long, so it is important to begin the session prepared and ready to shoot as soon as the model is ready.  With the camera set up, all you have to do is focus and shoot.  Their expressions change by the second, so it is important to be alert, because once a look is gone, there is no way to ask your model to repeat it.

Having Mom and Dad along to attract the baby’s attention is a big help and brought out the smiles that only a 4 month old can.

 

 

Once the session in the bumbo got old, we decided to try some more risqué photos.  When she gets older, she will not thank us for them, but Mom was delighted.  I wish we had a classic bearskin rug (faux fur, of course) to get that classic baby on a rug shot, but we made do with the soft changing pad that the parents had brought along.

Once more, the mood rapidly deteriorated and so Emily was quickly run through one last wardrobe change and introduced to Mr. Bear for her final sitting.  She delighted us without end and we wrapped up while she was still happy.

All in our photo session lasted about 20 minutes.  That may not seem long, but with a model as mercurial as a 4 month old, I thought we did rather well.

The photos were processed in Aperture 3.2.2 and Perfect Portraits  for the final finishing.

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Posted on Monday, February 6th, 2012 at 10:00 am. Filed under: Flash photography, portraits Tags: baby, Flash, high key, light modifiers, Portrait, SB-900, SB600, strobe, technique RSS 2.0 feed.