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7 Essential Tips For Stunning DIY Newborn Photos
DIY Newborn Photography
A professional newborn photo session is a luxury and a treat and, as photographers, we naturally appreciate the value. But we know realistically you can’t employ a pro every other week, and your baby is changing and growing every other day! So if you want to DIY your newborn’s photo session, we’ve got you covered with these 7 essential tips, designed specifically for amateur photographers.
All you need is a DSLR or a camera you can use in manual mode, and you can DIY your baby’s pictures like a pro!
Vicki Cardilini, CLG Advanced Grad
1. Natural Light
You don’t need fancy lights for DIY newborn photography. Moreover, natural light is free, abundant (hopefully!) and easy to use!
Look for a good amount of soft natural light, which you can find near windows and doorways. Soft light wraps gently around your subject, flattering their features. You can recognise soft light by the absence of harsh shadows, which have sharply defined lines between the light and shade.
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Positioning
When you want to DIY newborn photos, the best way to position newborns is with their head nearest to the light source so that it washes down their body, rather than up-lighting them and illuminating the inside of their nose! Look for a little shadow under the nose to confirm you’ve positioned your baby correctly.
Depending on the strength of your light, start by placing your newborn around 2m from the source.
Louise Glendon, CLG
Try to create some soft shadows on one side by placing the baby at a 45-90 degree angle to the light source, and this will add depth and interest to your photos. Look for a gently graduating line between light and shade, rather than a sharply defined line, which indicates harsh, unflattering light.
I encourage you to experiment with the position and distance whilst keeping your eye on the way light and shadow falls on the baby’s face, and ask yourself these questions:
- Is it soft and gentle?
- Does it highlight the baby’s eyes, forehead, nose and cheeks?
- Or is it coming up from the other end, illuminating up the nose?
- If you see catchlights in the eyes (little dots of light) chances are you’ve nailed it in terms of position.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
2. Gear & Settings
Lens
An indoor DIY newborn photo session usually calls for a wide-angle lens to compensate for small spaces. This also enables you to be physically close to the baby, so you can ensure her safety at all times.
Anything from around 35-50mm with the ability to use wide apertures (low f stop value) will be perfect. However, if your only gear is a kit lens, the 18-55mm will be fine.
We highly recommend the ‘nifty fifty’ when looking to upgrade your kit lenses. The nifty fifty is a 50mm f/1.8 lens, available in both Canon and Nikon. This is an inexpensive lens, but quite good quality for its price.
The fact it’s f/1.8 means you can capture more of the ambient light than your kit lenses allow, and it’s also sharper.
Related: The Nifty Fifty Lens
Merissa Wakefield, CLG Advanced Grad
Camera – Get Out Of Auto Mode!
Any camera you can use in manual mode is essential for DIY baby photography, as it is the only way to control your exposure and effect.
If you’re not shooting in manual mode, check out our intro to manual mode.
Related: Introduction to Manual Mode
Settings
Use apertures of around f/2.8 to f/3.5 — this will give you a nice shallow depth of field and let you capture lots of ambient light.
Set your shutter speed to, minimum, 1/250 (preferably faster) to freeze the baby’s motion. Then balance your exposure by increasing your ISO if needed. If the shot is too bright, increase your shutter speed instead.
If you have a kit lens that doesn’t open up wider than f/3.5, try using it at 24mm. That should give you the ability to shoot at around f/3.5 to f4, and you’ll need to step in closer for a tighter frame (zoom with your feet!)
Merissa Wakefield, CLG Advanced Grad
3. Styling Your DIY Newborn Photos
If you like a more posed and styled newborn photo, keep it simple.
Avoid a DIY newborn photo session Pinterest fail and keep additional props to a minimum. The more elements you add to the shot, the more you distract from your subject.
A wrap and/or hat or simple headband can look gorgeous, and the easiest way to make it work is to ensure they’re from the same colour family and only vary the tones.
Alternatively, use one colour and add only neutral tones.
Heidi Talic, CLG Advanced Grad
For this posed style of newborn photos, a beanbag is the way to go.
Most importantly, make sure it’s well filled with beans so that it’s firmer than you’d normally have it when using it for seating. Then drape a throw over the bag, and pull it up at the back and drape it or clip it to something that sits a good metre higher than the bean bag.
Professional photographers attach it to a backdrop stand but know that a clothes horse works really well too.
Attach it in a way that you avoid any wrinkles! You don’t want to be trying to fix that in every single photo later when editing.
This pose is nice, easy, and safe — the baby is on her belly, knees gently up and hands under her chin.
This pose is simply the baby on her side, hands folded as if in prayer and placed under her cheek, feet crossed at the ankles.
Note in both of these gorgeous shots, the throw matches the wrap/clothing. It’s a seemingly small detail, but it makes the difference between professional photos and Pinterest fails.
4. Locations
Vary your shots by trying different locations. Think bed, bath, beanbag, bassinet…(we really weren’t trying for only B locations, I promise!).
Why not try a milk bath? Add a little milk to a very shallow bath so the baby can lay on their back unassisted and safely. The water should be shallow enough that it only reaches just up to her armpits. You may need to hike the heating up to keep her asleep and comfortable.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
The neutrality of the bassinet, the timber floor working as a backdrop, and the white sheet are the perfect canvas for this beautiful floral wrap, creating a striking contrast of elements.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Don’t forget wide shots, and when photographing a cot/crib in this way, leave some negative space at the top for balance.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Shoot from multiple angles and perspectives for a variety of DIY newborn photos without even needing to move your baby.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
If your baby’s bed isn’t near a good source of natural light, and you can’t move it, shoot with the widest aperture your lens allows (lowest f stop value) and high ISO.
Related: Embrace High ISO (and get better results!)
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Your own bed is a lovely big space that will allow you to shoot wide frames and still fill the frame with the bed. Secondly, including all this negative space is a great way to highlight your baby’s size.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Step back for a wide shot and take away any surrounding elements that don’t need to be there and could clutter up your photos.
Related: Clear the Clutter
Merissa Wakefield, CLG Advanced Grad
The beauty of a bassinet for your DIY newborn photography session is the ability to place it wherever the good light lives. Winning!
Merissa Wakefield, CLG Advanced Grad
Casually drape a wrap diagonally across the bassinet, flowing over the floor to add interest. Additionally, this will connect the bassinet and baby to the negative space, bringing balance to the photo. Notice what a big difference this one small change makes?
Related: Photographing Your Baby’s Milestones – A First Year Photoshoot
5. What To Capture
There are only so many ways to pose a newborn! Still, you can get variety in your DIY newborn photo session by taking lots of pictures of the same set-up:
- Get in close to the baby and shoot the details
- Step back and take full body shots
- Change your perspective. Get up high and shoot down, and get down low and shoot straight on.
- Vary your angles. Try every angle possible whilst looking through the viewfinder. Just shoot it! You never know.
So with those compositions in mind, use them on one or more of the following ideas.
All Wrapped Up!
With baby wrapped and on their back, rather than moving them, move yourself around and try these suggestions for different angles and perspectives;
- Get down low and shoot side on
- Stand up and shoot directly down
- Compose from baby’s head down, and
- From the feet up
- Raise yourself up for a perspective that is higher than eye level but not directly overhead.
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Lauren Kennedy, CLG Enthusiast Grad
Claire Eastman, CLG Advanced Grad
Claire Eastman, CLG Advanced Grad
Claire Eastman, CLG Advanced Grad
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Details
Get in close and capture those sweet details…I’m talking feet, toes, fingers, hands, wisps of hair, ears, lips.
For these shots, use a narrower aperture (higher f stop value, i.e., f/4.5) as you’ll have less depth of focus when you get in this close.
Merissa Wakefield, CLG Advanced Grad
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Don’t forget to grab a traditional close up headshot!
Related: Using a Macro Lens For Newborn Photography
6. Siblings
If you want to include older children in your DIY newborn photos, one of the best pieces of advice we can give — especially when the older sibling is a toddler — is to get your location and settings sorted, then bring in the baby and big brother or sister.
Choose a comfortable location near good light. For example, the family bed is a great place to pose them as it’s big enough to place them in the middle of the bed and keep the baby safe at the same time.
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Claire Eastman, CLG Advanced Grad
Claire Eastman, CLG Advanced Grad
Related: 28 Beautiful Captures To Inspire
Alana Prosper, CLG Advanced Grad
Check out our fantastic toddler and newborn photography guide, which includes loads of prompts for gorgeous photos. It also includes a downloadable cheat sheet to make it super easy for you to DIY!
CLICK HERE to download our newborn and toddler cheatsheet to help you set-up and take beautiful photos of this age range
7. Editing
Newborn skin is fine and delicate, and if you use dramatic contrast or colour in your editing this can really enhance any skin imperfections and make more work for yourself.
If you’re not confident in your editing skills, keep it simple and flattering with a subtle hand. The process will be helped if you shoot in soft, gentle light such as in the image below.
For those new to editing, we have a free Lightroom Class which is the perfect first step to learning the fundamentals of clean hand editing.
Related: Free Lightroom Class
Alison Britton, CLG Advanced Grad
We hope you enjoyed our tips for beautiful DIY newborn photos! We’d love it if you share your baby pictures to Instagram and tag us #clicklovegrow
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