You know you would think from looking at these blog posts that I haven't done anything for over a year. Not a thing, in fact, since Mom passed away. Nothing could be further from the truth. I did take a self-imposed hiatus after that, but then I started getting back to it. Probably what it was was I got so busy that I never had a chance to blog like I wanted to.
The intent was to get out an entry coinciding with shoots. Not necessarily for EVERY shoot. That would be near impossible. But at least for a few of them so you could kind of get a look behind the curtain at the method to my madness. Better late than never so I guess this entry will be one of those.
The Manuels have been long-time loyal clients of mine going back to when I did a family shoot for them when I was still known as XL-Images. Since then, we've done a professional shoot for them (with another one on deck), a second family shoot and two senior shoots. But when they said they wanted me to do their newborn shoot, I knew it would be a struggle. Definitely not impossible though so challenge accepted.
I will readily admit that newborns are not my specialty. It takes a talented baby-whisper to get some of the epic photos you see advertised as professional baby pics. However, I do know a few tricks or two. Enough to get some great images to capture the baby's essence. One of those being what is traditionally a coaching opportunity for me: patience.
The best baby pictures are those that are taken when the newborn is sleeping. Naturally, you can't force a newborn to go to sleep. You're at the whim of his/her schedule. The idea is to make the circumstances conducive for them to want to go into a deep sleep. Things like turning the heat up, feeding them, soft music, etc. Well we didn't have access to all that in a home setting with several people present so we had to go with feeding the little lady and just try to wait her out.
As you can see, it didn't work out quite the way we had hoped. She never did get to sleep. At least not while I was there. I found out later that the minute I left, she fell into a deep, deep sleep. Because of course that's just how my luck works. It didn't matter too much though because it turns out the little fella take some darn good pics while she's awake too. One of the most difficult sessions I've ever done was well worth the effort.