my first new born baby photos :)

[adirosman]

Hallo people, good friend of mine, ask me if i can take pics of his new born baby eva (5 days old), and of course i tald him yes, so here is the pics, i would be happy to know what everyone else think about it, and of course , what i can do better for the  next time

[Dylan777]

Hallo people, good friend of mine, ask me if i can take pics of his new born baby eva (5 days old), and of course i tald him yes, so here is the pics, i would be happy to know what everyone else think about it, and of course , what i can do better for the  next time

Congratulation

This is the #1 reason I spent large amount of money into DSLR gear. Just take alot of pictures, because your baby will grow so fast. You just don't realize it until you go over the pictures that you took. Try to sort your pictures by month & year.

MAKE SURE YOU HAVE SOME BACKUPS. In my case, I have two 5TB external HDs with monthly backup.

[jaredvs]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaredvs/8269525922/#in/photostream

[RadioPath]

Hi,
just saw these pics, they are amazing! I wanted to know how you took number 3? I've been trying to get exactly this kind of shot, but how did you go about doing that (light, settings and especially prevent the little one from moving with flash light and shutter sound ). I (and my wife!) would be sooooo happy to manage to get such a pic, please help.
Thanks a bunch
RadioPath
P.S.: Hope it's Ok I added to this thread, even though it's older, but this was just the picture I'm interested in.

[ChilledXpress]

Nice shots... the real reason I suspect many started taking photos and one of the main reasons I don't give a sh#$ about 31 stops of dynamic range or 4K video. There are far more important things to spend my time and effort worrying about.  My sons first week baby photos...


Motherhood... by David KM, on Flickr


01/52 Weeks of Sailor - First trip to Starbucks by David KM, on Flickr

[pierceography]

Nice shots.  I actually had a baby a week and a half ago and have been filling up memory cards ever since.  Here are a few suggestions that I've been applying to the pictures I've been taking the past 10 days:

1) My most used slider in ACR is clarity.  I reduce the clarity in almost every baby photo I take to create that creamier look.
2) Babies have soft skin, but our cameras/lenses are often too sharp and the baby's skin comes out looking flakey or rough.  Try using layer masks and blurring (surface or gaussian blur) to soften the skin.  Surface blur is great for keeping edges intact, and masks for ensuring the eyes, nose, and mouth remain sharp while the rest of the skin can have that soft look to it.
3) Overexpose.  Even if my shots were coming out great on the histogram, I wound up punching the exposure or highlights to achieve a brighter image.

Hope these help!

[pierceography]

Also, just some friendly criticism.  I really like the second and third photos, but the chandelier in the first photo is very distracting -- I'd crop the photo to include only the baby and father.  It would be a tight crop, but better than including the light fixture.

And the last photo is nice composition wise, but the focus is on the tip of the baby's nose... leaving the eyes OOF.  I would either stop down to ensure the baby's entire face is in focus, or focus on the eyes and let the nose/mouth fall slightly OOF.  I've been using my center AF point only to ensure I'm focusing on my son's eyes.  If I want more in focus, I'll stop down to f/4.5 or lower.

But overall very nice shots!  :-)

[adebrophy]

Nice shots.  I actually had a baby a week and a half ago and have been filling up memory cards ever since.  Here are a few suggestions that I've been applying to the pictures I've been taking the past 10 days:

1) My most used slider in ACR is clarity.  I reduce the clarity in almost every baby photo I take to create that creamier look.
2) Babies have soft skin, but our cameras/lenses are often too sharp and the baby's skin comes out looking flakey or rough.  Try using layer masks and blurring (surface or gaussian blur) to soften the skin.  Surface blur is great for keeping edges intact, and masks for ensuring the eyes, nose, and mouth remain sharp while the rest of the skin can have that soft look to it.
3) Overexpose.  Even if my shots were coming out great on the histogram, I wound up punching the exposure or highlights to achieve a brighter image.

Hope these help!

Really good tips. I agree on overexposing a bit too. Babies have huge eyes, which are a real contrast, so pushing the exposure a bit will bleach out skin a touch (I actually think that that can negate the need to worry too much about reducing clarity) but will make the eyes and other facial features pop.

Window light, or bounce flash of a ceiling are really good too for soft lighting.

On that tip, I just bought a Lastolite Ezybox and - wow - perfect baby pics. Here's an example of results -

Another tip - Like all of us, babies can have all sorts of red blotches - dropping the red a tiny bit or better a B&W conversion is a good way of softening imperfections without using clarity or blur.

[ishdakuteb]

ah... these images are cute and priceless, especially they are all done by parents.  wish that i used dslr back in the day when my first daughter seeing the first light in this world...  CONGRATULATION!...

[neuroanatomist]

Forgot about this thread...seems a good place for an image from our son's first portrait session. 


EOS 1D X, EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM @ 47mm, 1/250 s, f/6.3, ISO 400

Lighting was a pair of Lastolite 24" Ezyboxes with 600EX-RTs in them, triggered by an ST-E3-RT.

[wellfedCanuck]

Forgot about this thread...seems a good place for an image from our son's first portrait session. 

Great portrait and congrats on the new addition. Fair warning, though. Ours started out all cuddly and cute like that too, but he's now 6'4" and 210 lbs. Something about feeding them after midnight or too many Flintstones vitamins... beware!

[sanj]

Congratulations.
Love the turtle!

[anthonyd]

Nice shots.

I agree with the overexposure suggestion.  Here is an example of taking this to the extreme (which resulted from a settings accident):


I would also recommend that you use props (large baskets, chests, hats and anything oversized to make the baby look smaller).  At the very least, go to a store like Joann Fabrics and get some textured blankets to hide whatever surface the baby is on.  Here are a couple of examples of that idea:




Finally, find a couple of pros on flickr and follow their work for inspiration.  Here are a couple of my favorites:
Jessica Tanner
Sandra Hill
Elena (Litsova) Sigtryggsson

[ChilledXpress]

Great images of happy babies... Love it and love that so many are using the Lastolite Softboxes, great travel rigs.

... but the chandelier in the first photo is very distracting -- I'd crop the photo to include only the baby and father.  It would be a tight crop, but better than including the light fixture.

But overall very nice shots!  :-)

Yea, that chandelier and the whit semi-circle right bottom... crop would be nice, or content ware patch bottom right, then crop chandelier.