Sleeping Newborn – Digitally Composited Image

This is a commonly requested shot at newborn photo shoots and it’s very easy to see why.

It’s not the easiest one to achieve though, it requires a very settled baby who is happy in the kind of folded up position that I have to get them in. Not all babies love this position (they all have their own preferences) and it also requires a willing pair of extra hands to make the magic happen.

This is because, although it looks like the newborn has their head balanced on their hands naturally, they can’t quite manage this yet as their heads are super heavy.  So this is actually two (or sometimes three) images stitched together with a parents hands offering all the support the newborn needs.

Step 1 – I get the newborn roughly into position and settled folded forward

Step 2 – I manually gently manoeuvre their arms and rest their head upon their hands keeping my hands around their wrists so they are fully supported.

Step 3 – a parent (usually dad because you have to crouch down to do this part), supports their head with their hand and I take the first picture

Step 4 – this is the tricky part!  Without moving their position, the parent then shifts to supporting their head by gently holding their wrists together. I take the second picture. Sometimes, we need to run this manoeuvre a few times with maybe a couple of make up shots in there if the position shifts too much in the transition.

Step 5 – it all comes together when I get it back to my editing suite!