first baby shoot C and C please

hayleyfraser24 · Oct 12, 2011

I took these for a friend this morning, I have done a bit of processing on them also... this was not paid or anything my freind just asked me if I would take some shots. I dont have studio lights or anything I just used natural sunlight through the window and fluffy blankets to get a soft look. I like them but I know that the pictures could be sharper. Would you normaly use proffesional lighting for a baby photo shoot? Id like to possibly try again and any tips or advice would be great. Here are 4 of my favourites, comments and critique would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

1 beanie

2 lily

3 feathers

4 feathers 2

MTVision · Oct 12, 2011

Can you post them SOOC without the processing?

MTVision · Oct 12, 2011

Also it's helpful if you list your settings: iso, aperture, shutter speed

hayleyfraser24 · Oct 12, 2011

ok, I used arpeture priority on my camera and it was set to f4.5, my iso was at 200. here is a picture I have done no processing to yet. As you can see it looks a bit dull... they all looked a bit like this one. I dont have photoshop, I used lightroom to increase the exposure and play with the colours and I used gimp to add the text in number 2... thanks for any advice in advance

I know the original is not great but as a final result do you think the mummy will be happy with them?

hayleyfraser24 · Oct 13, 2011

so no one has any tips for me?... as this is not my proffession and only a hobby I dont have alot of equipment but id like to be able to take good shots for my freinds as gifts and ive a few more freinds with babys on the way. For these pictures I didnt want to use a flash... I only have the in camera flash on my sony a290 dslr. For indoor shoots like this without a soft box should I have used artifitial light... like a lamp? I know that if I could get the originals to be a sharper picture without a flash Id have less proccessing and a better result. Id like to acheive a picture that is more in focus, but I dont want to spend too much money. Should I invest in a soft box? Ive seen cheap ones but I have been put off getting one as im unsure of the quality. Were my camera settings wrong? Has anyone else tried this "home made studio" Id really appreciate any advice

m_verbruggen · Oct 13, 2011

I like your pics! I'm sorry I'm new to this all so I cannot help you with any of your questions.

MTVision · Oct 13, 2011

hayleyfraser24 said:
so no one has any tips for me?... as this is not my proffession and only a hobby I dont have alot of equipment but id like to be able to take good shots for my freinds as gifts and ive a few more freinds with babys on the way. For these pictures I didnt want to use a flash... I only have the in camera flash on my sony a290 dslr. For indoor shoots like this without a soft box should I have used artifitial light... like a lamp? I know that if I could get the originals to be a sharper picture without a flash Id have less proccessing and a better result. Id like to acheive a picture that is more in focus, but I dont want to spend too much money. Should I invest in a soft box? Ive seen cheap ones but I have been put off getting one as im unsure of the quality. Were my camera settings wrong? Has anyone else tried this "home made studio" Id really appreciate any advice

Lighting shouldn't really affect your focus, at least I don't think so. Your SOOC photo is way underexposed! If you could open up your lens a little more (lower f #) that might help or you could try shooting in manual to see what would work with the lighting available then change it to a priority setting. You are right to not use your on camera flash but (I may be wrong since I'm not too familiar w/ lighting) you could always get some off camera flashes and use those!

The mom will love these pictures since they are of her baby and they aren't horrible. I personally don't like the processing style - I'd like to see a clean edit on them. The skin is a different color in every image and looks too perfect. Is the whole set processed this way? In the first one with the hat - because of the processing done it makes the hat the focus of the picture whereas the eyes should be. The babies eyes look black in all the pictures - probably brown eyes but they are super dark.

Do you mind if I play around with the original and post it here? It wont be for a little while since I'm not at my computer.

lizheaemma · Oct 13, 2011

I played with your straight out of camera pic a bit in gimp.
I think that I dodged it a tad to much, I took up the contrast a bit and smoothed out the blotchy a bit and a tiny bit of sharpening..
and brought up the reds

MTVision · Oct 13, 2011

lizheaemma said:
I played with your straight out of camera pic a bit in gimp.
I think that I dodged it a tad to much, I took up the contrast a bit and smoothed out the blotchy a bit and a tiny bit of sharpening..
and brought up the reds

Skin is still a tad dark and way too smooth IMO. The skin shouldn't be perfect on a newborn.

MTVision · Oct 13, 2011

lizheaemma said:
I played with your straight out of camera pic a bit in gimp.
I think that I dodged it a tad to much, I took up the contrast a bit and smoothed out the blotchy a bit and a tiny bit of sharpening..
and brought up the reds

I do like the edit you did the best. Much more natural looking!

lizheaemma · Oct 13, 2011

It was just a quick quick edit to let her see what she could do in gimp.

MTVision · Oct 13, 2011

lizheaemma said:
It was just a quick quick edit to let her see what she could do in gimp.

I didn't think it was bad - its just that her edited pictures have smoothed out the skin so much that the baby looks doll like.

So, here is a quick edit in Adobe Camera Raw - I adjusted the white balance (as much as I could with a JPEG), put a slight amount of negative clarity on the skin and lowered the exposure on the background since it was a lot brighter than the baby. I tried bringing back the eyes but the details in the eyes are completely gone and unrecoverable with this. From what I could get the eyes to do - I almost think the baby had blue eyes maybe? When I increased the fill light as far as it could go the eyes turned blue but looked really strange. I pretty much left the eyes alone. I did sharpen it some and it might be too much. My computer screen isn't calibrated so I tried to do the best I could!

Edit for Hayley by MT Vision Photography, on Flickr

I will take it down if you don't like it - just let me know!

arkipix1001 · Oct 13, 2011

great job hayley....

ababysean · Oct 14, 2011

They are very underexposed. Indoors you need either a nice bright window or you need to up your ISO.

How old was the baby?

I would stay away from the processing you are doing, it is very old/outdated. Keep it clean, in 20 years they will thank you for just keeping it "normal"

Here is my 2 second play in LR, adjusted white balance and exposure that is all.

ababysean · Oct 14, 2011

Newborns. » CrystalBellePhotography

all of these photos were taken in my home studio with one speedlight off camera bounced back into a 43 inch umbrella.