DO YOU WANT BEAUTIFUL PHOTOS OF YOU AND YOUR BABY?

It doesn’t matter how beautiful people say you are, most women are self-conscious when they are being photographed. This is particularly true for new mums and seeing what our bodies go through during pregnancy, of course we understand why. No need to list what part of our bodies we might not feel comfortable with, it’s different for every one of us, but I always encourage new Mums to have their photo taken whilst with me. 

 I am going to share a little story with you. When I was pregnant with my son, my Mum took plenty of photos of me pregnant and the first few weeks after I had given birth. I hated the photos of how I looked, and I tore them up, now my son doesn’t have any pictures to look back on of us together. Back in the 90’s all photos were on film, so the prints were all you had.

What a shame that I felt like that, because now I would love to look back on those photos, regardless of how I felt I looked. I want to see those first few weeks of me holding my son, even with my bad “Rachel” from friends hair cut!

I now realise how important self-love is for not just you, but your children as well. It might be a long and challenging journey towards loving our new bodies and ourselves in general, and that’s fine, but in the meantime, we need to learn to love who we are, and capture those memories for your children, if not for you.

If you wanted to book a newborn or family session with me and you said “But it’s just for the kids, I don’t want to be in the photos, I would give you the following advice (these can also work for your everyday family snapshots)

If you don’t do it for you, do it for them

Imagine your child in 10 years’ time looking through a family album and not finding any photos of you in it. Now, picture your child looking at a photo of you looking at him/her with a smile on your face and love in your eyes. Which situation do you think will make them feel loved and as part of a family?

You don’t have anything to loose

Getting a picture taken with you in it doesn’t mean you have to print it on a big canvas, hang it in your living room and look at it every day. Chances are you will actually treasure a portrait showing you holding your tiny baby or playing with your child, but if it’s not the case, don’t buy it / print it.

Angles are a powerful way to shift the focus

My job as a professional photographer is to use different angles and crops so that you end up loving a photo with you in it. I want you to fall in love with a portrait capturing your relationship with your baby or child, even if we can’t see your whole body in it.

Just be yourself!

Think of the session as quality time with your family, enjoy the moment and let me do the work. Whether it is a professional photographer like me or your husband taking the photos you can be photographed doing daily activities with your children: feeding, playing, reading a book, etc.

Children love to see pictures of their parents

Reason 1 said that if you didn’t do it for you, you could do it for your children and show them how loved they were. But this is different: our children will love to look at those photos in years to come and will be amazed at how young we looked, what clothes we wore and what activities we used to do with them.

It will send you back in time

Looking at pictures of your children on their own will make you smile and make you proud. Looking at photos of you with your children will bring back the emotions you felt at that particular time of their life and who would not want a time machine?

Capture the family unit

It doesn’t have to be a posed shot of everybody smiling at the camera (it can!) but it is an important photo to have, printed & framed, on the mantel piece.

So please… Whether it’s with me, another professional photographer or your mother, get in front of the camera and enjoy it! Your children will never look at them saying “I wish you waited until you lost a bit more weight” and you might be surprised and actually love and cherish those images years from now.

Also,  get them printed!!

Technology is not always reliable (or like me you might rip the photos up) and those memories are not replaceable. So always backup your photos AND print your favourites so you actually get to look at them.

If you would like to get in touch and book your photos in, please do

Jo x