How-To Maternity Photography: Focus on Emotions & Relationships
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As we’ve been talking about throughout this How-To Maternity Photography series, your task as the photographer is to make the mom-to-be feel as comfortable and as beautiful as possible. We’ve explored various ways to do this so far, including timing your photo shoot just right, offering tips for beautiful poses, and keeping the compositions clean and simple.
Today we highlight yet another avenue of making your client look and feel great by focusing on the emotional connection she has with her coming baby and the relationships she has with her family.
Let’s begin!
Capture Those Emotions
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There are a wide range of emotions that a pregnant woman goes through over the course of her term. Obviously, some of those emotions aren’t ones you want to capture in your photos! Instead, our goal here is to focus on the happiness and the love inherent in the process. This can take a variety of forms: on the one hand, as discussed in our articles on posing, you can have mom focus on her growing belly to demonstrate the connection she has with the baby to be. Bring greater attention to this connection by framing a shot tightly on mom.
Alternatively, you can compose a few shots in which you highlight the emotions of mom with her existing family and friends. Showing the love they have for one another, and the love that the family has for the coming baby, can result in a sweet, emotion-filled photo that your client will cherish for a lifetime, like the image above.
Highlight Relationships
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Though pregnancy can sometimes feel like a one woman show, it’s important that mom feel supported and that her family and friends take part in her maternity photo shoots. Of course, adding others into the shoot, especially other children, can be a tricky situation because you’ll need to direct kids that may or may not feel like posing for the camera.
The approach to working family and friends into a maternity shoot is to keep it as fun and as succinct as possible. You should take this approach anyway, but certainly, with kids in the mix, the quicker you work, the more likely it is that the kids will be happy!
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When it comes to composing the shot, working with a group is a whole different animal than working with an individual. In fact, couples photos can take on a life of their own as well. So, in some instances, you’ll likely have to work with what they give you. But, as seen above, you can often capture intimate, candid moments that make for gorgeous photos if you continue to shoot between formal takes.
But, if you have a couple or a group that’s taking direction well, focus on things that help highlight their relationships - eye contact, hand holding, touching mom’s belly, and so on, are excellent choices. As noted above, tight framing can help enhance the emotional effect. And, as discussed in our article on simple compositions, minimizing distractions in the frame can also help viewers hone in on the relationship of the people in the shot.
Dial Up the Emotion With Accessories
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A critical aspect of being able to document the emotional and relational aspect of pregnancy is helping mom overcome some of the less-than-desirable aspects of maternity. She’ll be tired. She might be bloated. She could very well just not feel all that ready to be photographed.
But, as we all know, the right wardrobe and accessories can make you feel rejuvenated. And, once mom feels her best, those happy and exciting emotions you want to see will more easily come forth.
Though there are plenty of choices for maternity clothing and accessories for your photo shoots, we can’t give Sew Trendy Accessories a more enthusiastic recommendation. Just look at the gowns and crowns featured in the images in this article - for mom and little girls alike, items from Sew Trendy bring a sweetness and beauty to the photo shoot that is prime for photographing emotion-filled scenes. Help mom take her mind off of how much her back hurts and how much weight she’s gained by recommending outfitting herself at Sew Trendy Accessories. She won’t regret it, and neither will you.