In 2012 I was primarily photographing weddings, families, and high school seniors. A sweet former wedding couple asked me to come to their home and photograph their newborn. I was scared! I had never done that before but I jokingly thought “how hard could it be?” Boy was I wrong!

While I had been trained in photography and knew what I was doing, I had no idea about the angles and special rules needed for newborn photography. Everything I knew was opposite to make sure baby was perfectly lit and posed.

I left their session - five hours later (!!!) - and I knew right then that I wanted to be the best at this. It was HARD and I was going to do everything I could do to learn more.

I enrolled in newborn photography classes and experienced workshops specifically for posing babies. Back then you still learned from textbooks, too. The education has grown and developed so much since then, and there are more resources available than I could have ever imagined.

My advice to anyway wanting to explore newborn photography is to do it the right way - research local mentors and invest in training with them. Someone’s baby is NOT a learning tool. There are many educators for newborn photography sessions in Charlotte NC.