Aizah: Newborn/Family Session

Hey Everyone!

This will be my first blog post featured on my new Facebook page. Be sure to drop by and “like” it: www.facebook.com/jvlphotographyofnova

I want to thank Sana and Aamir for trusting me to take their newborn photos with precious, little Aizah.  It was the requests to  “hire” me from friends like Sana that helped encourage me to get this photo business up and running.  Sana has always been special to Irum and I, as we trusted her to watch over Cooper and Ezra for the first years of their lives. 

I’m not going to lie, newborn photography is hard!  And, it requires lots of stuff: softboxes, Alien Bee lights, backdrop frames, beanbags, flash remotes, blankets, wraps, bonnets and all sorts of props.  Here’s a really bad pic of some of that stuff from the first time I tried setting it all up in my living room.

Most importantly, newborn photography requires patience!  These types of shoots can last several hours, especially for a newbie like me.  There are lots of variables like setup time, feedings, diapers, wardrobe changes, and the time that it takes to pose the baby, which has to be done, preferably, without waking the baby; it’s always easiest to pose a newborn when they are fast asleep.  Aizah was super cute and very well behaved, but she wasn’t very sleepy (until right after we wrapped up, of course).  We were able to get her to sleep eventually and take some shots but I wasn’t really sure that we were getting the shots we needed.  Honestly, when I left Sana’s I was thinking that newborn photography might not be for me.

When we got home, I had to download the photos immediately to see what I had.  Once I saw the images on my desktop, I felt much better and got excited to get into the editing phase.  The editing for these shots was very involved as well.  The shoot itself took about three hours, counting setup and packing up afterward.  The editing was probably nine to twelve hours.  Typically, most of my editing involves adjusting tone, brightness and cropping the images, which I do in Abobe Lightroom.  I rarely need to wade into Adobe Photoshop.  This wasn’t the case for Aizah’s photos as the fine details are so important in newborn photography.  The healing brush in Photoshop became my new best friend and I think it made a huge difference in these photos.  Here are some of my favorites:

And here are some of my favorite family shots:

Thanks again to Sana and Aamir for giving me this opportunity!  It was a great learning experience for me and I was really happy with the shots that I got.  I hope that they love them too!  If you, or someone that you know is looking for a newborn photographer in Loudoun, Fairfax or anywhere in the Northern Virginia area, please share this page with them and have them contact me.  From now through the end of the year, I’ll be offering newborn photography for $250, which is a steal.  You get all of your fully edited, high resolution images to keep and print/share as you like.