An up and coming super model

[Patricia Joyce]

I think I read somewhere that it is good to wait until a baby is six months old. One more month to go and I can start a portrait drawing on my granddaughter!!

So I am practicing!! Still a little blurry, but this was a "grab your camera, she is smiling alot"!!!

[Patricia Joyce]

I wonder if any of you could direct to a forum thread or if you have advice for photographing babies for portraits. My kids are really bugging me for a portrait and I keep putting them off (they don't understand). But it wouldn't hurt to begin experimenting. This shot is in natural light, she was about 12 feet from a large picture window. I was about five feet from her, probably too close. Her ear looks bigger than it is.

If I had an idea of how to "set up" a small baby, I would set up my tripod and try a few things next time I am babysitting. Any suggestions???

Thanks
Pat

[Mike McCarty]

It's not easy making these babies look like anything other than Groucho Marx. Here are a few attempts that I've made in the past. These are all window light. I think it's best that you wait until they around two years. This two year old was at twenty thousand feet in an airline seat.

[Patricia Joyce]

I see what you mean. Babies do not have a neck and their shoulders are so narrow that they end up looking like a bigger than life head sticking out of some material.

I really like the last shot of the two year old, though. How sweet. that natural light is perfect!