Preparing for your Newborn Session!

Yay! You’ve booked a shoot with Phoenix Productions ATL! We’re super excited to meet you and capture your special moments!

If you’re now thinking to yourself “What now?!”, let us guide you in the right direction!

Preparing for a Newborn Session

If at all possible, try keeping baby stimulated and awake an hour or so before the session; a bath usually helps in keeping them awake. We will need the baby to be asleep for a majority of the session to achieve the squishy poses you see on our site. It’s best to start on a full belly so feeding him/her right before you put them in the car seat to head my way is best. Please dress him/her in a button down (or zipper) outfit so I’m not having to pull anything over their head while undressing them. Try not put them in anything tight that will leave marks (like socks, mittens, etc.).

If your baby has jaundice or is still yellow from jaundice it is best we wait until it is out of his/her system. Jaundice is very hard to edit out of skin due to the yellow/red blotchiness it causes as it is leaving their system. Jaundice is typically gone by week 2.

Keep in mind regarding jaundice, baby acne, eczema, etc: our editing style is more natural. We perform light edits on our images. Any heavy edits may incur an additional charge.

Wondering what to bring to your session? A paci without an animal attached can help us get through a pose before eating, or pacify a baby that doesn’t want to settle. It’s also nice to bring a bottle of formula or expressed breast milk so we can feed baby during the session if necessary. Once baby has that connection with mommy in the middle of the session, it’s sometimes hard for them to get back into a deep sleep or if mommy’s milk is not in all the way baby may want to use mommy to snack and pacify frequently. If you’re exclusively breastfeeding, that’s perfectly fine. We will take breaks as we need to as the baby is always the boss in the studio. I will play a white noise machine during the session to mimic the sounds of the womb.

You can also bring small props if you would like. We have plenty of newborn props but if you have something special that you would like us to try and incorporate (like baby’s ultrasound picture, a special blanket, etc) you’re more than welcome to bring it along and we will try to incorporate it during your session.

And here are a few tips to help you look your best for poses involving the family:

• Please try to coordinate your outfits and avoid clothing with large logos, bright colors or wording.  This will distract the subject(s) in the photograph.  Here are some suggestions to help you prepare for your session:
• Choose solid colored clothing so that we can see all of your faces and no specific person will stand out in the session.
• Choose muted tones so that you are the subject and not your outfits.
• Choose similar tones for your top and bottom.  If you choose a lighter top and darker bottoms, it will make your top look larger and vice versa.
• Select a few colors with similar tones when there will be multiple people in your session or you can choose the matching look, but that is up to you.
• Choose tops with sleeves or at least to your elbow.  Your arms take up more skin area than your face and have a tendency of making your arms look larger.
• Plan your outfit days before your session so you can get plenty of rest the night before your session and are not rushing the day of your session to pull everything together.
• That being said, you could hire a professional makeup artist or stylist, set a hair and makeup appointment for the same day of your shoot, or if money is tight you can do your hair or makeup yourself or with the help of your friends and family. However you do it, just make sure that you feel beautiful. When you feel beautiful, you look beautiful!

Other than that, just prep yourself mentally. Relax. You focus on healing and adjusting to life with your little, and let us focus on the pictures. We’re going to do our best to capture moments and present images that you will want to hang up on your walls and present to the world! We’re so excited to work with you 🌻 if you have any other questions feel free to pop on over to our FAQs, or if you can’t find the answer to your question you can shoot us an email at ContactPhoenixProd@gmail.com!