Welcome, Lilly! – Behind the scenes : Raleigh, NC Newborn Photography

Ever look at one of my pictures or well any experienced newborn photographer for that matter and think – how did they do that?  The fact is that there is a lot of magic that goes into the post processing of the images and sometimes it is to keep the baby safe but also get the final result that we are hoping for.

At Lilly’s at home newborn session in Chapel Hill recently just that happened.  The parents requested one of my newest offerings – the flower hoop.  Since we were doing this at their home I knew that I wouldn’t have all the studio stuff with me and since it was warm we elected to do the photo outside.  That way I had a little bit more control over the background and shooting natural light it took some of the studio lighting variables out of the equation.

Here are a series of the images and steps that I used to get the final product from her newborn session flower hoop image!

~Enjoy!~

Rebecca

We first start with the 3 images I used to make the composite.  Notice that the only one that has the baby actually in it, mom is right there so if Lilly decides to wake up or roll she is right there to get her and calm her back to sleep. Safety!

 

Next this is the empty hoop on a layer over the background image of just the scene when I didn’t have anything else in the frame including the hoop.  I have lowered the opacity on the hoop so that I can see the background better and make sure I get the right placement.

Here the opacity is brought up and I am erasing some of the layer to show the background layer as opposed to the layer associated with the hoop.  This helps with blending to make it more believable.

Now I add in the layer with the baby.  I actually crop and manipulate the image quite a bit to make sure she is appropriately sized to fit in the hoop.  It makes it so that she looks sized correctly in comparison to the scene.

Blending and moving Lilly in the scene so it is believable.

All layers are at full opacity and brought to the front.  This editing is all the editing that is done before I adjust for exposure, color, clarity and my special little touches.

Final image