What I have learnt as a photographer about the 'older' babies.
If you have ever had to book a newborn photoshoot then you will have noticed that we typically try to get you booked in within the first two weeks after baby is born. Yes, going by the dictionary, a baby is considered newborn up to about two months old. But for the purposes of photography, twenty one days is about the limit of what we call a newborn, why is this? Well, simply put, up to then the babies still generally like being curled up snug, wrapped up tight and tucked in. Even when awake they don't tend to move much, so it is a whole lot easier (less stressful) to get those gorgeously cute images that we all love.
Older babies then are those over one month old, but most often the three and four month old babies, who for whatever reason may have missed out on getting newborn photos.
I don't turn clients away simply because their baby is 'too old' for a newborn photoshoot. We just need to be a little bit realistic about what photos are possible to capture and which poses we will be lucky to get. This age is wonderful in that your baby will almost certainly have their eyes open and we can catch them looking (and hopefully smiling) at the camera. They are learning to hold their head up and will be trying to roll over, both wonderful things to capture in photographs, and the babies generally enjoy a little bit of tummy time. As long as we are quick and move on to something else before they get bored. Because babies this age have the attention span of a goldfish! A noisy toy may get them to look in the right direction a couple of times, but then you need a different toy with a different noise, as the first one is no longer interesting.
While they are awake you can loosely pose them on their back or side and get lovely natural images. You can also wrap them up, which helps to keep their fly-away hands and feet inside the frame, but babies this age all seem to be master escape artists and can wriggle out of most any wrap. Or you can pop them in a prop, suitably padded of course, which will also contain them for a few moments. (Just make sure there is always someone right beside them for safety.)
But if you have mountains of patience, a well fed baby, and a decent sprinkling of luck, then they fall asleep! This is where you can pose them in some of the simpler traditional newborn poses. Which results in absolutely adorable images. This is where knowing if your baby has regular feeds and nap times is useful, as you can take some awake shots, then give a feed and get some asleep posed shots. The best of both worlds. However that does take a lot of time so can only be done in a full length photo session rather than a shorter baby only session.
I do have oodles of patience and my greatest (photographic) achievement to date was the successful posing of a four week old baby with a one year old toddler. Photo below :)
