My favorite baby photography tips when shooting on white background

You want to take beautiful newborn and baby photos, but you don’t know where to start. It can be really hard, especially if you’re a beginner. You probably wonder what light is best- natural or studio light? What gear to choose? Camera, lenses, light, macro filters. It gets even harder if you want to shoot on white background. White background is amazing, brings focus to your subject and takes away all the unnecessary noise. However, sometimes you can find yourself frustrated with the whites not looking really white. Or the background looks kind of white but the colors are flat and dull. I have been there and I can understand the frustration.

Here are some of my favorite baby photography tips when shooting on white:

1. Play with your camera. Adjust your camera settings for the perfect shot, try different white balance, shutter speed, f.stop. Just play with the setting & see what looks best. Use a toy, your kids or a plant to practice.

2. Set the white balance to achieve the most natural skin color. I always recommend shooting a little warmer. It’s  easier to fix  warmer skin color vc cool. Trust me on that!

3. Try to keep your shooting space in natural colors. White would be the ideal scenario but its not necessary.

4. Exposure – I recommend keeping the photos a little underexposed. To be honest the exposure should be correct in the camera already, but if you don’t feel confident yet, or you simply don’t know how to achieve the perfect

exposure- shooting a little darker will save the highlights in your photo. If you over expose the photo, then there is no coming back from it. This is especially useful with pale babies.

5. Color cast –  you adjusted the camera setting for the perfect baby’s skin color, but you can see color casts on the background. Don’t worry, this can be easily corrected in post editing.

6. Levels or Curves layers- they both work magic in post processing. Personally I am a big fan of the levels layer although some other photographers swear by curves. They both will do the job!

7. Contrast – add a little contrast if your image is flat. This will bring it to life and add more depth to the entire image.

8. Try to keep the light source, either a window or studio light,  to your side. Do not shoot with the light source behind your back. This will make your subject to look very flat

9. Have your clients wearing white/ ivory or neutral color outfits fir their baby session. The less color cast they will throw on the background, the easier the editing later!

10. Finally print your photos! What you see on the screen can look different on paper. Having properly calibrated monitor is a huge difference in the final product.

Also if you don’t have an access to  a white room  or white studio, you can simply invest in a seamless paper and create your own white room to shoot in. You can find the white background HERE

And if you would like to check another session shot on a white background simply check my PORTFOLIO

Hope that helps! If you are interested in learning more about my baby photography tips I offer 1:1 mentoring session with me don’t hesitate to get in touch. I can show you exactly how I shoot, my space, gear I use, settings and finally all my editing tricks.