It has become a tradition for many families to take some initial images of their newborn baby immediately after birth. The new baby photo session usually occurs in the first two weeks after
birth, creating timeless images of the new family member. But there are so many more moments beyond those initial images in the first year of a child’s life. This is where the “first-year collection” photo package comes in; it captures the tale of a baby’s first year of life.
Documenting Developmental Milestones
Newborn pictures show babies when they are at their tiniest. Capturing milestones during their first year shows milestones the baby accomplishes, and it also paints a story of the fast-growing changes happening as the baby gains strength, personality, and cognitive skills.
Sitting up and supported sitting shooting refers to encouraging a young child to sit upright with his or her back supported by something firm while taking photographs of him or her.
At around seven months of development, babies develop control in their neck and back muscles, which helps them sit with support. Photographic sessions at this age depict the new angle that
they are likely to view the world as they support themselves with the help of parents, props, and backdrops. Babies are more engaged with objects in these images, holding toys, smiling with
gums exposed, and staring at the camera with eyes wide open. These so-called sitter sessions are very popular among parents.
Strengthening Legs and Pulling Themselves Up
During the last months of the first year, babies begin to assume positions of sitting and standing with support by grabbing onto furniture. They often start to crawl around the environment with
lots of energy to cover some distance. Photographs at this age capture the joy of motion, their strengthening motor skills, and an increase in independence as the baby manages the set while
shooting. Crawling shoots are more informal and energetic, with funny faces, chubby legs, and hands stretched forward.
First Birthday Cake Smash
The first-year collection is incomplete without a cake smash photoshoot for the baby’s first birthday. Pre-birthday-themed shots, such as those taken right before the actual day of celebration, feature a baby and an enticing cake. Picking out your cake smash theme is so much fun and the options are endless. Your baby is dressed in a matching outfit and engages with the cake to their contentment; licking frosting, scooping up handfuls of cake, or even diving headfirst into the cake. The joy and the exaggeration of the images themselves are fantastic. Often during cake smashes we experience tears, but the photographs will showcase all the emotions!
Capturing Personality & Expression
However, first-year collections do not only capture physical achievements; they also display a baby’s unique personality developments and new facial expressions. Periodically, capturing the baby
over the first month and then the first year demonstrates his/her unique and rapidly evolving character. Parents watch their previously calm and docile baby grow into a reacting, signaling,
fully-fledged member of nature. Laughing pictures depict silly looks, facial expressions, and gestures when a baby is amused or angry. These photos help portray each baby as a unique
individual.
Special Occasions
First-year birthdays are a common way of celebrating. Still, there are other traditional and non-traditional events that happen before or after a baby gets home from the hospital. Some of the
first holiday occurrences, including Halloween, Thanksgiving, religious occasions, and monthly changes in seasons, also produce memorable photographic moments with the baby as the subject.
Remembering the baby’s first costume, meeting with Santa, playing with the autumn leaves, or first time seeing snow are all moments you will want to capture.
Lifestyle Family Sessions
Although formal, professional photoshoots are meaningful and capture a specific moment in the lives of families; many parents also enjoy having fun and capturing a more natural, behind-the-scenes view of the daily shenanigans with a new baby at home. Lifestyle family sessions are done at your house, the park, the zoo, and any other places where a baby spends his/her time and produces a photojournalistic documentary look.
Glimpses of baby cuddling with family members, parents giving the little one a bath, making funny faces while eating, gazing at the beauty of nature, and other real-life experiences can be captured in images. There’s something so raw, so genuine about photos where life doesn’t seem to make any sense, but where all the love and play happens anyway.
Conclusion
The average newborn photo session results in cute photographs of the dozing baby during the first days of life. First-year collections travel a long way to capture the fast-growing little person and his/her significant physical development, growing personality, and family activities that make the first twelve months of the baby’s life so unique. These carefully designed and photographed sets create a high-end photo album that will be cherished for generations. Still, isn’t that the truth of life – the days are long, but the years are short – and suddenly, you find yourself raising an active, chatty, never-stopping toddler out of a once-tiny newborn? First-year collections freeze time in the form of photographs.
