It’s all trickery…

A bed is a fantastic backdrop for child and baby photos.  It adds a natural feel and conjures up feelings of comfort, plus it’s bouncy and soft which babies and children love.

However a real bed can be really dangerous, especially if you’re trying to take a photo and your little one decides to crawl lightening speed to the edge. Cue tears and lots of mummy guilt.

So thats where this fab alternative comes in.  The general premise is a great idea for mums and dads to try at home and the photographers among you will be more interested in my overall set-up and lighting.

So we’ll start with the finished image, pretty cute right…

Now I’ll share the straight out of camera image, to show that the image isn’t an editing or photoshop trick..

Now finally I’ll share what the ‘bed’ and setting actually looks like…

Surprise!  Now for how I did it.

It’s such a simple set-up, I use a:

• Single mattress – this is to ensure we have some shadows at the side so it looks as though the ‘bed’ if off the ground.
• A double duvet – this gives a bit more flexibility on angles as it covers a wider area than a single duvet would.
• A couple of pillows.
• A little box that I turned upside down to give the idea of a bedside table. I put a little plant on mine to give a pop of colour, but you can use whatever you have to hand (a photo frame, a little lamp etc.)
• I have a section of wood flooring and used this as a ‘headboard’, but this is just an added extra.

For mums and dads thats all you need and you can snap away, being careful with your angles so you don’t give the game away.

For photographers I recommend:

• Shooting as wide as you can so the background has a creamy bokeh.  I shot this at 1.8.
• Set your white balance in camera using kelvin, it’s the only way to get white, whites straight out of camera.  I’ve also found that manipulating the white balance in editing never has the same results as getting it right in camera. Mine was set at 5000 and I lowered the magenta slightly, but these settings will differ depending on your light, space and camera.
• If you’re using flash, have it as close as you can and at a rough 45 degree angle so that it’s throwing light across the background. Make sure you block all other light.
• I have my shutter speed at 200 because this is the maximum I can go to with my flash, but if you’re photographing little ones jumping and can go higher then definitely do and you’ll help to avoid motion blur.

And that’s pretty much it.  I hope this was helpful and please feel free to share.

xSx