[Newborn] Harry

On 03.01.13 I got the chance to meet Laura & Martin's new little boy Harry. Born on 21st December 2012,  we scheduled their newborn shoot in as soon as we could after the festivities.

Harry's big brother Jack came along for the shoot too - then Harry was 13 days old - and just look at the cute scrumminess of them both!

I asked Laura & Martin if they would mind answering a few questions about their shoot - in the hope to help other mummies and daddies who are looking at having a Newborn Shoot with Blue Lights Photography.

What kind of look were you going for in your photographs?
We wanted some pictures of our newborn, with his big brother.

How was your experience during your session?
Fantastic. I would definitely recommend to friends.

What's one piece of advice you'd give to other parents having a session including their other children?
Consider taking along a toy or two to occupy your older children whilst your newborn has their individual shots.

Any tips on what to bring?
A few spare nappies and feeds to help settle them.

What were you most anxious, nervous or fearful about prior to your session, and what was the outcome?
I was a little nervous about our newborn not settling well for pictures. Adele was absolutely fantastic working with our children and knew how to reassure them and guide them into the poses. Our newborn settled straight away and didn't mind what so ever.

If you are looking to book a newborn photoshoot - then please remember you are best to book in before your little one arrives, to guarantee a space in the diary! x

To book please call Adele on 01226 872 491 or email adele@bluelightsphotography.co.uk

[Studio] Olly

This is from a studio session before Christmas. Here we have Olly! I'm photographing his Mummy's Wedding in May! :)

Dont forget I'm moving away from the white background photography! 

[Tutorial] Making a PDF in photoshop

Now, I work a lot of the time in Photoshop CS5 and Adobe Bridge. I do not like Lightroom but its just personal preference. This is how I make my PDF's. 

Now for those of  you who don't use Photoshop Bridge, it is similar to lightroom apparently, however its also not like it at all. This is where you can do your PDFs, and comes with Photoshop, and you don't have to pay extra for it! You can find your folder that your images are in, whether desktop, external drive, or any other drive - just by finding them like you would in "my computer"

In the folder I have the origoinal template, and then my template PSD files also. I do not save as JPEG at this point, as I will keep going back and making certain tweaks before I make my PDF.

Then I run a batch action in photoshop to flatten the files, and create JPEGs of all my templates into a seperate folder....

And here is where the PDF creation begins...

I've currently been working in the Essentials workspace, but now I'm going to change over to the Output...this is how to make the PDF. 

I select my files, I click Output, and it comes up with this screen. Perfect.

On the Right hand side of the screen, it has all the details which are relevent to making a PDF. Paper size, etc. (This is also good for making contact sheets too!)

This is the default in my Photoshop, so we are down as A4 paper size, at 300ppi, 2*2 cells, as this isnt actually what we want we can change it. We can change from A4 to A5 or A6 to make it smaller, and even change the ppi from 300 down to 72, however I find that 150 is generally a good size to use.

So this is the changes that I made, That I made the differences to the size of it, the ppi etc. And I also made sure that it was 1 per page. In this i made it 96ppi, but would have been better quality at 150ppi.

Save it how you want to, and where you want to save it....and voila. Your PDF brochure is complete.

Hope you found it helpful - comments are welcome!

[Tips] Cropping and Sizes

One of the things I get asked quite often from clients, is when a photograph is ordered - why is it cropped. This is something I discuss at the viewing, but not everyone remembers. Sometimes when you pick an image, and then you want it in a different size, sometimes a little bit may get cut off.

Lets have a look for instance at this image of Phoebe.

This is the image straight out of the camera the size the camera took it. You can see everything in it.

If you decide you want a 7x5 Print of this photograph,
you can see the dark bit which gets cut off. 

And with a 10x8 and 20x16 you generally get the same/similar amount "cut off" too.

This last one is cropped to a 20x30, which keeps all of it in.

Cropping ratio's generally mean that sometimes photographers can offer funny sizes like 9x6, or 12x8 which can be hard to find frames to fit. So you are best to remember if you want "all" the picture in, you need to choose a size that you are happy with

 - or be happy with the crop!

[2012] My Amazing Couples

I want to thank all my brides for 2012, who booked me and allowed me to share your special day.

This year saw me start the Wedding "season" at Kings Croft Hotel in February, and then end in December at The Bridge Inn.

My most photographed venue's this year were Rogerthorpe Manor, and Tankersley Manor, where I photographed 5 Weddings at each venue! One weekend in May I had two weddings the same weekend at Tankersley Manor!

I also photographed at Venue's that I've never photographed before.
Leeds Town Hall & City Centre, Wentbridge House Hotel, Hickleton Golf Club, Rock Inn, Hemswell Court and Hellaby Hall.

I also photographed more church weddings than previous years!

I'm looking forward to seeing what 2013 has to bring!