The surreal world of making infant portraits

I hadn't stepped foot in a portrait studio since my senior year of high school before today. But, in addition to the literally thousands of digital photos of Gillian we have already taken, I naturally thought we needed some professional ones too. One of my RPMs recommended a place called "portrait innovations"-a place that has no sitting fee, and a package deal including one 10x13, two 8x10s, four 5x7s, 8 4x6s, and four sheets of wallets, all for the bargain price of $9.95!! Of course, what they are banking on is that you, so in love with your photogenic angel, will want well more than a single pose. I mean, how could you not??

See, this is a brilliant marketing scheme-take high quality, digital images, and LOTS of them. Take as many as the baby can stand to sit for. As many good ones as possible so mom and dad walk out with as many "have to have" poses as possible. No skin off their back-they aren't developing film or anything. Just pulling out the memory card, putting up your 75 photos to choose from on a giant screen, and you're off. They say things like "you can change her clothes as much as you want" and toward the end "are you SURE you don't want to take any more poses??"(since Gillian started grabbing her head with both hands and looking distressed (a brand new thing), the answer was a resounding YES)... And each pose is $16.50 for "3 sheets". And you can't buy just a 5x7 of a pose. You have to buy a whole package. Hence us paying a lot more than $9.95 for her first trip to the photo studio.

I can't imagine working there every day. You should have seen and heard them trying to make Gillian laugh-high pitched shrieking shrill squeaking and jabbing at the baby's belly to try to get a smile out of them. While we were there, three other babies came in, so there is a whole lot of squeaking and jabbing all day long. Sounds a lot like how I would imagine hell to be-noisy, painful, and crowded. I think those people must go home hoarse after a couple of days in a row working with all the vocal acrobatics. I found myself disturbed and wondering, really wondering, if someone could actually like working there. Perhaps that is why most of the employees look like they are seniors in high school-they aren't jaded yet, and have a lot more energy than someone ten years older. They are capable of making sounds like that all day and not losing their sanity.

Then there are the poses. When a baby is three months old, there are lots of tricks to getting them posed since they can't sit up on their own. So, they support her with a boppy over a blanket, or have someone hold her under the blanket, all the while everyone is acting like nutjobs trying to get the prize-a precious smile. And the backgrounds. The only reason we didn't get the one with a cloud background is because Sean was convinced it made Gillian look like the smiling baby-faced sun in the Telletubbies. Which begs the question-how does Sean know what the sun in Telletubbies look like, anyway? Does he have a secret side I don't know about? (actually, I find out things I don't know about him all the time, so that wouldn't be so strange). So, there are all kinds of corny backgrounds you can put the baby in front of. Even tackier-there is a little motorcycle you can have them pose on or next to (one of many nauseating backdrops you can choose). There were lots of unsettling display pictures of little girls that made me quite sure that Gillian will not be wearing makeup for photos (or at all) for the next 15 years.

We opted for no background in the end. And we love that we captured her sweet little face in this moment of her life with good lighting, a nice camera, and as Roxanne said "enough pictures to plaster a wall with". It was soooo worth it. Amen, sister.