Queer Newborn Photographer Across the UK

Two mums booked me for a session at home in Leeds when their daughter was nine days old. About two hours in, one of them asked me fairly quietly whether she should be in any of these.

She hadn’t carried and wasn’t feeding, and she’d spent nine days being the one who answered the door and made everybody tea. Nobody had pointed a camera at her yet. That included me.

Booking a queer newborn photographer in the UK mostly comes down to whether somebody has already thought about that question before you have to ask it out loud.

A newborn session has a default shape, and the default shape has one parent in it.

The window is shorter than people expect

Traditional newborn photography aims for somewhere between day five and day fourteen. Babies that age still curl into the shapes people associate with newborn pictures, and they sleep through most of what anyone asks of them.

After about three weeks that changes. You can photograph a four week old and plenty of families do, but you’re making a different kind of picture by then.

Which means the booking conversation happens while you’re waiting rather than after the baby arrives. Most photographers hold a rough slot around a due date instead of a fixed day.

Who gets handed the baby

A standard newborn session gets one thing badly wrong for a lot of the families I photograph. The template assumes one parent gave birth and the other one turns up in the final twenty minutes for a picture on the sofa.

So I split the time on purpose. Each parent gets their own stretch alone with the baby, shot exactly the same way, and neither of you has to ask me for it.

Nobody should have to negotiate for a photograph of themselves holding their own child.

When your family didn’t arrive on a due date

Adoption doesn’t run to a nine month calendar. Families I’ve worked with have had days of notice rather than months, and the child who comes home isn’t always small enough to curl up in somebody’s hands.

Surrogacy carries its own timings again, often with travel attached and a first week that happens a long way from your own house.

If either of those is your situation, book late and book loosely. Photographers who work with queer families are used to a phone call that opens with “can you come this week”.

Across the UK, because the travel runs the other way

Newborn sessions happen at your house, since a nine day old and a car park make a poor combination. So the travel question works backwards from most shoots. Your photographer comes to you.

The roster is densest in London, and there are photographers working out of Manchester, Bristol, Glasgow and Brighton who cover their own regions. If nobody sits near you, a London photographer will usually travel with the cost of getting there added on, which is worth asking about before you rule it out entirely.

For families further along than this, I’ve written about how the same thing works with older children in the piece on LGBTQ family photography across the UK.

What actually happens in those three hours

Newborn sessions run long and most of that time isn’t photography. Babies feed and get changed and then fall asleep at precisely the wrong moment.

Plan for two to three hours and treat anything quicker as a bonus. The room wants to be warmer than you’d normally keep it, somewhere around twenty four degrees, because a cold baby won’t settle and skin to skin pictures need a room where nobody is shivering.

Wear what you’d have worn anyway. The pictures families keep from these sessions are almost never the posed ones.

Whether any of it ends up online

Every photographer will ask permission to use client work somewhere, and you’re allowed to refuse all of it.

For a fair number of the families I photograph that isn’t a small question. Not everyone is out to every relative, and a picture of two dads holding a newborn sitting on a public portfolio reaches people you may not have told yet, in an order you didn’t choose.

Raise it at the booking stage and get the answer written into the contract rather than agreed in a text message you’ll never find again.

What it costs

Sessions through queer.photo usually start around £500, and newborn work tends to sit above a standard portrait booking because of the hours involved and the drive to your door.

Every photographer sets their own rate and publishes it on their profile, so you can compare before you enquire rather than after. If you’re booking while pregnant, ask what happens when the baby comes early or late, because that answer varies far more between photographers than the price does.

Choosing the right fit

Ask to see a full newborn session rather than a best-of set.

What you’re looking for is whether both parents appear the whole way through, or whether one of them only surfaces near the end. A portfolio edit hides that. A full gallery can’t.

Read a couple of photographer profiles before you enquire, or start with the portrait work if you’d rather see pictures first.

If you’re still pregnant, the maternity piece covers the shoot that comes before this one.

Common questions

When should a newborn session happen?

Most newborn photography happens between day five and day fourteen, while babies still curl up and sleep deeply. You can photograph an older baby, but the pictures look different.

Do you travel outside London for newborn shoots?

Yes. Newborn sessions take place at your home, and the queer.photo roster includes photographers covering Manchester, Bristol, Glasgow and Brighton as well as London. A photographer will usually travel further with the cost of getting there added on.

How much does a queer newborn photographer in the UK cost?

Sessions usually start around £500, and newborn work often sits above a standard portrait booking because of the hours and the travel involved. Every photographer sets their own rate, shown on their profile.

Will both parents be in the photographs?

Yes. A session should give each parent their own time alone with the baby, shot the same way, without either of you having to ask for it.

Can we book if we are adopting?

Yes, and you can book at short notice. Photographers who work with queer families are used to arranging a session in the week a child comes home.

How long does a newborn session take?

Plan for two to three hours. Most of that goes on feeding and settling the baby rather than on photography.

Ready when you are. See portrait options, or find a photographer.