For starters, if you send us a blurry, grainy, dark or badly lit photograph of your baby, then your announcement will reflect these flaws. We do not want that! So here are some tips that we hope will help you capture the perfect photograph(s). One of our best pieces of wisdom is to keep it simple. Keep your baby as the focus of your photo, and avoid anything busy in your photo, including clothing colors, background and distracting objects. Keep the focus on your beautiful baby!
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VERY IMPORTANT: Required photo resolution and file format for sending photos
Ideally, we need a 1200x1800 pixel image to get the best quality for
your 4-inch x 6-inch print (at 300dpi). A higher resolution is even
better! A lower resolution may work for a collage design, which incorporates several smaller size photos. To check the resolution of your photo(s), use our Photo Submission Requirements Check page. If using a digital camera, set your camera to the
highest resolution possible (Please refer to your owner's manual for more information about setting the resolution on your camera). If you still have questions or concerns as to whether your photo(s) will work, we'd be happy to take a look at your photo(s) prior to ordering, by e-mailing photo(s) to us at customerservice@instylecards.com with your question in the body of the e-mail. Please save your files to either JPG, TIFF or PSD format before sending them to us. Also, please make sure your e-mail program does not try to automatically resize your photo(s) if you e-mail your photo(s). Following these resolution and file format guidelines will ensure the highest quality card. More info on how to send your photos...
Lighting
Use natural light if possible--either outdoors or coming in through a window. But avoid bright, direct sunlight. You especially want to have good lighting around your baby's face to prevent shadows on the face. You also can use a flash along with lamps or bright lights, again being careful to avoid shadows. You may be surprised that cloudy, overcast days provide ideal lighting for pictures of babies. On overcast days, the soft light flatters faces. Indoors, try turning off the flash and use light coming in from a window to give your baby a soft, almost glowing appearance.
Focus
Focus on your baby's eyes. Check your manual for instructions on how to focus your camera. Photos that are out of focus may be blurry, which we can not fix. Blurry photos may also be caused by shooting too close or movement by you or the baby while shooting the photo. If you are getting a lot of blurry photos, try stepping back, and read your camera's user manual on focusing and optimal close-up distance to shoot from. We will not be able to use a blurry photo. Often times, if you are looking at the photo from a digital camera, you won't notice how blurry it is. In fact, we had to make this photo rather large to imitate what it would actually looklike in print. If in doubt about a photo, check your photos by zooming in on them. If it lacks sharp features such as the blurry photo does, as compared to the nice, sharp photo on the left, please find a sharper photo to replace a blurry photo.
Dressing your baby
As some of our birth announcements will attest, sometimes a naked baby on his or her tummy, or a baby in just a diaper is adorable! When choosing clothing, choose light colored, minimally patterned clothing. We do offer handcoloring, so you may want to choose clothing with a hint of color. Of course, we can handcolor any clothing, any color, so it's not necessary to include color in the clothing; we can add it for you. Please avoid dark colors.
Use a simple background
An uncluttered background focuses attention on the baby, resulting in a stronger photo. Place your baby on a light-colored, plain, non-distracting background. A light colored blanket is perfect. However, if you want a black background for your baby's photo, as shown on several of our designs, you want a true black. You can pick up a large piece of fabric of any color at your local fabric store fairly inexpensively. You can also buy flowers at crafts stores to achieve some of the handcolored studio portrait looks you see in our design gallery. Tulle is availabe at fabric stores and adds a very soft, professional look to a photo.
Get close, but maybe not too close
This is a very important section to read-- a lot of tips, and even a tool to assist you.
Keep in mind the design you want to order. Some designs need space around the baby to place text over. But for some of the collage designs, tight closeups are great, but leave some room for cropping. Please refer to your owners manual for your camera's closest focusing distance and which camera settings work best for closeups.
This brings us to cropping, probably one of the number one problems we face with photos (other than getting the original, uncropped photos). Often times, a customer orders a design with, lets say, 3 horizontal photos. But they send in 3 very tight, close-up vertical photos, which if we did crop them horizontal, we would cut off a head or something very important to the photo. Keep in mind, when matching photos to a design, the orientation of the photos needed for the designs photo area dimensions. It's not that a vertical photo cannot be cropped square or horizontal...but look at your photos and envision what a particular crop would include or lose in your photo. Click here for a great cropping tool that allows you to upload an image and then move crop arrows at top, bottom, left and right. You can take any photo, and see what a square, vertical or horizontal crop would look like. Without our actual dimensions for a photo area, which are not fixed anyways, because our designs are not quick paste-in template based. We have flexibility to some degree regarding the crops we can use in a design, given the room allowed for photos and text. If you use the tool, try taking a see-through piece of paper over a design of ours and trace the photo area. Then upload your photo to the cropping tool, and play with the cropping bars until you think you have a close match to the crop dimensions in the design. You might also hold that piece of paper over the screen with your crop in view and adjust accordingly. If you get the crop you love, you can download it to your computer, and send it to us along with your original uncropped photo. It's a wonderful tool. I think it will also help customers get a better understanding of cropping. Please check it out, and if you found it helpful, please let us know in the email that you send to us to submit your photos.
Capture various emotions
A smirk, a frown, a cry, a sleeping baby. Capture all the emotions, not just the pretty smiles.
Include other people in your photos
Capture others with the baby, such as a sibling, or one or both parents. One of the cutest photos we've seen is of mom and dad kissing both cheeks, one on each side, which shows only the profiles of the parents, and the baby's face all smirked up from being squeezed between the kisses. Be creative!
Try different angles
- Shooting at the baby's eye level
- Prop the baby over someone's shoulder with just face resting on shoulder facing to the back of the person, and arms kind of hanging over the person's back (with a dark shirt on the other person works best)
- Line up multiple babies on the sofa
- Stand at a higher level and shoot down at the baby in the crib or bassinet
- Try taking photos at 45 and 90 degree angles from the baby
- Lay baby on tummy with head turned toward the camera. Hands up close to baby's face is always adorable
Take lots of pictures!
We've taken upwards of 100 photos to get 5 great photographs. This is pretty easily done with a digital camera these days. Sometimes you can take a whole roll of film to get one great photograph. It may take some time, practice, and creativity to get the perfect photo(s), but once you see your final birth announcement design, you'll agree it was all worth it.
The Film and The Camera
The best type of film to use is 200 or 400 speed film. Anything higher will be too grainy. Use a camera that has a lens that will focus. Please do not use a disposable camera.
Can I send a professional photograph?
If you are sending a professional photograph, please be sure to include a signed release from the photographer allowing us to reproduce the photograph.
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