What is birth photography?

Things you need to know.

For decades, birth took place in a private realm. Separated from support, a woman often gave birth with only medical professionals by her side. However, in the last few decades, huge strides have led to a much more mother-centered birth experience. In most birthing spaces, women are allowed to birth with whoever they wish in attendance…and many women are choosing to bring a professional photographer into the birth room. 

But just because it’s happening doesn’t mean it’s common. You’ll find many people who will express a degree of shock when you tell them you’re having a birth photographer. “You mean you actually want pictures of THAT?” Perhaps the best response is the simplest: “Yes, I do.” 

Birth is one of the most beautiful and transformative experiences of a women’s life. Birth often leaves women and their partners in a haze, not remembering the details of one of the most important days of their lives. A newborn baby changes so much in the first hour of his or her life. That first breath. That first glimpse into their eyes. That first cry. The first latch. It’s all worth remembering. 

Birth stories, first and foremost, are love stories. They are far more organic than a wedding day and display a wide range of emotions that few other experiences in life contain. You will capture strength, tears, desperation, pure bliss, peace, and people transforming into parents right before your eyes. These moments are unscripted, raw, and rich with emotion. There is no posing in birth photography. There are no carefully crafted moments. Instead, there is real life and you have someone there to step in and capture it, however it unfolds. 

Dad’s are usually the most hesitant about hiring a birth photographer. Most of the time it’s because they’re scared and think that the addition of another person in the room will be stressful. A birth photographer makes it their top priority to be unseen and unheard. We are silent ninjas moving around the room. We stay out of the way and capture all the special moments you don’t even realize are happening. The details in the room.. the emotion on your faces.. the feelings you’ll forget you even felt. Your focus will be elsewhere. I promise. Most people say they don’t even remember the photographer being in the room.

Birth photography is a gift not only for the mother, but also for the child. How incredible to look back and see how your parents worked with such strength and courage to bring you into the world. What an empowering collection of images for your child to see as he or she grows older. 

Birth photography is about celebrating the female body and our capacity to nurture and bring forth life. Our bodies working with a strength that many of us didn’t know we possessed. Every part of birth is beautiful, even the parts we have been culturally told are not acceptable. Crowning. The first latch. The placenta. All of these are examples of the miracle of birth. These moments deserve to be remembered.