We did a maternity photo session at Fort Smallwood Park the other day. I am very thankful for all the amazing parks in Anne Arundel county. I could have easily done this photo session at any of the parks in Anne Arundel county and ended up with good scenery. Though I do tend to rely on Fort Smallwood and Quiet Waters because I know with 100% certainty, I can get three of four different backgrounds just a short a bit apart.
The trick to doing any session is to try and understand what positive feelings are going on going into the session. For maternity sessions it is usually joy, pride, and a sense that things are about to change for the mother to be in a big way. So, you just tap into those emotions and the directions tend to be very easy as the poses tend to just bubble up. The only catch is to plan ahead of time as there is a time limit to do these photos. Furthermore, you want to keep the session or sessions short as you subject will likely be just a few weeks away from her due date meaning they tire easily.
As always, take a field trip to your local parks and look around. Parks are great places to do photo sessions and I use them often, but you do not want to find the best spots when you go to do the session. If you can go ahead of time and scout around, you will speed things up, improve your photography since you are familiar with the area, and have back up locations.
One other thing, I get permission before I throw up photos like these and only after the client gets the photos first and has time to take them in. I don’t recommend doing it any other way.