While we can't guarantee that you'll win, but we sure can help you maximize your baby's potential for winning a photo contest. Here are three really quick tips and tricks that can get you better results.
A friend of mine once told me he wished he could win the California's super lotto. This was decades ago when we were younger.
Anyways, I asked him. "How much did you buy?" I was referring to how many tickets did he purchased.
He said he doesn't buy lottery tickets. He doesn't play!
"What?" I thought to myself whiling giving him a confused look.
Yep, that was his answer. It's crazy. Isn't it? How can you win if you don't even buy a ticket? What is his chance of winning?
ZERO.
If you're hoping your baby will win a contest but you never submitted any photo to any baby contest at all then, what is your chances or odds of winning? Yep, like my friend's result. Zero chance of winning.
The hardest part is submitting that first baby photo to a contest.
It's always the first one that's the hardest and scariest, but remember, it's exciting too. It is probably the most important one, because that first baby photo you entered just gave your baby a chance of winning vs. zero chance.
Don't stop the activities that keep increasing your odds.
By entering and submitting photos to as many baby photo contests you can find, you are increasing your chance and your baby might be the next contest winner. Don't forget to enjoy the experience in itself. It is well worth it.
Plus, with experience, you will know better on which photographs to submit and how to capture your baby at their best.
Each contest you entered will give your baby another shot at winning. So don't hesitate, just do it. Stop thinking about it. Again, just do it and don't stop doing it.
What's the worse thing that can happen?... is...
NOTHING.
Really, that's the worse that can happen.
But look on the bright side, even if you don't win and "nothing" ever happens, you can still tell your child in a few years from now that you're so proud to be their parent.
You thought that they were the cutest baby in the world. You didn't just think of it but you took actions upon it. You've entered him in a bunch of photo contests when he was a baby.
Now that's a story to tell at dinners and gatherings.
Recommended Reading: 9 Tips How to Get Your Baby to Cooperate With the Camera for Baby Contest's Amazing Photos
Babies in their natural state and environment often are the cutest. You can see or will see if you haven't seen it yet.
Your baby will do the most incredibly cute stuff when you least expect it. Get them to have fun, and have fun with them. They are as natural as they can be when they are just having fun.
Your baby is not a 21 year old model that knows how to get in the mood and strike a post as soon as the cameras are on. Nope. You might want to try having him warm up to it naturally by having fun.
And you should be enjoying your time with your baby anyways, right? This helps them to be as natural as possible. You want the real deal. Not some artificial animated character.
Remember, a cheerful baby is a healthy baby.
Leave them alone, meaning—don't make them feel like they have to be cute for the camera. In other words, instead of having them post for the winning photos you have the camera ready at all time to capture the moments to be the winning photos.
Your goal is to be readily patient, so you can capture the moment when it happens. So you must be prepared and ready at all time. This is great if you have a nice camera phone. Now-a-days, almost everyone does.
You don't need to buy a fancy DSLR camera that cost hundreds or even thousands.
Natural, no photoshop. That's the key.
You don't need to touch-up with softwares or modify your baby's photos. You shouldn't because most baby photo contests don't allow these type of modification anyways beside cropping and resizing files to submit to contests.
Just simply remember, you, capturing your baby and nothing else. If anything else in the picture then it's only there because it just happened to be there.
Continue on with natural...
Lighting is a very important aspect when you are taking picture. There are so much to learn about lighting. Good thing, you are here on this site and this page and good thing you're not a professional photographer.
So do what moms and dads do best, keep it simple.
Two simple advice.
1. Always avoid having lights behind your baby. Because that will darken your baby and sometimes can not even see your baby. So have the light shine on your baby from the front and not the back.
2. Natural lighting. This is very important. Most pictures don't have enough lights. With strong good lighting, you will see a whole world of a difference.
The best way to do this is not go out and buy those expensive lighting, which you can but you don't need to. We are going to give you a tip right now that's even better than those expensive lighting.
It your warm and natural lighting from the sun. And the best part, it's free. Completely free.
To take advantage of this free power of natural light.
First, do your best to take picture during the daytime when it is nice and bright. Then find a room or an area in the house with the most light.
Usually it's the ones with the nice big windows that have a lot of light coming in. Of course a lot of light doesn't mean direct sunlight beating in.
Another way, to take advantage of this is taking pictures outdoor.
You can have a picnic with your baby at a park or even just in the backyard would be great. A lot of free natural lights. Ah... just by mentioning outdoor that should have opened up a whole new can of worms for you huh?
So much idea comes to your mind right? Like, on the swing, playing with water hose, the slide, the sand, the grass, and etc. But do remember your baby is the main object, the apple of the camera's eye.
It's not easy to capture the perfect moment but these are simple things that you can do to create the opportunity to capture those special moments.
You might be interested in this contest: The Cute Kid Contest Reviews - Cutest Kid Wins $25,000
To our next baby contest winning tips.
This is along the line of increasing your odds but this time, it's a chance for a great photo. Imagine for a moment, the pictures on the cover of magazines. Submit that kind of magazine's cover photographs to a baby contest to wow the judges.
Wooh... Wooh... let's not get ahead of ourselves here.
We're not talking about glamour shots or gorgeous photoshop baby pictures. We're talking about the hard working process of how those photos get to be on the magazine's cover.
Not only that you have to be ready to capture the moments but do it as much as possible because you don't know when that precious moments will come.
The take-a-way here is take picture, take picture, and take picture.
You should never stop taking pictures of your darling little baby. The professionals take hundreds if not thousands of photographs before it is then submitted to be the cover of a magazine. The process takes days, weeks and months and only one will be picked to be on the cover.
Good thing, we are living at an age where hundreds and thousands of pictures fit on a tiny little memory card. And within a second or few seconds all of the pictures can be deleted. We don't have to waste films or have it developed, no wasted money or time. There's no reason to not take picture of your baby as often as possible.
Yep, hundreds and thousands if possible. Maybe one of them will win the next baby magazine photo contest or better yet, the winning picture of the next Gerber baby PHOTO Search.
Want a reason to do it everyday? Watch this video. Maybe it helps you find some inspirations.
The professionals do it and you should too. You don't have to be a professional and it doesn't have to be a job. Have fun with your baby. It's quality times and a great activity. People are always looking for great activities to do with their kids and babies. This is one of them.
The image above is of Gerber's past grand prize winners of the Gerber baby contest. Can you see a little pattern?
We mentioned this earlier but we think it is worth mentioning again as a bonus tip. "A cheerful baby is a healthy baby."
Yes, all of the photos captured the babies and not focusing on their surroundings. It's not even about the background but it's about the baby. Anything else in the picture just happened to be there.
Stay focus on your baby. Close up is a great idea as long as you can capture his charm, her cuteness, and their healthiness in their cheerfulness.
SIDENOTE. ENTRYbaby.com provides information for parents that are interested in baby contests. It would be much appreciated if you help us spread the word by sharing. Thank you in advance.
