LITTLE ROCK — When Megan Henry of Hot Springs had her first baby, she relied on family members to document the experience. But last year, she, along with a growing number of women, upgraded to a professional photographer.
The trend of expectant parents enlisting professional photographers to capture the moment of their baby’s birth has been growing nationwide, according to media reports from The New York Times, The Huffington Post and MSNBC.
And while professionals say Arkansas has been slow to jump on the trend, the business is becoming more widespread across the state.
Mary Buffington, 26, has been a professional photographer for six years. Her studio - Mary Buffington Photography, at marybuffington.com - is based in Hot Springs, but she travels across the state.
While she said birth photography isn’t as big in Arkansas as it is in other areas - particularly major cities in Texas, which has 42 studios registered with the International Association of Professional Birth Photographers - the market has grown in her two years of photographing births.
“It seems to be more prevalent and more and more popular,” Buffington said. “It hasn’t quite hit Arkansas, but I think that it will.”
Photographer Tonee Lawrence, 32, said she has offered the service since 2010 but started receiving more birth photography requests over the past eight months. She averages one birth per month and charges $500 or $800, depending on the package.
“I think a lot of the time the price turns [people] away,” she said about the slow demand.
But it’s becoming more popular, Lawrence said. Her business, Tonee Lawrence Photography, at toneelawrence.com, services mostly the Little Rock area.
“It’s one of those genres of photography that has a stigma to it,” she said. “People want it, but they don’t really want to want it. It’s such a private matter, but I think the world is becoming a little less modest about the thought of childbirth.”
Lawrence had her husband photograph the birth of her third child four years ago.
“The more people catch on to it, the more popular it gets, and I think that’s how women in general work - if their friends do it, then they’re going to look into it too,” Lawrence said.
Henry, a client of Buffington’s, said she first learned of birth photography from pictures on Facebook.
“Once I saw some other pictures [Buffington] had taken, I was like oh my gosh, I have to have this done,” she said. “They turned out so wonderful.”
Buffington, who also shoots weddings and portraits, said she averages six births a year and only during her slower season so a baby’s unexpected arrival won’t interfere with a wedding. She charges $500 per birth.
“You have to be on call for the mother,” said Buffington, who hasn’t missed a birth yet. “The phone’s on all night, and I’m ready to go at any given moment.”
Most area hospitals allow birth photography, as long as the parents discuss it with their doctor beforehand. But some, like St. Vincent Health System, forbid any pictures during delivery.
After The New York Times article on the subject, some women went online to denounce the practice as intrusive and overly graphic. But birth photographers disagree.
The general policy is to be as minimally invasive as possible, with no flash photography. And the shots are not meant to be graphic.
“I’m not getting the doctor’s view, I’m positioned above mom’s shoulders,” Buffington said.
Henry, now 25, said she didn’t notice the photographer’s presence during the delivery of baby Alyssa.
“She’s very professional - honestly, I didn’t even realize hardly she was there,” she said. “There was so much going on, and she was very much in the background. Looking back at the pictures, she was capturing stuff that I was too much in the moment to even think about.”
Capturing the little moments that often go unnoticed is the reason why birth photography has become so popular, Buffington said.
“It’s a priceless moment to have captured,” she said. “The mother obviously is very busy and in pain and distracted, so she can’t remember the expressions of maybe her mom there with her, or her husband or boyfriend there with her. She’s not going to remember if he held her hand a certain way, or the way he’s looking at her. She’s certainly not going to see the baby’s face when he first comes out. She’s not going to see that first moment, so this way she can.”
Business, Pages 23 on 07/03/2012