I have been asked to do some three-year-old pictures for some friends of mine who have an adopted girl from China. They have a relative who is a studio photographer who will not be able to do the photos. I am a newspaper-trained photojournalist now running his own photo business. Never trained and don't care to go the studio route. Up to now, it's been on location shoots (parks, etc).

Being in Wisconsin, we really cannot do an outside shoot this Sunday for the pics, so I have a bit of a dilemma. Does anyone have suggestions for indoor locations or possible homemade backdrops I could use indoors? I've heard of using colored bedsheets, but that's about it. Help!

Three year olds are plenty active - I'm sure she has some favorite toys that she likes to play with like a doll house, tea set, whatever. Think of it this way - if your newspaper did a feature story on her, what would the environment be?

I would find out where they want the prints used. Match a background to the room. For a kids room or maybe a hallway bright blue, yellow, orange work well as a backdrop. Could be a ironed starched sheet or 2-3 matte boards used for photo framing if the child does not walk. You can never go wrong with bright white and have the child in bright colors.

I wouldn't worry too much about backdrops and searching too hard for a location (outside of the home). What I would suggest is to find a room without a lot of clutter and good lighting (bring some if you can borrow/rent them) and just make sure the child is engaged and having a good time and capturing those expressions and they'll go great in any room later. The laughter and joy in a child's face will light up any room. Take closer shots so the background is less of a focus and be at the level of the child and I'm sure you can't go wrong!

Thanks for the ideas. I did find a great site with some examples of indoor posing using stairs, beds, couches, etc, so I feel a bit better. The "pretend it's a feature story" mentality is one I tell myself alot, but didn't consider it for this, so thanks for the reminder. I've already written down about 6 places we can do some family pics (they want those too). Afterward, we'll do kid-only stuff. I'll have to pay even more attention to background, that's for sure. If it's one thing about photography, it's never boring, and there's always a challenge!

That's always a problem here in the frozen tundra of the midwest - where to shoot in winter?

There are a few indoor locations you can use, but most require some form of persuasion to use, but as long as you're with the family you might get lucky:

* Church or synagogue. If the family is religious, their clergy may allow them to pose for a few photos in their place of worship, especially if you offer to donate an image for their newsletter or bulletin board.
* McDonald's Playland - some restaurants still have them, and there is some variation in how strictly the managers enforce "no photography" rules (either real or conjured). Is this the girl's first Happy Meal? That might warm the manager's heart...
* The greenhouse at a local nursery
* Your local library
* Local museums or tourist destinations
* Local university or community college
* Another photographer's studio - if you don't intend to compete with them in the portrait or wedding business, they might be willing to rent or lend you their studio space.
* Shopping mall (although mall security is notoriously inflexible when it comes to allowing photographs on those facilities)
* The local YMCA

You are in a unique position to be able to persuade managers and business owners to allow you to photograph at their facilities... I can't imagine too many of them saying "no" to the first photos of a newly-adopted baby girl from China! It never hurts to ask, and it may open the door to being able to do more shoots at those facilities in the future.

Thanks for the ideas--we have a decent children's level at our local library I had planned to use in January for a different shoot, and the McDonald's idea has potential (ours is small, but if there aren't a lot of kids it could work). I work part-time at a Hilton hotel and thought about the lobby and a couple other places there. Like you said, I'll have to do some persuading, but it's free publicity for the location so to me it's win-win.