Alien theme toddler photo shoot

I wanted to do a cute photo shoot for my daughters 18 month birthday.  My maternity shoot was an alien theme, so I thought it would be cute to pull the alien theme full circle. I made most of the props myself.  Below I will go over how I did it.  First here are a couple of the pictures from the shoot. 

The most important thing about a great photo shoot is a great photographer. www.BriJohnson.com was my girl for this job.

Now on to the homemade props. 

First the backdrop

What you need:

MDF board 4 foot x 8 foot (Home Depot)

Flat black paint 

White paint

Pencil

What you need to do:

1. Paint the MDF black.  We did 3 coats.  We chose flat black to give it a more chalkboard appearance. 
2. Sketch with a pencil the large planet. 
3. Paint with white over what you sketch. 
4. Fill in the gaps with stars. 

Prop chair 

What you need:

Kids saucer chair (Walmart)

Twin size sheet 

Binder clips

What you need to do:

1. Take the sheet and lay it over the saucer chair. 
2. Use binder clips to secure it . The back doesn't have to look good - only what will be seen on camera does. 

Lots of other props for the shoot. 

Box aliens

2 different alien headbands

What you need for the headbands:

Pre-made headbands (Michael's Craft Store)

Glitter foam paper (Michael's Craft Store)

Googly eyes (Michael's Craft Store)

Pipe-cleaners (Michael's Craft Store)

What you need to do:

1. Cut out the glitter foam paper in the shape you need. Most of them come with self adhesive papers, so you can just cut a little tab and glue it to itself.  A little hot glue would work too. 
2. Hot glue googly eyes. 
3. Twist on some pipe-cleaners for antenna. 

Box alien sans goggly eyes. 

Box Aliens

What you need:

Empty cereal boxes

Elmers glue

Googly eyes

clothes pins 

pipe-cleaners

Green paint 

pom pom balls 

aluminum foil 

What you need to do:

1. Wrap empty cereal boxes with aluminum foil.  
2. Glue half a clothes pin for legs... I did 4 legs per box
3. Glue on googly eyes
4. Paint a smile and eyebrows. 
5. Glue on pipe-cleaners for antena
6. Put a pom pom ball on top of the pipe-cleaner antennas 
7. Another option is to cut out construction paper for a tongue or teeth. Just glue that on too. 

For one of the shots I taped this little alien guy to the back drop.  

What you need:

Construction paper

Googly eyes

Black sharpie

Pom poms

What you need to do:

1. Cut your alien shape out of the construction paper. 
2. Glue on googly eyes
3. Glue on pom poms 
4. Draw on a smile. 

Alien mask

What you need:

Glittery foam paper

Ribbon

What you need to do:

1. Cut your mask shape. 
2. Hold it up to the child to make sure it fits. 
3. Use ribbon on both sides of the mask to tie it on the child for the shoot. 

Colorful stars

We hung 3 of these on the back drop to add color. 

What you need:

3 different sized wood stars. 

4 different color paint

What you need to do:

1. Paint all the different sized stars different colors 
2. Hot glue them all together. 
3. Paint a highlighting color around each star. 

Unfortunately I am just now learning to sew, so the costumes were bought on etsy... I fully plan to 

make them for her next shoot :) 

This shoot was also featured on

 http://offbeatfamilies.com/2013/03/alien-themed-toddler-photos

Check it out for more pictures and info.