The Most Expensive Celebrity Baby Photos

The Most Expensive Celebrity Baby Photos
News Source Info - NSI August 4, 2008: Chalk up another No. 1 ranking for Brangelina, arguably the most famous celebrity couple on planet Earth.
An exclusive first glimpse of twins Vivienne Marcheline and Knox Leon, the highly anticipated offspring of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, tops our latest rundown of the most expensive celebrity baby photos. According to published reports, People magazine, which is owned by Time-Warner, along with London-based Hello! magazine coughed up between $11 million and $15 million for exclusive first shots. (In the U.S. and Canada, People holds the rights, while Hello! has international rights to the pics.)
This comes just two years after the tabloid-staple couple peddled pictures of their pouty newborn--and first biological child--Shiloh Nouvel. Rather than pocket the loot, the humanitarian duo donated the funds to African charity. The reported sum: a then-record $4.1 million--and that doesn't include the $3.5 million that Hello! reportedly shelled out for the British rights to the pictorial.
The second-most lucrative photo sale to date came in March this year, when boldface pair Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony sold exclusive first shots of twins Max and Emme to People magazine. In return for the lavish spread, the glossy allegedly coughed up $6 million.
The newborn shots are not only must-sees for the masses but also big business for the magazines that publish them. As celebrity weeklies are forced to compete with a growing number of entertainment shows and tabloid-style blogs to chronicle the minutia of celebrity life, the price tags associated with these types of private moments have skyrocketed. And entrepreneurial celebrities stepping in to maintain control of--and profit from--their exposure only fuel things further.
In Forbes' list, we surveyed top-priced photo sales in the U.S. over the last decade. Our estimates are not adjusted for inflation, and we didn't look at photos that sold for less than $500,000. Since the celebrity weeklies are notoriously tight-lipped about such sales, we were forced to rely on published reports and only considered photo sales for which information was available.
Such photographs are no doubt adorable, but are they really worth their hefty price tags?
Absolutely, says OK! magazine Deputy Editor Rob Shuter. First off, they sell magazines--job No. 1 for publishers. A heavily hyped exclusive typically sells an extra 300,000 to 500,000 copies. Some do even more: The buzz-worthy Shiloh cover sold 800,000 more than usual.
"But anybody that looks at it as just a one-week phenomenon has missed the real point," Shuter explains. "It's branding. It's publicity. It's marketing." For a magazine, an exclusive set of A-list baby pics generates a tremendous amount of buzz, from blog write-ups to talk show segments to newspaper headlines.
Star magazine Editor-in-Chief Candace Trunzo agrees, adding that you're giving your readers what they want: a window into the real lives of celebrities.
Of course, with stars dictating the terms, it's often a heavily primped version. But getting in on the action offers more to a celebrity than just a preapproved shot. Rather, working directly with a publication to capture the big-ticket event is one way to ward off the paparazzi and control the media maelstrom--not to mention making big money along the way.
Not every star is willing to play, however. Hordes of photographers found themselves tripping over each other trying to score the first shots of Sarah Jessica Parker's son James Wilke in 2002. By walking out of the hospital and posing for the masses, she turned what some predicted would fetch $1 million as an exclusive into a discounted also-ran.
Will the latest crop of pregnant celebs, including Jessica Alba and Nicole Kidman, take their cue from the Sex and the City star?
The increasingly competitive stargazing industry is hoping not, and Trunzo says the audience that supports it wouldn't be pleased either.
"Celebrities put out one face when they're on the big or small screen," she says. "But the face that our readers want to see is the one behind closed doors."