Getting Great Kid Shots
Wherever you find kids, camera-toting parents are never far behind. (OK, they’re usually far behind, but doing their best to catch up.) And now that email makes it easier than ever for parents and grandparents to share those precious images with the world, the gross national production of kid photos has risen from gazillions to bajillions.
If you’re one of those parents, you’re right to capture those memories before childhood flies by. But try to sit still long enough to read this section. With a little technique, you can shoot photos that make your kids look even more gorgeous (just don’t expect the other parents to admit it).
Children are challenging for all photographers. They’re like flash floods: fast, low to the ground, and unpredictable. But with a little patience and perseverance, you can keep up with them and get the shot.
If you want great-looking kid shots, you’ve got to play on their turf. That means getting down on your hands and knees, or even your tummy.
Many of the action photography tips you learned at the beginning of this chapter are great for kid photos, too. Highlights include:
1. Be prepared.
Rule Number One for capturing great kid pictures is to have your camera handy at all times, charged and with memory card space to spare. Great kid shots come and go in the blink of an eye. Parents don’t have the luxury of keeping their equipment snugly stowed away in a camera bag in the closet.
2. Get down there.
The best kid shots are generally photographed at kid level, and that means getting low. (Flip screens are particularly useful for kid shots, because they let you position the camera down low without actually having to lie on the ground.)
3. Get close.
Your shots have much more impact when the subject fills the frame. The less excess space you shoot, the less you’ll have to crop out later.
4. Prefocus.
Shutter lag will make you miss the shot every time. In many cases, you can defeat it by prefocusingthat is, half-pressing the shutter button when the kid’s not doing anything special. Keep your finger on the button until the magical smile appears, and then press fully to snap the shot.
5. Burst away.
Use your camera’s burst mode to fire off several shots in quick succession. Given the fleeting nature of many kids’ grins, this trick improves your odds of catching just the right moment.
Photographing fast-moving children is easier if you use your camera’s burst mode, which lets you hold down the shutter button and fire off a sequence of frames. Chances are, one of them captures the decisive moment. On most cameras, you choose burst mode using the onscreen menus. Nicer cameras offer a choice of several burst modes: for example, one that captures full-resolution shots but not as quickly, or a more rapidfire mode that takes lower-res photos.
6. Force the flash.
Indoors or out, you’ll want the flash to fire, since it provides evenly distributed illumination and helps freeze the action. Switch your camera’s flash setting so that it’s always on.
7. Make it bright.
Don’t bother using the red-eye reduction flash mode on your camera. By the time your camera has finished strobing and stuttering, your kid will be in the next zip code.
If red eye is a problem in your flash photos of kids, make the room as bright as possible, shoot from an angle that isn’t dead-on into your kids’ eyes, and touch up the red eye later on your computer, if necessary.
8. Fire at will.
Child photography is like shooting a sports eventyou’ll take lots of bad shots in order to get a few gems. Again, who cares? The duds don’t cost you anything. And once you’ve captured the image of a lifetime, you’ll forget all about the outtakes you deleted previously.
