How to Photograph Children

Taking that perfect photograph of your children can be very difficult - babies present a challenge because they are largely unanimated, whilst younger children present exactly the opposite problem, they can move too quickly!  Here are some tips to think about when trying to capture those special moments:-

• Crouch to the level of your children rather than looking down on them - if photographing your baby, lie on the floor next to your baby
• Try to shoot your pictures outside, you'll find the light is much better than indoors and you won't need a flash. If you are indoors, see if you can take the picture without flash to get a more natural shot - digital cameras require less light than film cameras, but the quality of pictures taken in low light will vary between models
• If you are photographing outside in bright sunlight with the sun behind, you can force the flash to fire so that the faces of your children are illuminated rather than appearing in deep shadow
• If your camera has multipoint focus, see if you can put it into a single point focus mode - this will ensure that the focal point is in the middle of your shot and makes it slightly more predictable when photographing fast moving children
• Try to capture your children as they are playing and unaware that you are photographing them; rather than getting awkwardly posed shots, you can achieve some beautiful natural shots
• Make sure that you have a good capacity memory card for your digital camera so that you can shoot lots of shots in a single shoot and not worry about running out of space; leave behind old school film mentality, where you shoot one shot at a time with caution, instead shoot dozens of pictures and select the best ones later
• If you are going out specially to photograph the children rather than just capturing them as they play, then choose a fun setting, such as some open countryside, the park, or even a historical landmark

Different cameras come with different preset modes.  Some of the modes will give you really neat effects when photographing children:-

• If you have a 'sport' mode, try that; 'sport' or 'action' mode is designed to focus quickly and capture movement
• If your camera has 'burst' mode, you can photograph a series of shots, such as your child coming down a slide or running towards you
• If you have 'portrait' mode, then use that to capture the foreground whilst leaving the background blurred; 'portrait' mode changes the depth of field so that only the foreground is in focus

Photography is so much easier, and many times cheaper than when we grew up.  As a result, your children will grow up with many more photographs of them than we probably have of our own childhood.  They'll treasure their childhood photos later in life, so make sure you take pictures regularly and build a portfolio of their early years especially for them!