Skip to main content

Three Simple Tips to Take Better Photos of Your Kids

Tip #1: Remove unnecessary clutter from your background
This can be done in one of two ways. First, physically remove the unwanted item from sight. This could be a bin, a pile of paper work, a sock annoyingly left by one of the children (for some reason children never want both socks on at the same time) or maybe you've left a can of furniture polish out when you got distracted by one of the million tasks that children create, as in this photo below of myself and my mother from many years ago. This is actually one of my favourite photos from my childhood but ever since I spotted the can of furniture polish on the coffee table I can't stop seeing it. I have even been tempted to Photoshop it out. At least its in the distance and a little blurred in the background.
Or it may be that all you have to do is change the angle you are pointing the camera. Look at your surroundings and make a quick assessment as to whether or not you can make a cleaner and more attractive background just by rotating your position a little. When you are out and about there are many things you cannot move so move yourself or your subjects instead.  A cleaner, less cluttered background will make for a more attractive photograph. 

As an aside, however, sometimes your background has something really interesting in it that you want to include so keep that in mind too. It doesn't just have to be about removing clutter but rather strategically placing appropriate elements that add and not distract in your photographs. Years ago I came across a wonderful photograph of a bride on the stairs in front of a Virgin shop. I thought it was a fantastic idea and loved the play on words. 

Tip #2: Look for the good light
Its often there. It just needs to be found. Many non photographers reckon that a beautiful sunny day makes for a great day to take pictures. And to some extent it does. Everyone is certainly in a better mood and a landscape is going to look fantastic with sunlight and blue skies. However people never look their best in harsh sunlight (unless they are wearing sunglasses). 
(I love this photo for the colours and overall happy feeling in this image, however had the girls not been wearing sunglasses they'd be squinting badly. And as you can see my husband is squinting and has rather dark eyes here - very unflattering for women in particular).

A bright sun, high in the sky casts horrible, dark shadows in very unflattering ways, not to mention that you could end up with a whole group squinting into the camera, not an attractive look. And to place your subjects with their backs to the sun will often result in under exposed faces with an over exposed background. There are ways around this but thats a discussion in itself so I'll leave that for another blog post.  

Instead though, try to find open shade. Look for trees, a porch, canopy, covered bridge, anything that blocks the top light from hitting your subjects but still allows the light to come in. This will provide beautiful, soft and flattering light.  

But if you have to live with bright sun use it to your advantage. Below are a few images where the sun was strong but I still managed to light my daughter well. 

(Notice the harsh shadows on the left. For the photo on the right I had asked my daughter to turn her face more towards the sun. Although we still have squinting the light on her face looks much more attractive).

(In this photo the sun wasn't in the right direction causing too much shadow on my daughters face. So I decided to get her playing where I wanted her so I could photograph her in better light - we can't move the sun afterall - see below for the images I took with her in a better position)


Please note that in each of the above sunny examples the sun was not at its highest point in the sky. Each were taken early evening which will also make a difference. As the sun starts to lower it becomes a more flattering light. The colour also warms up making skin tones more attractive. High noon is possibly the trickiest time of day to get good photos. 

Tip #3: Get them Doing Something
Not all kids like to pose for the camera. Mine in particular hate the experience and I rarely get any sort of natural expression. But photograph them while they are already doing something or ask them to do something so that you can photograph them and I can gaurantee that will change. Before long they won't even notice the camera and you can snap away capturing some great expressions. 

While doing so though, keep in mind Tip #2. Look for the good light first and make sure they are facing into it and not with their backs to it. If their backs are to the light you will likely end up with under exposed images that make their faces look too dark and lifeless. Even if it means moving a coffee table or area rug, stage the moment and then snap away. Real expressions will come naturally through play.  

(I took these images of my daughter about 10 years ago and I still love them. Washing up was something she loved to do as a small child but surprise surprise, hates it now.)

Baking in the kitchen is a great opportunity to have some fun and using daylight and facing the window will ensure some lovely light falling on your child, often making the background fall into darkness which then helps to have your child stand out from the surroundings. Colouring at a coffee table or playing with Lego or building blocks by a large window or glass doors is also a great way to capture some great moments. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

London in Spring, Whats Not to Love?

Well I know there is still a lot not to love but I'm choosing to see the great things about London at the moment. I am having a ball this year visiting London as often as I can. Which is unusual for me since I usually prefer the comfort of my own home, in rural old Leicestershire. Staying home and avoiding people has always been the easy option. But this year, possibly due to the wonderful weather we keep having, has me longing for venturing out. Again, just like my last trip, I headed out with my good friend Panikos Hajistilly . Living in North London he finds it easy to meet up for our shoots. This time though I had more of an idea of the sights I wanted to use as the backdrops for my portraits. With it being spring I was in search of colour, preferably flowers. Admittedly. I didn't quite get what I was looking for. The white fronted terraced houses with pink magnolia trees we did not find unfortunately. But I did make it to Peggy Porchen's which was a must see on m...

Family Photos with Flair - Vanity Fair Style Family Portraits

This style of portrait continues to be the eye catching success I had always hoped it would be. Once again I created a beautiful family portrait that I am really proud of and I know this family loves too. Over the years I have developed this style through influences such as Vanity Fair and the many photographers I follow, though I hope that there is something in here that is entirely my own. Having my work easily identified as my own was a goal of mine from the start. Getting to the point where people will want not just a portrait but a Christina Lauder portrait is where I've always wanted to be and I'm hoping I'm on way. These portraits were created for the family of two professional photographers who wanted some portraits of their own. Family portraits isn't really something one can do of oneself, at least not easily. So they needed the services of another and I was honoured to be chosen for the job. They chose me not just for my style but also for my ab...

Never Work With Children or Animals

Or so the saying goes. But I have to say that working with dogs has been so lovely. They have been almost entirely a dream to work with. I say almost entirely because we have had a few moments where a dog has needed to settle. And one moment where the dog had settled but one of my cats decided to have a look through the glass door which, as you can imagine, rather quickly unsettled the dog. Still, that didn't stop us from creating incredible work. In fact it was during that shoot with the cat instance when I created two of my favourite pieces, shown below. (It was while sitting on the couch here when he noticed the cat peering through the curtain) I don't know if I've just been lucky or all dogs are just easy to work with. I photographed a french bull dog puppy and I thought that would be tough as he hadn't had time to be properly trained yet. But he did everything we wanted in no time at all. And this included the props we used here (below), which to me...

Teen Portraits - Prom Season is Just Around the Corner

If your child is heading to prom in the next couple of months I'd say there is probably no better time than now to have portraits created of your growing teen. With the purchase of a new (and probably expensive) outfit wouldn't it be nice to capture this milestone with a portrait created by a professional. Across the pond this is a hugely popular time to create portraits, and although I am not American (I'm Canadian) I wholeheartedly agree that this is a special moment to record. My prom was a key memory in my teen years and in fact I myself had professional portraits created also. I think I'll go dig them up if I can, though admittedly I think my mother has them back in Canada. I wonder if I can get her to scan one for me. My daughter is currently making plans for college and in the running is one that will move her away from home, as many others are probably experiencing for themselves, particularly those who are 18. This makes it all the more important to ...

Wedding Workshop in Nottingham

On Wednesday of this week I made the trek up to Nottingham (which wasn't actually much of a trek compared to most of the other delegates who travelled from as far as Glasgow, Portsmouth and South Wales) for a workshop held at Crash Taylor's home. Crash, a very talented photographer, specialising in weddings is someone I can highly recommend to anyone. Apart from spending the morning getting to know the other photographers we then spent the afternoon photographing a hired model, in her own wedding dress, as we wandered through Nottingham Castle. It provided me a chance to see how other photographers handled their weddings as well as a chance to experiment with equipment I haven't had a chance to play around with. Like in this image to the right. Here I used my flash, mounted on a tripod off to the side. This allowed me to achieve studio quality lighting out of the studio, a technique I will be using in my environmental portraiture. I can't seem to make up my mind on whi...