Most of the time, my little guy is a pretty willing subject; however, there are times when I would love to snap some fun shots of him and he gives me a look like this:
I have heard this called: PCS or photographer child syndrome :); as a mom and photographer I love to capture every little detail of his life so we can both remember this time, he is only this age once and I do not want to forget a minute of the time we spend together. Here are a few tips I have found work with my little guy in order to capture his personality or moment in his life:
1. I bring my camera pretty much everywhere we go--but especially if it is a place my little guy has never been to before, I never know when a special moment may happen and since I do not have a cell phone (my husband and I share one and I rarely carry it with me, shocker I know!) I haul around my DSLR--which is bulky but I love it. With the popularity of camera phones most parents have a camera with them at all times anyways!
2. I do my best to make a photo shoot with my little one as FUN as I can (as I do with my client sessions). I let him run around, play and be himself. When I want some close up shots of him games help tremendously--my son loves to play Simon Says and that has worked wonders to get him into poses or freeze when I want to snap a shot of him!
3. I am training myself to omit the word SMILE and CHEESE from my vocabulary--I try to not use it with clients either, when someone is told to smile on command, the smile is usually stiff, forced and fake. Instead I will have my son say something silly or ask him a silly question in order to get a real response from him, usually these words have something to do with bathroom humor or are made up rhyming words--the trick is to make sure I have the camera ready to catch that response!
4. If I am trying to capture everyday life with him I try to not give him too much direction as to what I expect, I would rather sit back and observe him in an activity and capture that than try to force a moment to happen. These are usually some of my favorite images of my son...especially when I catch a moment between him and my husband--two of my favorite guys :)
5. I know when to take my photographer hat off and put my mom hat on. In my mind I may have a perfect shot all planned out--rarely does it happen that way and I have to adapt to it. Usually if I push too hard to try for too long, frustration sets in for both my son and myself--it is at that time that I put the camera down for awhile and we both reset ourselves to hopefully try again another time. Before I know it he usually is asking for a picture to be taken of him and I get to try again.
6. I let him lead, I ask him what he wants a picture taken of. I am lucky in that my son is very interested in looking at photos (especially of himself or an event we went to as a family). Sometimes he will want a stuffed animal in the picture with him, sometimes he will want to do a funny pose and sometimes he will make a funny face. I take these too because all these little things make up my sons personality and are little insights into his childhood--plus some of these photos turn out really well. After we take it then I ask if he is ok with doing a pose mom wants him to do and I usually get him to humor me for a little bit longer.
Hopefully some of these tips can help you too when trying to capture those moments of your little ones lives that turn the picture at the beginning of this blog into something more like this:
Do you have some tips on how you get great shots of your little ones? I would love to hear them especially since I have number 2 on the way in a matter of days :)
