The Look Of A Photograph

Before you start your journey to capturing great images of your children you first need to know how those great photographs look. You can start by browsing the internet and looking through the portfolios of some of the professional child photographers. This will give you a sense of what great photos look like.

But don’t be discouraged as you look at the images and think that it is impossible for you to take some for yourself. Rather, just spend a few moments and try to understand what about each photograph attracts your attention. Where did your eyes go when you first saw the image? Other than the child, was there anything else in the picture?

You will quickly note that each photograph draws your eyes to a specific point, and that you don’t even see the background at first. Observe what part light plays in the photograph. Is the child’s hair highlighted, or are there shadows in the background? Does the light fall directly on the child’s face, or somewhere else?

Notice in the photograph on the right how the light falls on the subjects hair, and how the background is blurred. Your eyes are immediately drawn to the subject and nothing distracts you from understanding the point of this photograph, does it? Simply paying attention to lighting and the background can improve your photographs.

Now that you have an idea of what a great photograph looks like think about how you can photograph your child. You don’t have to know everything about your camera to make a huge improvement in your photography. You don’t even need an expensive, complex digital single lens reflex camera with all the bells and whistles.

Even if all you have is a simple point-and-shoot camera that limits your choices you can still learn how to use the functions it has to create better photographs. In the beginning exposure, depth of field, settings like aperture and shutter can befuddle you. But over time, with a little study and practice, you too can learn how to use these things to create wonderful photographs.

Over time we will discuss all of these items, but for now just learning to see light better and working on composition will yield amazing results in your photography. Learning camera techniques will allow you to get the photos you envision and prevent situations that result in poor photographs.

Until next time take lots and lots of photographs of your children – you will be glad you did!

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