Tips for photographing children

When you’re a parent, the number of photos you take seems to increase dramatically, but there’s definitely a knack to getting good photos of your children.  Sometimes they can be a bit hit & miss, especially once the baby is a toddler and never staying still, but there’s still things you can do to get a few good photos.

My tips for taking (some) great photos are:

• Snap snap snap.  My last camera I opted for one with a faster shutter speed, so I can keep clicking quickly as I’m watching N play.  I do the same with my phone camera.  The more photos you take, the more chance you get of hitting some great photos amongst the blurry ones.  I always laugh at my mum because she’s more used to an SLR, so even with her ‘point & click’ camera, she still takes loads of time trying to perfect a shot.  That won’t work with a quick moving toddler, so just keep clicking.  You can always trim down and delete the ones that you don’t like (the joy of digital).
• Try for natural light.  I always find that it’s harder to get good pictures in the winter as when the weather’s wet we’re always inside a lot more and the light’s never quite right. So the more you can get outside, or in bright places with more light space, the better your photos will be.  If you have to take photos inside, then look for coloured backgrounds and get up close (don’t feel you need to have the whole of the child in the picture – some of my favourite shots are really cropped up close).
• Try different angles for photographing children.  Get down at their level, look up at them, get them from the side.  It’s always better when they’re still doing what they were doing (unless they like posing), so by doing something different you’re likely to get a different more realistic shot than an awkward smile (or finger across their face which is what I used to get).

I’ve got lots of favourite photos I’ve taken of N – here are a few that I’ve taken

Hopefully these tips are helpful.  I find taking photos of N much easier than of other artistic shots, probably because I get a lot of practise at it. My OH does despair at all the photos taken, but I like to look back at old photos, so hopefully N will like to as well.

What’s your best tip for photographing children?