How to Photograph Children Outdoors
The summer provides many wonderful opportunities for photographing children outdoors. These simple tips will help you to overcome technical and psychological challenges to achieve great and memorable photos.
Set the Camera
- Use the camera's action setting to capture un-posed shots of children at play.
- Turn on the camera's flash so that you can pose the child with his or her back to the sun. This will prevent squinting and provide nice highlights on the hair. The "fill flash"? will light the face, which would be too dark if no flash were used.
- Select the distance from your subject that fills the frame with exactly what you want to see in the final photo.
Get a Great Expression
- Tell a joke or act silly. Telling a child to smile almost never results in a natural look. It is best to create a scenario where the natural response is the one you want to capture.
- Use a prop to create interested or surprised expressions. Capturing a child's interest creates an intense and engaged look. Props that can be used to create elements of surprise (e.g. a jack in the box), can elicit a completely different but equally strong expression.
- Use reverse psychology with difficult subjects. Tell the child not to smile or behave in the way that you would like to see them portrayed in the final photo.
