Fun In The Park

I was wondering if I could get some opinions on this. I want to get a large print of this for the house but was wondering if it is printworthy.

The kids look like they're having a terrible time. That would make it not print worthy to me personally. The blown sky is another issue, but unless your kids just never smile, I'd try to get better expressions.

nope it wasn't the case...guess we'll have to try that again since they were all smiles until I made him look at me to take the pic...and she was more in the mood to get out of his way I think

Do you notice the dull blue cast over the entire image? Also, it would seem the little girl is out of focus.

I'm not sure I'd be too happy about framing this image in its current state - the sky is all blown out white and compositionally speaking, it's a shame that the left edge of the slide has been cut off. I think I'd be tempted to reshoot next time you're at the park, and if your kids freeze up when you stick a camera in their faces, maybe try grabbing some candids instead of trying to pose them?

This is far from perfect, but this is literally just one Curves command to fix the cast and add a little contrast, plus some sharpening. If I were planning on framing this, I'd want to spend a lot more time on it, but this at least goes part way to addressing the main problems I see with the photo.

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Its a try again photo As mentioned, the sky is totally blown, the focus on your daughter is lost.maybe try to get them both at the bottom of the slide, take it from the ground up?

What time did you take them to the park? Which way does the slide face? At the time of day you went, you have to overexpose the sky in order to expose the kids and slide properly. Plan your trip for a time when the sun is behind you a bit. If the sun is directly behind you, the kids may be squinting so I wouldn't wait that long. About 10am or 2pm depending on whether this trip was morning or afternoon. Use a CP filter to reduce the reflections and make the sky easier to expose properly if you have one.

With no movement in the subjects a shutter speed of 1/400 is not really required either. I'd stop down your aperture in order to get more depth of field keeping both kids in focus.

Or if you feel like competing with the sun, you can always use flash, and underexpose for the sky, and let the flash fill in the kids.

it was a spur of the moment trip around 7:30 p.m. The park is just down the street so I think we'll make another trip and as one said above try for both at the bottom. Or maybe we'll just go with a bench pic together. With ages 3 1/2 and 1 it's hard to get them that close together without one crying or fussing as one's usually trying to get the other one in one way or another.

or better yet I'll mess around with the seperate pictures of them on the swings actually smiling and attempt to make a collage of some sort.

Cropping is little strange, horizon is crooked, sky is blown, color temp is too cool, both subjects are a bit soft.

I would look into reshooting when there is more light on the subjects faces (ie lightsource behind shooter, not the subjects), utilization of fill flash (preferably off camera).

Of course for children it can be difficult. Sometimes its best to have a good (and fast) telezoom and wait for the right shot/lighting. Contrived photos always seem...well...contrive​d to me. I would focus on capturing more genuine expression (i.e. all smiles until you made them look at you), work around your subject, not the other way around.

Do not get discouraged though, it will come.

They are both looking at you, not good, looks contrived.

A day in the park needs to be done with a long lens with the photog being ignored by the kids.

Get there in the early AM (no other kids around for distractions), throw a sack breakfast on the ground and
tell them to eat and play and that mommy will be over there.
You want them to interact together with you out of the picture, taking the pictures.

Let them play for about 1/2 hour or so, until they get tired, and take at least 100 shots, just keep shooting.
You can't anticipate that special moment when their interaction makes it all happen, when the silly factor sets in and giggling erupts spontainously.
That is the image that you want, but it requires patience.

It goes without saying that you have heeded the aforementioned advice or this is all an exercise in futility.

While they are certainly issues, I'm not really worried about the sky or the horizon or anything...it's just those expressions. I think if you had of gotten really good expressions, the rest would have been a little more subjective.

The next time I would bring someone else along to help keep the kids busy and playing while you shoot and then instead of trying to get them to look at you, just catch some natural "happy" expressions...maybe some nice close ups as they're going down the slide (and with the close ups you won't have to worry about the sky or the horizon either).

Just my $.02 worth,
Jim

I appreciate all criticism. It would be so much easier if Sarah could actually walk around. She's just into the crawling and he is so rough...

We have an expression at our house, "no blood, no foul". "He's so rough", is laughable.
He is mostly jealous of a new "center of attention".

Sarah won't cry half as much if mommy isn't there to console her
Did ya ever notice that when a kid falls, they first look around, if they see that mom's watching, they cry.
If they don't see her watching, they don't cry.

Off topic but true:
First baby drops bottle; wash and resterilize bottle, give it back.
Second baby; wipe it off and give it back.
Third baby; kick it back to him, your now feeding them on the floor.
Fourth baby drops his bottle; don't worry about it, they'll find it.

Before anyone tries to give me grief, I've got nine, 3 natural and 6 adopted.

OMG...9 I can't imagine. LOL. I have warned him though that she's gonna start getting even with him.

I do have to agree with the quote above too. It's amazing what things were a major issue with #1 aren't even a problem with #2.