First shoot with a 2 year old girl

It was a very dificult shoot, since it was an extremely sunny day and the sweetie would not stop going from shadow to sunny spots making me changing my cam sets very quicly (any tips on this?)! Here are a few, please give me your honest opinion, thank you:

1

#3 is my favorite! I would crop it over on the right side a teeeny bit, just to get rid of the blown out background you can see.

Nice shots though

Thank you so much for your reply! Anyone else?

I definitely understand the challenges of an active little one. A few questions...

1. Was this a session for a client?
2. Did you get to choose the time and location?

She has such a beautiful smile! I just wish the environment would have been different. The trees seem to dominate the scene in the last three pictures, and the bicycle pics could have been better composed. I wonder if you would be able to do a second shoot with her where you would have better control over the lighting and also a different location.

I like her expression in #3, but the sun spots and the busy trees tend to distract. I like her expression in #5 as well, and her face is evenly lit, but the light on her head is very strong.

I know there's so much to think about when shooting little kids!

I hope this helps.

Tim

awwwwe!!!!! <3

#3 is ADORABLE!!!!!!!!!!

I think you did a terrific job!!! I especially like the tree shot. she has a great smile and the light on her face is uniform and very nice.

Shooting the wormy squirmy toddlers is difficult, but many photographers overlook the notion of using the mom as a helper to keep the kid in place. Most of the shots of toddlers are going to be closer up anyway, as they are physically small. Having the mom 18 inches away and on her knees keeps her within arms reach and able to hold the child in place if needed. The child realizes that mom is there VERY close by and is more comfortable and sometimes more "resigned" to the notion that she can't run away. Having mom on her knees makes it so she isn't throwing an unwanted shadow into the scene from overhead, and can be made aware that the edge of her knees is as far into the shot as she can go. I may not be explaining that very well, but it really does help tremendously for me. You will likely crop the photo anyway, so give it a try and see if it helps YOU. Just a wild thought. Great work, in any event.

Tim Park wrote in post #9854510
I definitely understand the challenges of an active little one. A few questions...

1. Was this a session for a client?
2. Did you get to choose the time and location?

She has such a beautiful smile! I just wish the environment would have been different. The trees seem to dominate the scene in the last three pictures, and the bicycle pics could have been better composed. I wonder if you would be able to do a second shoot with her where you would have better control over the lighting and also a different location.

I like her expression in #3, but the sun spots and the busy trees tend to distract. I like her expression in #5 as well, and her face is evenly lit, but the light on her head is very strong.

I know there's so much to think about when shooting little kids!

I hope this helps.

Tim

Thank you so much Tim for your reply
She was not a client, she is a daughter of a friend, so unpaid shoot, just for my practice and I offer her the pics!

The location was a last minute thing you know, it was a very sunny day so I thought about thislocation, was a near home and with lots of space for her to run and be herself. In fact I could only get her still sitting in the trees, that's why there are so many tree pics, lol! The time of the shoot was at about 5pm, later was getting very cold and a bit dark.

I was shooting with a 50mm 1.8 if this helps!

What do you (and others experts) advise in terms of time and location? One more thing, everytime I tried to shoot her with her mother one of them would be OOF, how can I change that?

Other than that do you think the colors look ok, the pp?

Thank you all so much, keep the opinions coming as I want to learn the best I can!

suecassidy wrote in post #9854765
I think you did a terrific job!!! I especially like the tree shot. she has a great smile and the light on her face is uniform and very nice.

Shooting the wormy squirmy toddlers is difficult, but many photographers overlook the notion of using the mom as a helper to keep the kid in place. Most of the shots of toddlers are going to be closer up anyway, as they are physically small. Having the mom 18 inches away and on her knees keeps her within arms reach and able to hold the child in place if needed. The child realizes that mom is there VERY close by and is more comfortable and sometimes more "resigned" to the notion that she can't run away. Having mom on her knees makes it so she isn't throwing an unwanted shadow into the scene from overhead, and can be made aware that the edge of her knees is as far into the shot as she can go. I may not be explaining that very well, but it really does help tremendously for me. You will likely crop the photo anyway, so give it a try and see if it helps YOU. Just a wild thought. Great work, in any event.

Thank you sooo much for your reply if you don't mind answer the questions above, I would like to hear the opinions of you experts

Sereia wrote in post #9854793
Thank you so much Tim for your reply
She was not a client, she is a daughter of a friend, so unpaid shoot, just for my practice and I offer her the pics!

The location was a last minute thing you know, it was a very sunny day so I thought about thislocation, was a near home and with lots of space for her to run and be herself. In fact I could only get her still sitting in the trees, that's why there are so many tree pics, lol! The time of the shoot was at about 5pm, later was getting very cold and a bit dark.

I was shooting with a 50mm 1.8 if this helps!

What do you (and others experts) advise in terms of time and location? One more thing, everytime I tried to shoot her with her mother one of them would be OOF, how can I change that?

Other than that do you think the colors look ok, the pp?

Thank you all so much, keep the opinions coming as I want to learn the best I can!

I think your approach to practicing on friends' kids is really good, and the more you practice, the more you'll get comfortable with thinking about all the elements (expressions, lighting, background, etc.). There really is so much to think about during a session!

5PM is a pretty good time for this season. Next time, I would just pay close attention to how the light falls on her face. At the same time, I know how difficult it is to keep up with a moving child!

One of the challenges of the 50mm (I'm assuming you're using it on a cropped sensor) is that it tends to be a bit long in some cases (and it chops off limbs), but outdoors, you can try stepping back and including more of the environment. With mom in the picture, you really need to pay attention to the f-stop to make sure you have enough depth of field to keep both faces in focus. I tell parents to keep their faces on the same plane as the child as much as possible.

The colors are nice on these shots and the pp looks pretty straight forward.

Tim

Great subject and I like what you tried doing but I hate to see pictures taken directly under the sun, it kills everything, # 5 looks better to me than the rest, and I would have shot it with a zoom lens instead, kids move very fast and unless you're that agile and fast it's hard to keep up with them.

I think a lot of well placed fill flash would even out the shadows here. It looks like you might have used some, but still, the shadows make an appearance on her face.

As to shooting from sun to shade: Without flash, shoot aperture priority, and make sure you have enough shutter speed for the shade without maxing out on the sun. With flash, it's a bit harder as you need to balance the ambient exposure with the fill.

She's a cutie, though!

Thank you al, I love to hear and learn as much as I can.

Tim, what is a cropped sensor... sorry I am portuguese and some terms are not clear to me! Being to far from the subject with the 50mm wouldn't make it less sharper. And what about the focus, I try touse the center focus, but when shooting 2 or more ppl in the same picture which focus should I use?

Enrigonz, thank you for your reply! The only lens I have for now is the kits lens and the 50mm 1.8. I don't like my kits lens that much cause it doesn't give me the OOF background I like, but I would like to hear opinions about this lens - 18-55mm 3.5/5.5 and how I should use it!

Jman, thank you too for your reply. I didn't use the flas in any of them, cause there were so much light that using the flash would make it worse, right?

Thank you all and keep replying I love to learn woth you all

Sereia wrote in post #9855383
Thank you al, I love to hear and learn as much as I can.

Tim, what is a cropped sensor... sorry I am portuguese and some terms are not clear to me! Being to far from the subject with the 50mm wouldn't make it less sharper. And what about the focus, I try touse the center focus, but when shooting 2 or more ppl in the same picture which focus should I use?

Enrigonz, thank you for your reply! The only lens I have for now is the kits lens and the 50mm 1.8. I don't like my kits lens that much cause it doesn't give me the OOF background I like, but I would like to hear opinions about this lens - 18-55mm 3.5/5.5 and how I should use it!

you can still get shallow DOF with your 18-55 IS kit lens, it also depends on your distance to your subject

Jman, thank you too for your reply. I didn't use the flas in any of them, cause there were so much light that using the flash would make it worse, right?

I think "fill flash" is extremely important when you shoot in the sun, set in ETTL mode and the camera will figure how much power to use on the flash to light up the face, specially under the eyes, nose, any place where you might get a strong shadow.

Thank you all and keep replying I love to learn woth you all

Keep shooting, you're doing good! We're all learning, no matter how long you've been doing it.

Enrigonz, how do I set my flash to ETTL mode? My camera is a 500D and I don't have external flash!

sounds to me like you just need to work on technics and worry not so much on lighting yet but the pop up flash on the camera work automatically on ettl mode so just pop the flash when you're shooting outside in the sun and/or in the sun and shady areas, the built in flash works ok outside but not so good inside so when you feel ready try looking for an external flash unit and then look for ways to shoot it off-camera