One Trick That Will Improve Your Baby/Kids Photography Immediately

Babies and Kids are perhaps the most photogenic subjects that we can ever find. They are cute, delicate, little and most of all they are innocent and that innocense just shows in each of their picture. While I strongly believe that there is no such thing as a "Bad photo of a baby", there are things that you can do that can make their photos better and give it more meaning so that it can create memories worth life time.  

The thing that we all should understand is that babies/kids are small, and they have very small attention span and even lower tolerance level.  At the same time - parents have very high expectations. And therefore - it is important that you do not waste valuable time figuring out your techniques and settings and focus on capturing the emotions and innocense. 

Most of my current readers are not photographers and therefore I want to share a tip (which is known to all almost all the photographers) that will make your babies photos better. 

Here's the trick -  "Get Low ! Get to their level"

Yes. That's it. This one thing alone will make your baby/kids pictures so much better. Let me explain how. 

Me & my family visited a friends place a few weeks back and here are the two photos that I clicked on  that day. I specifically wanted to demonstrate how changing  the perspective makes all the difference in the final image and that's why I intentionally clicked two pictures. One the right way and the other wrong way. 

The first picture is clicked from my eye level, pointing down at the kids. Isn't this how most of us click pictures of kids? Do you click your babies picture like this? If you are then you may want to change your technique a bit. The problem with this picture is - 

1. The subject (kids) are looking very small (remember pointing down at something makes them look smaller).
2. There are too many other objects in the picture. My idea was to show that both kids are riding the car.Other elements in this picture are not really adding any value to the picture. 

Now here's the second picture. Do you think this picture looks better than the previous one? Notice that - nothing has changed in the picture except the angle/perspective from where I am clicking the picture. Both these pictures are clicked using my cell phone and are absolutely unedited/untouched. But they look so different..don't they?

Here's the reason why - 

1. Less distractions. Merely changing the perspective removed about 80% of distractions.I admit, not all the distractions are removed, but lesser the distractions, better the picture. 
2. Kids are filling almost the entire frame, that means that your eyes will go directly to the kids and nothing else. Very important. 
3. Since you are not pointing camera down at kids, they don't look small or big . They look pretty balanced  in the overall picture. 

I admit, this is a very simple and a small tip, but it will definitely make your pictures better. Hope it helps you capture pictures that you like better. Do leave a comment if you tried this and found it helpful ! 

Till then - you guys have a wonderful day and stay blessed !! 

Regards,
Priyank Pardiwala