Little Miss Pumpkin

[KaVla]

Hello! Yesterday my friend asked me to take some pictures of her Little Miss Pumpkin and since it was last minute we just walked around their development. I have Nikon d70 and used the 50mm/1.8 lenses. Here are my faves. Can't wait to hear your critiques!!! Any advice on how to shoot running kids that won't slow down is very much appreciated! THANKS!!!

#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

 

[camz]

Cute kid =D

I think in general you should be aware of your surroundings as you shoot infront and behind your subject. I like how simple and concentrated the composition is on her on #2. Think of it as if you were shooting in a studio environment where the backgrounds are simple and controlled, and apply this on location shoots. Start with simple backgrounds, like a brick wall, fences, grass, then as you progress add on to what compliments what ever that maybe. Currently, the general surroundings are just a bit gusy.

Good effort regardless.

 

[heroes19]

adorable~~~

 

[Derrel]

Adorable, indeed!!! MY favorites are the first, of her pointing, and the B&W shot with her walking and her mamma bent over and walking beside her,giving encouragement. As far as photographing kids on the move: elevate the ISO to 400 to 640, keep the lens set moderately wide-open, at around f/4.5 to f/5.6, and stay 20-30 feet away with a 70-200 or 70-300. That distance gives you reasonably easy focus with decent depth of field, AND forces you to use a long enough focal length that the background angle of view will always be somewhat narrow, which allows you to move just a short distance one way or the other to control background "issues". When shooting closer, at say 7 to 10 feet with wide-angle focal lengths, you will be forced to have wide-angle backgrounds, because the subtended angle of view of a wide-angle lens is.....wait for it...wide!!! And no, I am not kidding you with this advice...stay back a bit...keep the ISO higher...we're hoping for shutter speeds in the 1/500 or faster range, because you are going to be shooting on the fly, crouching, standing up, moving, working the situation, and you want to be able to zoom RIGHT IN, to maximum, 200 or 300mm, for beautiful close-up or detail type frames, of a moving kid...at f/4.8 to f/5.6, borderline shutter speeds like 1/200 will NOT cut it reliably.

 

[KaVla]

Adorable, indeed!!! MY favorites are the first, of her pointing, and the B&W shot with her walking and her mamma bent over and walking beside her,giving encouragement. As far as photographing kids on the move: elevate the ISO to 400 to 640, keep the lens set moderately wide-open, at around f/4.5 to f/5.6, and stay 20-30 feet away with a 70-200 or 70-300. That distance gives you reasonably easy focus with decent depth of field, AND forces you to use a long enough focal length that the background angle of view will always be somewhat narrow, which allows you to move just a short distance one way or the other to control background "issues". When shooting closer, at say 7 to 10 feet with wide-angle focal lengths, you will be forced to have wide-angle backgrounds, because the subtended angle of view of a wide-angle lens is.....wait for it...wide!!! And no, I am not kidding you with this advice...stay back a bit...keep the ISO higher...we're hoping for shutter speeds in the 1/500 or faster range, because you are going to be shooting on the fly, crouching, standing up, moving, working the situation, and you want to be able to zoom RIGHT IN, to maximum, 200 or 300mm, for beautiful close-up or detail type frames, of a moving kid...at f/4.8 to f/5.6, borderline shutter speeds like 1/200 will NOT cut it reliably.

Thank you so much for this detailed advice. I have so many friends with kids and I get decent snapshots of them but I can never get a good composition. This advice is AWESOME!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!