My girls

BrickHouse · Apr 21, 2015

Finally getting the chance to shoot with the new D750 a little. Here's a couple of my girls for C&C. As always, struggling to control the background in my cramped 5th floor apartment with moving children. Also still using/learning the 24-120 kit instead of using my 85/1.8g so shooting mostly at f4. Hopefully as the weather gets nicer here we can make some exploration trips to the parks.

1)

DRB_0521 by Navy doc, on Flickr

2)

DRB_0546 by Navy doc, on Flickr

Gary A. · Apr 21, 2015

Simply good stuff. Great lighting, great expressions, great conversion ... great stuff.

funwitha7d · Apr 21, 2015

lovely photos, relaxed and the B&W is perfect

BrickHouse · Apr 22, 2015

Gary A. said:
Simply good stuff. Great lighting, great expressions, great conversion ... great stuff.

funwitha7d said:
lovely photos, relaxed and the B&W is perfect

Thanks! Appreciate the time and nice comments!

mmaria · Apr 22, 2015

they're sooooo cute!

and I so understand the bg issues in the apartment

Designer · Apr 22, 2015

Excellent light!

BrickHouse · Apr 22, 2015

mmaria said:
they're sooooo cute!

Thanks mmaria!! What I love the most is their personalities! These kids are SOOO funny. Crack me up all day. This is how most of their day is spent. Can't believe how blessed we are.

DSC_0246 by Navy doc, on Flickr

DSC_0244 by Navy doc, on Flickr

BrickHouse · Apr 22, 2015

Anybody have any critiques? I promise I won't bite.

Derrel · Apr 22, 2015

I LOVE the light and the B&W in the second shot...gorgeous neutral-tone B&W, lotta' snap! to it, lovely direction to the light, her eyes have big, strong catchlights. Minus: cropped off her sitter and left more headspace...cluttery background? Maybe, but it's REAL, and it's where you live, and it has the tricycle, some of the toys, and so on, so I look at it as being more of a documentary photo, rather than a posed shot. Shot #1 blowing bubbles is cute, but unremarkable, but again...documentary, shows the balcony, shows her real life. There's a balance between real, daily life documenting of things, and setting up "candid portrait opps"...there's a place for both. The third and fourth are what I mean by "candid portrait opps"...candid in the old sense of the word...the light has nice direction, which gives shapes, but the eyes go a bit dark with the chair positioned that way in relation to the window.

I dunno...I call this kid photography...when my son was little, I did a lot of it; it can be very challenging, and the child's world is messy, filled with clutter and stuff, fast-paced, short-timed, unpredictable, and occurs within two feet of the ground most of the time, which is what makes the backgrounds such a big issue: down that low, there is a LOT of stuff that gets into the background...no clean white walls to allow to drop to middle gray as with a 5'8 inch woman...nope...there's chair legs and dolls and throw pillows thrown on the floor and crackers and stuffed "aminals" and "Wego's!". But I still like to see that stuff if it fits into the reality. We have some people here who have elevated kid photography to a high level; I think one's kids are a subject well,well,well worth shooting for at least a decade.

BrickHouse · Apr 22, 2015

Derrel said:
I LOVE the light and the B&W in the second shot...gorgeous neutral-tone B&W, lotta' snap! to it, lovely direction to the light, her eyes have big, strong catchlights. Minus: cropped off her sitter and left more headspace...cluttery background? Maybe, but it's REAL, and it's where you live, and it has the tricycle, some of the toys, and so on, so I look at it as being more of a documentary photo, rather than a posed shot. Shot #1 blowing bubbles is cute, but unremarkable, but again...documentary, shows the balcony, shows her real life. There's a balance between real, daily life documenting of things, and setting up "candid portrait opps"...there's a place for both. The third and fourth are what I mean by "candid portrait opps"...candid in the old sense of the word...the light has nice direction, which gives shapes, but the eyes go a bit dark with the chair positioned that way in relation to the window.

I dunno...I call this kid photography...when my son was little, I did a lot of it; it can be very challenging, and the child's world is messy, filled with clutter and stuff, fast-paced, short-timed, unpredictable, and occurs within two feet of the ground most of the time, which is what makes the backgrounds such a big issue: down that low, there is a LOT of stuff that gets into the background...no clean white walls to allow to drop to middle gray as with a 5'8 inch woman...nope...there's chair legs and dolls and throw pillows thrown on the floor and crackers and stuffed "aminals" and "Wego's!". But I still like to see that stuff if it fits into the reality. We have some people here who have elevated kid photography to a high level; I think one's kids are a subject well,well,well worth shooting for at least a decade.

Thank you for the great comments! Glad to hear that the real life stuff isn't too distracting. I try so hard to manage the backgrounds when I'm shooting but there's just so much limitation when you're on the 5th floor of a cramped apartment. I look at other child photographers (especially people like paigew) and see how wonderful and natural their shots are with such clean natural backgrounds and I am filled with jealousy. I can't wait to have a house/yard again some day. Even if I leave the apartment, I'm still on a Marine Corps base in a foreign country so finding suitable scenery can be tough. Lots of trips to the park but when the light is good, the girls are tired. The struggles of this hobby that owns me.

mmaria · Apr 23, 2015

BrickHouse said:
Anybody have any critiques? I promise I won't bite.

ok Brick...

What is your name?

A good composition is missing here. When you have a good composition and make your subjects really stand out, then the viewer don't care about the clutter in the house, balcony or bathroom or wherever.

You cut their legs, feet, bottom... you're so focused on their head and the clutter that the documentary style, or a portrait or anything else can't be successful.

Pagew have the clutter all around their kids but her composition is beautiful, she presents her subjects in a very nice way and the viewer don't care about anything else in the picture except the subjects.

You're in a small apartment, don't have a clean wall... So what? don't bother with your limitations, bother with what you can make out of them. Shoot documentary style, but pay attention how you frame and compose your photos.

I understand your frustration because I was in the same place as you are now.

Forget the clutter, pretend there is no clutter at all, just focus on how you compose your shot and shoot them while they play.

Don't expect too much from yourself and you'll be surprised how well you'll do when you take the pressure off.

Shoot the whole scene. Girl in the balcony. I would go much much wider. With every photo here I would go much wider. I would include the balcony bars into the composition, the lines f the wall in the second... go lower, go wider....