Camera Labs

I'd say get good lighting, a nice lens and a good backdrop/ background and use your DSLR with a lower speed. I'll try and post some later but f8 to f11 can look great with kids or adults with nice lighting and a decent background.

Maybe try a park with the lake a hundred feet back at F8 an hour before sunset. Great colors, slightly blurred background and hard for the little one to dodge to DOF at 35mm - 55mm on a DSLR.

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Nikon D90
18-55mm VR
55-200mm VR
ML-L3 Wireless release

http://www.flickr.com/photos/97752536@N00/

Slightly off topic, but has anyone got any good recomendations for photography software aimed at baby photography. Ive been asked recently if i could take some shots and put borders round them aimed at children, the likes of teddy bears, faries, that kind of thing. Also someone else asked me about making their baby look like it was in a rose, or a flower, something similar to this.



Im pretty useless with photoshop, so any ideas as to the best way to recreate this kind of thing would be most welcome.

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Canon 5D Mk2, Canon 50D, Canon 24-70 2.8L, Canon 70-200 2.8L, 50mm 1.4, 580 Ex2, and a load of other bits and bobs.

I think this should be the appropriate thread to find out which camera would be suitable for shooting kids.

I am a Panasonic FZ35 owner and I am extremely pleased with the performance of this camera in terms of photo quality at low ISOs, the image stabilizer and long zoom. However this my not be enough to shoot kids who are always moving around and where most of the photos would be taken indoors.

My friend will be a father soon and wanted my advise on a small compact camera for clicking photos of small kids. He shall be using this camera for next atleast 5-7 years. The main requirements would be a fast camera with video recording capabilities. DSLR is not an option as compact camera is desired.

I am leaning towards latest compacts like Panasonic Lx5, canon s95, samsung TL500 but am not sure which one would be the most appropriate.

Any experience on the ideal camera would me most welcome.

What i usually do, is to keep the children "locked". I give them only one way out where they are from, and i'm at the end waiting. i can control like this where is the kid is going, and i try to shoot fast has i can.

I got nice photos of children running, there hair on the air, smiles, jumping, very funny pictures, but i only gave him one way to get to me, and of course, in the end they get a reward, ehehe.

But i have a D50, so after 3fps it stalls, sucks ... i missed lot of photos, my lens is not fast to, i shot with a 18-55 f3.5.

Like gordon said, it's very difficult to have depth field with a children, they just can't stop, maybe we should give them a candy so that the stay still, lol.

But with kids that can't stay still you better forget depth field, maybe if you have a very fast focus len, but im not sure if that would work

My wife comes from a large family, and as such, we have 12 nephews and nieces to take pictures of every time we visit Mexico.

I find that the DoF is a factor of both the aperture, but also the focus length. What I found works best is my 50mm f/1.8 lens, opened up at around f/2.8. With 50mm, I find that the DoF isn't too restrictive. You can have a subject move a few feet forward or behind, and the image still comes out nicely. I don't own any fancy USM lenses, so I mostly use manual focus, and that doesn't cause me any troubles. But that said, I usually try to "trap" the kids so they stay within the DoF. Good examples are to move the table near a wall when taking pictures of birthday cakes, that way you can keep their movement in the direction that doesn't affect your DoF. Or position yourself aiming somewhere you see them pass often, just waiting for them to pass in your DoF.

Last week-end I had some fun at a butterfly exposition where you can walk in a large room full of butterflies. That reminded me taking photos of the little ones. They move fast, and they move erratically. In sports photography, you have a general idea where the action is going to be next. In wildlife photography, depending on the subject, it can be much harder to predict their patterns. There are no rules, there are no nets, no ball/puck/whatever, just an infinite 3-D universe where things can happen.

But also, just like wildlife photography, you have to set your expectations correctly. If the kids are sitting still, you can get a good success rate on keeper photos, but if they're playing around like crazy, then don't set your expectations too high, maybe 1/10, or even 1/30 photos will be keepers.

And alternatively, you can take videos in 1080p, freeze whichever frame you like best, and print it out to a 4x6.

Last subject I want to touch is lighting. In professional movies, there are very strict rules about how long a baby can be exposed to intense lights. Babies and kids are much more sensitive than we are, so try to use special lighting as little as possible. If you can make do with ambient light, even the better. The flash can really hurt their eyes, and if you're badlucky, can even cause permanent damage. The younger they are, the more careful you have to be with light.

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Cameras: Canon EOS Rebel T2i, Canon S90
Lenses: Tamron: SP70-300mm F/4-5.6 Di VC USD, Canon: EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS Lens, 75-300mm f/4.0-5.6 III, and EF 50mm f/1.8 II
Retired camera: Fujifilm Finepix s700