Photo Shoot...take two...

I love taking pictures. And I love learning how to take better pictures. I've taken some photography classes, read a lot of photography books, and done a lot of research on line. With all that said, I felt up to the challenge of taking Sarah and Michael's family photo. We met at a park on Saturday and got started. I felt pretty good about how the whole thing went and was sure I had at least a few good pictures (out of three hundred you would expect something to turn out). But when I uploaded the pictures, well, as Walter said, "yeah, they're nothing special", I knew I still had a lot to learn because in most of the pictures Michael was out of focus and they were just boring. So I called Sarah yesterday morning and said, "thanks for being my guinea pig and, I need a re-do." Thankfully they were more than happy to meet at the park again. I did some research and armed myself with information about aperture and distance from the subjects and shutter speed and last but not least, my handy index card with circles and stick figures showing ideas for positioning everyone. Oh, and my 35mm lens, which every time I don't use it, I regret it. Sierra's unsolicited advice: If you have a DSLR, do yourself and your photography a favor and buy a fixed lens. You'll be forced to learn a ton and take sharper pictures.

By the way, Isabella just came up and said, "I love you mommy".

Walter said yesterday was like deja-vu because we were meeting at the park again. I told him that every day of my life is deja-vu...wake up, feed kids, get dressed, feed kids, go somewhere, feed kids, change Isabella's clothes (because she inevitably got a drop of water on her shirt), feed kids, go somewhere, change a bunch of diapers in between, feed kids...you get the idea.

Anyway, I don't mind admitting that I still have a lot to learn about photography and I also don't mind admitting that most of the pictures I took during the first photo shoot were horrible. Here are some pictures from day one and day two...

Does it matter that Maya is trying to sit on Charlotte on this picture?

Sarah and Michael bought a camera for Maya for her birthday, so of course Isabella wanted a camera to take some pictures of her own. We decided she could use our old Kodak Easy Share, which has been on the fritz for over a year anyway, and she loves it and has been blinding all of us with the flash. On my next post I'll share some of Isabella's pictures. For the photo shoot she was my lovely assistant.

 Maya and Isabella were sitting so nicely together in the next picture. So I asked Charlotte to scoot over and sit next to Maya. She did, but as you can see she by the little arm sticking up, she fell off the ledge.

We couldn't figure out what was so funny but let me tell you, something was very funny!

 

We got to the park early so that I could scout out some new locations and check camera settings. Of course Walter and Isabella were my subjects...

Best friends and at times, best enemies!

Thanks again Michael and Sarah for letting me use your family to learn how to photograph more than one or two people!