Be sure to go to Alabama Bloggers to enter my first contest over there (and you don’t have to be an Alabama blogger to enter!!) – There are three prizes worth $40 each – Beautiful coffee-table historical photograph books of Birmingham, Mobile, and Huntsville. You may remember that I gave some of these away a few months ago – they are amazing! So go enter!!
As you MIGHT have figured out by now, I take a lot of pictures. I have a nice point and shoot (being that I take a lot of pictures, I can’t have an SLR – it just doesn’t fit in my purse) that takes pretty decent photos.
However, photos are only as good as the subjects are cooperative.
And Ali has been going through somewhat of an uncooperative-photo-op stage lately. I pull out the camera and she runs away, looks away, scowls, whatever it takes to make sure that I don’t get a good one.
However, I have been quite aggravated stunned by the pictures that Chris has been getting of her on his iPhone lately.
I present to you exhibits A through D (I didn’t edit these in any way):
I mean COME ON. A CAMERA PHONE SHOULD NOT BE TAKING BETTER PHOTOS THAN MY CANON!!!!
All I can think about when I look at those pictures is how amazing they WOULD have looked had they been taken with a real camera.
Exhibit B would have been awesome if her hand didn’t look like a blurry blob.
Exhibit C would have been amazing had it not looked like someone just threw up sand on the lens.
Exhibit D would have been stunning if there had been the right lighting to show her blue eyes.
Why won’t she give ME photo ops like this?!?!?
I finally mentioned it to him the other day.
“How is it that you are getting such cute pictures of her and she won’t even look at me?”
His response?
“Oh, she asked me to take her picture. She saw me get my phone out and said, “Take a picture so I can see! I’ll say ‘cheese!!!’ and I’ll smile!!””
Incredulously, I said, “Are you KIDDING me?!”
“Yes. She kept wanting me to take them because she wanted to look at them.”
Seriously?!?!? I’ve tried that strategy a million times and it hasn’t worked. How is this possible?
I now present to you my exhibits. I took 35 photos in a row yesterday (had my camera on continuous shoot) trying to get just ONE picture of Ali and her friend Kendall both looking at me at the same time. And of course I was doing crazy antics to make it happen.
35 pictures. And not a single one of them both looking. AND on top of that, my lighting was bad.
I might as well just buy an iPhone for my camera. Maybe Ali would like it better.
Here were the BEST attempts of aforementioned photo shoot, Exhibits E through H:
But then again, I can sympathize with Ali.
Maybe she just knew how pale Kendall made her look.
Cute pictures! My girls (especially Mia) do the same thing…very frustrating.
Too cute! My kids do the same thing, now everytime I get the camera out they say, “great she’s taking ANOTHER one for her BLOG”
She’s a cutie! My son doesn’t like for me to photgraph him anymore. He looks grumpy in every single picture.
-FringeGirl
I get great photos on my iPhone…and even though I am in major love with my Nikon (and think it takes the most beautiful photos ever) I still have a great time with the iPhone because I always have it ready. And my nieces love for me to take their photo with it.
I like your hypothesis about Ali not cooperating with the pictures b/c her friend Kendall would make her look pale, very funny :)
My husband does the same thing! Some of our best pictures of Kariya are from him just randomly snapping ONE pic. I will literally take thirty pictures of her doing something and get one or two good ones. :P
LOL my girls do it to, but if we walk into Portrait innovations they turn on the charm! Its sad that i have 3 years of photography experience and have to PAY someone else for pics of my kids! :)
Very cute pictures…but I’m sorry she’s not cooperating like you’d like her to. Maybe this stage will pass by pretty fast.
lol. I am always the ghostly face in the pic that requires major touch up. . .oh, to be tan. . .
Thanks so much for picking me in the capture the caption! I think your pictures are great! (Just make sure your mom knows I wasn’t trying to offend her with my caption!!) : )
They may not both be looking, but they’re still really cute photos!
The last picture is actually the best picture. Sometimes, taking a pic where the child isn’t looking directly at you, or posing, produces a great result! If you wanted it to be just your child, use a program online to crop the picture.
Also…some unsolicited advice:
Get down on her level…if you are lower to the groung, on the same level as she is you will get a more interesting angle.
Take your camera off auto! try the program mode…leave the flash off and adjust the ISO to suit your lighting. (raise the iso if lighting is poor)
Adjust your shutter speed…a longer shutter to capture movement.
even a point and shoot can take great pictures! and, you definitely have the subject matter and patience!!
i much prefer snapshots that are taken when my subject is unaware. i have some amazing ones of my preschool kids from last Halloween. we were walking from one building to another, i was at the head of the line, and i put my camera behind my back and began shooting. they were GREAT.
as to your dilemma with ali, i am going through the same thing with tosha. as of about a year ago she will not look directly at the camera and it doesn’t matter if it’s my phone or my point and shoot.