Everybody enjoys taking photos of their children. They are great to look back on in years to come, and are a lasting memory of your child at different ages, passing through different phases of their lives.

While we would recommend you come to our studio to enjoy a professional photo shoot, we feel we should give you a few pointers so you can get better quality images yourselves.

Obviously the better your photography equipment, the better the quality of images you will be able to capture. A camera that allows you to manually set some of the camera controls is a big advantage, but with many parents relying on mobile phone cameras we will progress by helping you get the best with what you have.

Getting better indoor photos

Capturing great photographs is about using light to your advantage. If you’re photographing inside, try to utilise the natural sunlight coming in through a window. Turn the lights off in the room and sit your child close to a window, with the light falling onto their face. Net curtains may not be as fashionable these days as a window decoration but they are perfect for diffusing the light coming in from outside.

Getting better outdoor photos

If the weather permits, photographing outside can provide a variety of backgrounds. Try to avoid direct sunlight, it isn’t particularly flattering if falling onto the face, leaving high contrasting light and shadows under the nose and around the eyes. Try to photograph your child with their backs to the sun, this will give a nice hair light and provide much more flattering light on the face. If you can get your child to play in shadow areas where the sunshine is more diffused, such as under trees or in the shade of a building this will make things much easier for you.

Photographing on an overcast day provides the easiest shooting conditions, giving a nice soft diffused light all around with very little contrast. This will also stop  your camera being fooled by the variety of lighting brightness found on sunny days.

Getting down

A quick and easy improvement to your photographs comes from just getting down to your Childs level. Photographing on an equal level will give your photos a more professional look. Try lying down or sitting on the ground to see things from your child’s vantage point.

Zoom in close

Zoom your camera into your child, getting in close and getting intimate shots of your child at play can improve your photos no end. Framing can be more problematic, especially with the shooting delay experienced on phones and point and shoot camera, but practice will help improve this. Try to get a close up of your child’s face removing any distractions from the background. Great photos are about great expressions.

Blurry Backgrounds

If you get in close, you may find blurring backgrounds possible, although this won’t be as effective without the use of more expensive camera equipment. Blurry backgrounds are an effective way of drawing the viewer’s eye to the focused part of the image, which hopefully will by your child.

Photos at playtime

Children are at their most adorable while at play, with natural expressions of joy. Shooting them playing on a swing or in a sandpit, or on their favourite tricycle can provide endless opportunities to nail a playful action shot. With more expensive manually cameras, a fast shutter speed will help freeze the action.

Capture your child’s phases

Try to capture images that are typical of your child at that age. It may be a certain look that they use, a gesture, a particular toy that they play with. When you look back on your photos in years to come, you want to have images where you say, “Aww I remember him/her doing that at that age”.

Hope you find something useful from this article, we would love for you to send us some of your images, before and after implementing some of these tips, if you would like to get some one to one tuition, please check out my photography tutorial page for more information. If you think someone your know would like the tips contained in this article please share it with them, thanks for dropping by…