Top Tips for Better Back to School Photos

As I teacher myself, I am acutely aware of the steadily growing hum of back to school reminders! Now is the time to set aside a little time and think about capturing a series of shots to commemorate this special moment in your child's life. These top tips will help you get the shots you want with a minimum of fuss and effort.

Do Your Homework

Take some time beforehand to plan out the type of shot or shots you want to capture. Nothing ruins a kid's mood and willingness to cooperate than scrambling around during the shoot trying to find something. Assemble any props beforehand and think about the best location, lighting, and timing for your shoot. Schedule your shoot the week before school starts (or earlier) to avoid adding pressure on the actual first day.

Start by celebrating the event and including the year or grade level your child is starting. One quick idea is to make or print a sign specific to your child's grade level. You can create your own or download every year's worth of cute signs from the pin below, just follow the link.

Get your child involved. Ask them to bring together a few of their favorite things, favorite books, or objects that represent hobbies and activities. This post pinned below, Creative Photo Ideas for Back to School, walks you through how the photographer and her children picked out items to represent them for their Back to School shots. Kid cooperation and ownership leads to better smiles and interest when shooting!

Another popular idea is to use PicMonkey, Photoshop, or other post-processing apps or software to add in the grade level or other specific details about your child. Plan ahead for this by leaving a wide area of space around your shot. You could also photograph your child in front of a blank wall or holding a large chalkboard, whiteboard, or even blank poster board.

Or, think beyond the wall and get creative with your post-processing skills. The series of photographs below shows how you can use a collection of book spines and personalize them with information about your child and the new school year. (Not into Photoshop? You could easily duplicate this effect with some good old copy-and-paste here in the real world. Print or draw your own labels and wrap them around books to use when shooting.)

During the Shoot

Once you have everything assembled and ready to go, make sure to choose a good location (available natural light is a big plus). Backyards with continuous shade and leafy backgrounds can work well for more nature-themed shots, while indoors with strong window light and clean backgrounds can work well for indoor shots. Hang a patterned sheet from your curtain rod or pinned up on the wall for an instant backdrop. If you are not familiar with how to utilize window light indoors for portraits, please check out this helpful post below from It's Always Autumn.

Now you are ready to shoot. Have a mental list (or physical list) ready of the types of shots and poses you want to capture. Think about detail shots and close-ups as well as more standard full-body or head shots. (Not sure about posing? Check out these Top Tips for Photography Portraits and Posing for suggestions.) Kid-cooperation is always an uncertain thing, so do not push too hard or try to capture too many different ideas in one go.

Be ready with your settings. If you are a shoot-on-auto kind of shooter, think about trying Portrait mode. If you want to move beyond portrait, shoot in Aperture Priority (Av or A). Choose a wide aperture if you want a blurred background or a middle range aperture to keep your child and a wide range of props in focus. Set focus on the eyes (read Deciding Where to Focus for more details). Watch your shutter speed. With too slow of a shutter speed (like 1/50th or slower) your own movements may add noticeable "shake" to your photographs.

Finally, don't forget to go beyond "Say cheese!" Ask your child questions while shooting, to draw them out and get more natural-looking shots than just posed, canned smiles. Tell some funny jokes or ask them to tell you one. Have them talk about some of their hopes (or fears) about the new school year. Make it quick, make it fun, and make your shots count.

A Final Word of Advice

However you choose to do your child's Back to School photographs, please do not become "that parent." The first day of school while at school is not the time to be indulging your photographic urges. Once your child is at school and ready to start their first day, they need to be free to get down to the business of catching up with friends, meeting their teacher, and focusing in on their first activities and lessons.

Please do not be the parent who demands that their child sit and pose at their desk when they would much rather be meeting new friends. And please do not be the parent who is still in the classroom photographing when class is starting and the teacher is trying to get the year off to a great start. We teachers thank you.

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Boost Your Photography: Learn Your DSLR is now available from Amazon. Get the most out of your camera with practical advice about the technical and creative aspects of DSLR photography that will have you taking beautiful pictures right away.

Teaching Kids Photography Part 2: Composition and Design

Want to take that next step in teaching your kid(s) about photography and stoking their life-long passion? This article is the second in an occasional series on teaching kids photography, based around a series of lessons I designed for an elementary and middle school Photography Club. The first article covered Teaching Kids Photography: shooting modes, focus, and exposure.

Composition and Design

For our second Photography Club meeting, I chose to focus on the twin issues of composition and design, as these techniques and strategies are relevant no matter the type of camera you use. (Club members had access to several varieties and levels of point-and-shoot and phone cameras.)

We started with a brief PowerPoint presentation about some of the basic concepts of composition and design. Students enjoyed looking at the comparative examples, in particular, which sparked some interesting conversation and discussion. Many of the students, for example, were initially more attracted to the symmetrical sunset image than the 'Rule of Thirds' version, which helped reinforce the point that composition is really a series of suggestions and that everyone has different opinions and interpretations. (Curious? Read more about Composition and the Rule of Thirds here.)

In addition to the Rule of Thirds, we also discussed the concept of using leading lines as a composition element. Students were generally familiar with the idea of perspective from their Art classes and enjoyed seeing how they could use concepts from other art forms to inform their photography. (Read more about Composition and Leading Lines here.)

Another topic I wanted to be sure to emphasize was the importance of paying attention to your background and not just your subject. Like many beginning photographers, I had noticed from our first meeting that students were often so absorbed in their main subject that they paid little attention to the rest of the photograph. We shared a few examples where the background detracted from the overall photograph, including the slide below of an accidentally slanted horizon. (Read more about how to Remember the Background and Move Your Feet.)

Finally, I decided to end with a little bit of fun before we got down to shooting: forced perspective. Forced perspective takes advantage of the fact that a photograph is a two-dimensional capture of a three-dimensional scene. Think: someone near the camera squishing the face of someone farther from the camera or the classic shot of tourists holding up the background Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Photo by Flickr user thentoff, used under Creative Commons license

Photography Exploration

After the presentation and discussion, we had about half an hour for hands-on photography. Due to the weather, we had to stay indoors but had access to several areas in the school, including the gym, to spread out to and apply the new compositional learning. (I have deliberately left out identifiable photographs of the students themselves, but many portraits and other 'forced perspective' attempts were also made.)

View outside of the playground using the Rule of Thirds

Off-center composition using Rule of Thirds, as well as a decluttered background

Leading lines and perspective on the stairs

Leading lines in the white board marker rail

I am posed by a student with an attempt to make the eagle pose on my shoulder.
(It was Team Spirit Day at school as well.)

Forced perspective, holding up the painted eagle in the gym (cropped)

Conclusion: Teaching Kids Photography Composition

Composition and design is a great place to start when encouraging kids to do more with their photography. Start by exploring just a few basic rules at a time, and see how a little bit of planning can make a big impact. (Plus, don't forget to have a little fun!)

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Boost Your Photography: Learn Your DSLR is now available from Amazon. Get the most out of your camera with practical advice about the technical and creative aspects of DSLR photography that will have you taking beautiful pictures right away.

Spring Roundup

Welcome to the Spring Round Up. This is a chance to look back at the posts from the last three months and catch up on any posts you might have missed.  You can also check out the previous round ups for Spring 2013, Summer 2013, Fall 2013, and Winter 2013-2014.

Consider joining in the Boost Your Photography: 52 Weeks Challenge! Our focus for May was on photography basics. In June we will be looking at different composition techniques. Join the Google+ Community to share your weekly photographs and receive feedback.

For Beginners

This is a collection of posts geared towards beginners or those who want to learn to do more with their camera. Many of the 'Tips and Tricks' and 'Inspired Ideas' posts will also be applicable. You can find other posts geared toward Beginners here or in the tab up top.

Shutter Speed: an overview	Teaching Kids Photography	What the ... White Balance?
BYP 52 Weeks Challenge	Focus on Focus	Deciding Just Where to Focus: Focus Points
Explaining Exposure and Exposure Compensation	Shutter Speed Guidelines	Creative Ideas Using Shutter Speed

Tips and Tricks

Advice for getting the most out of your camera and your photography. You can find more Tips and Tricks posts here or in the tab up top.

Tips to Improve Your Macro Photography	Product Review: Close-Up Lenses	Macro Fakery: Background Creation
Product Review: Light Tent Kit	Focus Stacking for Macro Photography	Tell a Story with Easter Photographs
5 Food Photography Articles	GorillaPod Tripod Review	Photographing Architecture Watch Your Lines
Top Tips for Camera Memory and Storage	GorillaPod Tripod Review

Inspired Ideas

This is a collection of posts containing ideas, both those that you can implement immediately and those that require a little more time, effort, and potential planning. You can find more Inspired Ideas here or in the tab up top.

Make the Shot: Water on CDs	Make the Shot: Droplet Refraction	Master the Heart-Shaped Shadow
Capture a Day in a Single Image	Better Before/ After Photographs	Flipped Reflections

Guest Posts

During the winter, I became a regular contributor to Digital Photography School. These are my posts that were published over on their site in the last few months.

How to Use a Light Tent for Product Photography

Light Tent Comparison: DIY vs. Kit

Travel Photography without the Travel

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Teaching Kids Photography: Shooting Modes, Focus, and Exposure

Photography is a great hobby to share with kids, and the ever-increasing accessibility of point-and-shoot cameras and camera phones makes this even easier. This is the first article in an occasional series about Teaching Kids Photography. Part 2 focuses on Composition and Design. (You might even learn something new yourself!)

Teaching Photography: where to start?

Last semester, I ran a monthly Photography Club for upper elementary and middle school students. Many of the students had never really been given an opportunity to use a digital camera and were excited to learn. The biggest question in my mind, of course, was where to start?

I knew that one of my goals was to help teach them how to control their cameras and to get the kind of shots they envisioned. So, I decided to start with a brief overview of the commonly available shooting modes, so that they could immediately move beyond Auto and exert some measure of control over their camera.

Common Shooting Modes

Students either brought in a phone or camera from home or shared some of the few point-and-shoot cameras provided by myself and the school, so everyone had different menus and options to choose from. With that in mind, I only introduced some of the more common shooting modes that are widely available on digital cameras.

Photographing started right from the start. Here, a student captured me in motion, discussion shooting modes.

Below is an easier-to-read version of the slide that I was showing, detailing some of the most common shooting modes available on point-and-shoot and DSLR cameras.

Macro and portrait modes were by-far the most popular. Later on, some kids chose to explore some of the more unusual shooting modes and effects, like taking pictures in 'toy camera' mode to make everything look small and dollhouse-like or fisheye-type effects. By understanding what mode to choose for a given photography situation, the kids were better-able to capture the kinds of shots they wanted.

Toy Camera Effect on the nearby construction site

Focus and Exposure

My other main lesson for our first meeting was the link between focus and exposure with point-and-shoot cameras. With a point-and-shoot camera, when you press the shutter down halfway, the camera locks focus. Pressing the shutter the rest of the way takes the picture. But what I wanted the kids to understand was that pushing the shutter down halfway also locks the exposure or how light or dark the final photograph appears. (For more technical details about exposure, especially with DSLR cameras, read All about Exposure and Troubleshooting Your Exposure.)

For our first experiment, I asked everyone to turn around and point their cameras at the window. Then, holding down the shutter halfway, I asked them to look at how the camera interpreted the scene. The second step was to change the composition slightly so that it included a good section of the wall next to the window and to repeat holding down the shutter. They were amazed at the dramatic differences in light and darks between the two views.

Focus and exposure locked at the center of the image.

Focus and exposure also locked at the center of the image.

This led to a quick discussion of the strategy of "Focus and Recompose." The idea here is that you first decide on the composition you want (say, a view out the window). Then, you hold the shutter halfway down and see if the version in the viewfinder matches how you wanted the scene to look. If not, change the composition slightly, depress the shutter halfway, and then move the camera back to the original composition. Even without knowing anything else about exposure or camera settings, the kids were easily able to control and manipulate the desired lightness and darkness in their photographs.

Photography Exploration

The most important part of any photography lesson, however, is the application. After the initial lesson and discussion described above, we took a forty-five minute slow-moving walking tour outside on the playground and nature trail. I hung back to answer questions, and the kids were free to explore and photograph whatever inspired them. The following are just a few small samples of their creativity during our first meeting. (I have deliberately left out identifiable photographs of the students themselves, so just imagine an additional quantity of portrait-style and "I'm taking a photo of you taking a photo of me!"-style shots here too.)

Close-up photograph of a milkweed pod

Exploring patterns from beneath the play equipment

An effort to capture the motion of jumping

Blur from intentional camera movement using a slower shutter speed

Shooting shadows with attitude

Conclusion: Teaching Kids Photography

There are endless different ways to teach children photography and to nurture a love of photographing and exploring the world around them. Since I was working with older kids (10-14 year olds), it made sense to start with some of the technical controls before letting them loose to explore. With younger children, you might want to focus more on just the idea of focus or on holding the camera still when shooting. Part 2 in this series focuses on teaching about composition and design.

Where did you start with teaching children about photography? Share a tip or advice in the comments below!

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Boost Your Photography: Learn Your DSLR is now available from Amazon. Get the most out of your camera with practical advice about the technical and creative aspects of DSLR photography that will have you taking beautiful pictures right away.