8 Tips for Taking the Best Photos of Your Kids
Sarah Merians provides 8 expert tips for taking fun and spontaneous photos of your kids.
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Take candids from far away to capture the moment.
If you want to snap a shot of your child living in the moment (i.e. reading, playing, having fun with her friends), stand just outside the doorway or in another room to take the photo. Then you can zoom in and crop the photo to focus on your child. That way, she isn’t aware you’re there.
Don't forget to live in the moment with your kids.
With social media, it’s (unfortunately) easy to compare yourself and what you’re doing with your kids to others’ curated feeds. Merians urges parents to occasionally put the camera down: “I think it’s important to be with your children and enjoy them and interact with them and capture moments—just not all the time.”
Let your child take her own photos.
While you’re in an environment where your phone or camera is less likely to break if dropped (on carpeting) and your child is old enough, take a moment to teach him how to snap a photo of you. “It becomes a shared moment, a moment of education, and not all about what Mom and Dad want but letting the child have a voice and a vision as well,” Merians says. “They might find they enjoy having their picture taken that much more if they understand it.” And who knows, you might just have a budding photographer on your hands!
Make sure to get in the photos yourself!
Whether you’re on vacation or you’re doing something really cool with your child near home, ask someone in your vicinity to take a picture of you together. And if you see another parent snapping pics of their kids, volunteer be their photographer.