Summer is Slip Sliding away!

This weekend the weather was beautiful!  And what do you do with restless kids on a sunny Sunday?  Let them slip and slide.  This bad boy was on sale for the end of the season and like most things at the Circus House it was used, enjoyed, and destroyed.  Pat nearly had a coronary trying to get the T rex to stand up straight and finally improvised a brilliant "Dadgyver" solution of bochee balls in a garbage bag. 

Our next door neighbor asked what was wrong with the hose and some plastic but what fun would that be?  Pat wanted to make sure the kids had a fun fabulous summer day.  Mission Accomplished.

I positioned myself just out of reach of the water and played around with action shots.  This is a great way to try out action shots of your own.  With the action coming towards you there will be less blur.

 
 Ellie made it quite easy for me on this one crawling down the slip and slide. 

 Olivia goes full force, while Dad sits in the background and enjoys watching the kids play.  Most of these shots were taken at an ISO of 800 the shutter speed was 1/1000.  This is a fast shutter speed which is what makes the drops of water so crisp and clear.  Because the shutter opens and closes so quickly, not letting as much light in you have to go to a higher or more light sensitive ISO and/or a smaller aperture setting.  These are 2.8-4.5 .  That is why Pat is so out of focus in the background. 

 Fearless Kels. In photoshop you can create your own actions.  I have an action that sharpens and slightly lightens the center of the image and then slightly darkens and blurs the outside of the image.  This brings focus into the subject.  It is a type of vignette.  You should really, really try to avoid a heavy black or white vignette on your image.  I always make a separate action for a horizontal or vertical image. 

Here is the original SOOC (straight out of the camera).  I punched the color up by making a new layer and then changing the blending mode from "Normal" to "Soft Light".  Then of the soft light layer I lowered the opacity way down to 20%.  All of these things you can create as an action for yourself to save you time if you do the same thing over and over to your pictures.  Then you can do a large number of step quickly to one image or to a whole folder.  Like when I put my name on the bottom corner. 

 Dad decided Ellie was too slow and needed his help. 

 She wasn't a fan of the sped up version of the slide. 

 That's it I quit. 

 The goal is to wear them out so they are in bed before us but the more times they ran the farther they went!

 Eventually clearing the entire thing and ending up skidding on the grass. 

 Our neighborhood daredevil that just happened to be biking by.  You didn't have to ask him twice to join in!

 

It was the best money we have spent in a long time!  The kids had 2 full days of fun and exercise, the grass got watered and they even cleaned it all up!  Thanks Dad!

Mommy's Model

I set Ellie down in the bed after the tub and just something about her and the monotone of the towel, pillow, walls and her hair made her eyes pop out at me.  My time has been taken up lately by a million different things and I haven't had much time to photograph my own kids.  The Grandparents are begging for new pictures to replace the outdated ones on the walls.  I decided to have a mini session with Ellie.  Maybe I can share a bit with you to help you photograph your own kids. 

Here is the first image.  Typical with her nose right in the centre of the frame.  Starring directly at the camera.  How can we change it up to make it a bit more interesting?  

This one is bit off center and when the subject is looking out of the frame there should be room for them to look into open space.  If you are using auto focus then sometimes when the subject is not directly in the center it will cause your picture to be out of focus because the camera will focus on what is in the middle (in this case the pillow)  which is farther away than Ellie.  So if you are able to you can move the auto focus to an off center point or use manual focus.  

In this image I cropped it so that she is off center by moving her up in the picture.  Your eyes are drawn up to her eyes.  

Some of my favorite shots are when kids are not looking directly at the camera but are engaged in an activity.  

 Ellie started shaking her head back and forth.  So fun. But even on 1000 ISO and a brightly lit room the image of her moving is blurry.  Next time you are at the park try taking pictures of your kids moving like for example on the swing.  If you stand in front of them and they are moving towards you the blur is different if you go to the side and they are swinging from side to side.  

I just popped a bit of flash to freeze the motion.  There is a large window to her right.  A window right behind her and above and a window to her left a long ways a way.  You can see just under her chin that there is a bit of a shadow created by the on camera flash.  When I am at home I am not always 100% technical like I would be for a job.  If I was I would never get any pictures of my own kids!

 Again with flash.  Freeze!

 Without flash.  Blurrier.  Blurry isn't necessarily a bad thing.  Sometimes it can enhance the mood of an image.

 Whhhewww tired out from all the hair whipping.

 Watch some more TV!

 Would you like more tips like this?  Do you have an image you love that you would like to share.  Do you have a photo question?  Feel free to send feedback and questions to corla_rokochy@hotmail.com