Most photographers will tell you that taking a decent (non-smartphone) picture of their own child/children, is very hard, nearly impossible to do at times… There is a thing called ‘Photographer’s Child Syndrome’, and let me tell you, it EXISTS! It is very real indeed (at least in my experience!). For all of the toddler years so far, I’ve been wondering if this is the case with just my child, or if other parent photographers experienced the same…and then I came across this article on a blog by Prop Insanity. It made me chuckle quite a bit at how much I can relate, so thought I will share my personal experience with you too.
My 3year old does not like me taking pictures of him, so if I want to get a decent image of him, I either have to stalk him with my camera from a distance whilst he is playing, or on better days, I may be able to bribe him to give me 5mins 2mins of his time! There has been times that the ‘stalking images’ actually turned out to be some of my faves, capturing him just having fun and being a child, but sometimes as a mum (not just photographer), you want your child to actually look at the camera too… but Photographer’s Child Syndrome kicks in and just when you think ‘got it, press the shutter!’ he will give a shy smile and speed off, leaving you with the back of a head of side profile at best, and you cursing yourself biting your lip ‘why didn’t you just press the shutter sooner’?!
Some of my ‘stalking-type’ images of him (still love it!):
Playing, mostly unawares of mummy and her camera
Just over a week ago, I realised that I’ve never really actually ‘set up photo session’ for my child apart from Christmas… nope. It’s usually just a spur-of-the-moment thing when we are out and about and I happen to have my camera with me. So, I’ve decided one recent morning to grab a few props and head off to a nearby open space, where I had to prep him on our way there that he was going to have a photo session with mummy… as expected, he wasn’t too keen, but then I bribed him with ‘if you sit for a few quick photos, we can go play in the park and have a treat’. So after literally a few quick snaps he wanted out (not giving mummy much time to play with my camera settings even)… he just got up from the little chair and wanted to play in the field instead. I then had to improvise, making a game out of it… told him we can play hide-and-seek but, he must take his guitar and play it, then I will see if I can find him by listening for his guitar – it was worth a shot! And boy, was I happy with the result! As he was walking from hiding-spot to hiding-spot, I just kept my distance taking images… then quickly hid when it was my turn, making sure I still clicked away as he was ‘looking’ for me.
In the end, this was the result, and I love it! 🙂
A boy and his guitar
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