1. Used a remote and tripod for my Canon 5d mark II Last year my husband bought me a tripod for my birthday. Oh I just LOVE it. Some of the most special time with Trey is in the morning. But I am often so caught up in being together I forget to take out my camera. I did set up the tripod one or two mornings, and I tried not to feel self critical when I realized that I was still in my mismatched sleep clothes (somehow spending money on matching pj’s seems like a waste when I could get something nice to wear in public instead). These moments filled with snuggles, giggles, whispers, dancing and reading are moments I most want to capture.

2. I stopped hiding from the camera.

taken by Christina Parisi

Yes I am a photographer, but I am a bit camera shy.  Somehow I find myself not knowing what to do when a camera is pointing at me. This is why I make a point of communicating a lot with people I photograph. It can feel awkward to be in front of the camera especially if you aren’t used to it. Most of my friends and family are so used to me toting the camera, that I rarely get people snapping candid pictures of me (my friend Christina is the best at taking candid pics of me…thank you Christina!), but this year when the opportunity presented itself, I took a deep breath and smiled.

3. I asked my husband to take pictures of Trey and me. Instead of expecting my husband to be mind reader, this year I lovingly asked him to take pictures of me and Trey. You know what? He did it happily.

4. I accepted when people offered to take a picture and even asked people to take a picture of me with Trey. This is BIG! It is really hard to hand over my camera to other people, and most people are uncomfortable being asked since it is not a point and shoot and I am a photographer. Taking photographs is one of the ways I show love, so I can sometimes feel a bit needy asking someone to take a photograph of me. I decided to let that go and just ask. What is the worst thing that could happen? They say no?

5. Used the timer on our point and shoot camera.

GorillaPod was on bridge railing GorillaPod wrapped around the branch of a bush.

I bought a GorillaPod last year and it is fabulous! You can attached your camera to so many things with that little tripod. It took a while to get used to bringing it along, but I sure am happy when I do. By the end of this summer we were really good at bringing the point and shoot along and most of the time the gorilla pod too. I haven’t gotten very creative with it and it still takes a bit to get it set up. I sometimes get a bit nervous and end up rushing and settling for a quick posed group shot.  Practice will make this go smoother…so practice will happen this coming year.

This year as I went through the family pictures I saw more pictures with me included. It got me so excited! This is doable! Not only am I beginning to create tangible memories to enjoy and for generations of family to enjoy, but I am able to see us as a family from a new perspective. There is something so powerful about seeing yourself from the outside. I have so many ideas on how to deeply explore the ins and outs of our days as a family and my life as a photographer. If you are interested in getting a peek into my process I will be sharing lots of details in my newsletter.

A friend sent me a text the other day asking for some advice. She’s headed to Florida with her family for vacation and would like to have family photographs taken on the beach. She wanted to know if I had any tips for finding a good photographer.

As a photographer, I take for granted the things I would automatically take into consideration if I were looking to hire a photographer myself.  Her question was so helpful to me, as it gave me an opportunity to think this through from a client’s perspective.

Whether you are looking for a photograph of your family, yourself or your children, the following tips should help you get the perfect photographer for you…

1. What do you want from your images? Before visiting any photographers’ websites, picture in your mind (or even better, write down a short description on paper of) your “perfect” image. Whether you know it or not, you probably have a vision (it’s OK if it’s a little blurry) of what you are looking for. What is most important? Is it the perfect location, capturing that right “feeling”, the pose, the interaction? When you look through photographer websites, do you get an inner sense they would be able to help create the image you are looking for?

2. Look for a bio and picture. When you look at the sample pictures and read the photographer’s bio, do you have a sudden urge to hang out with her? Having your photograph taken is an intimate experience. You will be hanging out with this person for a couple hours and trusting that she will be able to make you feel at ease. You are welcoming her to see and capture the real essence of your genuine self, as an individual and/or as a family.  You want everyone being photographed to feel as comfortable as possible to get the most genuine photographs.

3.  Ask for a phone consult. This will give you a sense of the photographer’s personality and whether you are a good match. Does the photographer want to get to know you?  Talk about that perfect image you have in your mind and would like them to capture. You can share with them the images you saw on their website that made you feel they would be a good match for you. What specifically did you like about their photographs? This will give the photographer important information about you and your preferences, as they know their own work intimately and will help you both come together in a place of shared understanding on the art you will be creating together.

4. Read Testimonials. Look for a testimonial page on the photographer’s website. See of they have a Google Places page with any testimonials there. Read what other clients have to say about the photographer. Always trust your gut feeling.

5. Get clear on what products you want. Do you need a digital file to use as an author photo, are you looking to have images that tell a story, or do you want something in between? How do you enjoy sharing or displaying your images – this will speak to the types of products you will be purchasing. Some people enjoy sharing their images online and in digital photo frames, while others love looking through traditional photo albums cozied up on the couch with friends and family. Some love to display photographs on their walls while others enjoy making scrapbooks. I suggest writing a list of the ways you plan on enjoying and sharing your images so that when you visit the photographer’s website you can get an idea of how well their offerings match your needs. You also can get a realistic idea of how much you will be investing to get what you want. You want to check for minimum purchase requirements. Many photographers have minimum purchase requirements to buy digital files.

I went to a David Alan Harvey lighting workshop in Brooklyn NY yesterday. I was very interested in learning from a magnum photographer how to light difficult situations, especially now that we are in winter and most of my client sessions are inside peoples homes with limited space and light.  I wasn’t sure how the workshop would be taught, but I was excited and frankly a bit nervous too.

The workshop was wonderful. What I enjoyed most was hearing DAH talk through his process and how he works, while showing us his work. At first I got a bit caught up in trying to get the specific technical details he was sharing, but soon realized that if I could let go of the technical aspects I would walk away with so much more.

The following photograph is from DAH’s book Living Proof. In the picture you see Uptown and Ruckus, unsigned hip hop artists, who “became Harvey’s trusted friends and self appointed guides, bringing him inside their homes and inside their lives”

Uptown and Ruckus came to the workshop to speak about their experience working with David, and to share how they feel about the book. DAH also showed us some of his process by photographing Uptown in the studio. We  got a chance to go outside on the roof top of Ten Ton Studio, to take pictures of Uptown and Ruckus.

National Geographic was there at the workshop as well, in this photo Uptown is being interviewed. You could feel that this experience was life changing for all involved.

DAH spoke about how he keeps his photography and lighting equipment simple. He also spoke about his goal of keeping the number of steps he has to make while shooting as low as possible, both literally and in terms of his lighting and equipment, because the shot is so easy to miss if you aren’t focused.

Over the course of the workshop, I started gaining a lot of insight into ways to fine tune my style. I have talked a bit on my blog in recent posts, about my desire to add a new layer of  candid “life in action” photography to my work. There are so many thoughts and ideas floating around in my head, on where to start. I find workshops and creative gatherings help me see which ideas I should experiment with next.

Here are some of the things the workshop deepened my understanding of and/or brought to my attention:

* When photographing to tell a story. Stay in one place. Accept that I won’t get every shot possible. Commit to the subject. Give the time for the photo to evolve/happen.

* I can use  ETTL mode on my flash to free up time and mental space. This will help me get better  unstaged/life in progress photographs. * A couple of years ago I bought the one light dvd and it opened the door to off camera lighting. In the one light dvd photographer Zach Arias teaches how to use off camera flash in manual mode. It deepened my understanding of the relationship between iso, aperture and shutter speed, and gave me all the information I needed to get an off camera lighting setup. I still prefer natural light but when I need lighting I now have it and know how to use it.

* Take photos with the intention of not editing or cropping. Get the picture right in the camera. I have heard this so many times, but I understood another level of why after the DAH workshop. I have already moved in this direction. At first I had very little understanding of light and how to compose in camera. As I gained better mastery of my equipment and understood light better I no longer needed to correct or crop as much. But I wasn’t really having it as a clear goal in my mind, it just sort of naturally changed a bit. Then I began thinking more about my composition and had enough mental space to actually start looking for distracting elements and to work more on composition, but mostly to simplify and cut down time spent on editing. Yesterday it hit me that I may now have enough knowledge to start learning more about my camera, composition and light. Not sure that makes sense, but I feel like setting my intention to get the shot right in the camera, and keeping that at the forefront of my mind will allow me to claim my work, and my voice. This is probably because for so long I relied on “fixing” my photos in photoshop, and never got out of that mental space even though I was probably ready to a long time ago. This is a mental thing.

* Think about going back to working only with my fastest prime lens (50mm 1.4). This is a suggestion I have heard many times, and I believe it can teach a photographer a lot, no matter where they are in their understanding. I spent about 6 months working primarily with this lens and I learned a lot about composure and played alot with sun flare- one of my deep loves. I moved back to a zoom because I wanted to play more with wider angles and so I started using my widest lens which happened to be a zoom. Now that I am working with a full frame, I think dedicating some time to work with the 50mm 1.4 (my fastest prime) will allow me to deepen my understanding of  how to commit to basic composure and then let the shot evolve. It will also give me more flexibility in terms of using my flash to get the lighting and detail I want, because of the wider aperture, it is so much faster than my zoom.

* Keep studying master photographers and artists work to gain a deeper understanding and appreciation of art, how they grew in their work, and more specifically the art of photography. I have studied many successful business/portrait photographers, but my knowledge of the masters is no where near what it could be. This limits me. It also perpetuates this belief I have that all amazing photographers were amazing right out of the gate.

* Keep looking for opportunities to be around artists and photographers that are waaaaay better than me. This will push me to grow and learn and strive for more. It won’t feel as safe, but it will help me grow. *Thanks to Edite Haberman for a great talk touching on this.

* Don’t be so quick to be convinced I am not good enough. Do not make sweeping judgments and stereotypes, especially about myself. Be courageous and determined, despite insecurities that are bound to arise. This was a bit challenging yesterday, because I went to the workshop feeling a bit intimidated and nervous. This was my first photography workshop with classically trained photographers of this caliber, taught by a magnum photographer. I knew there would be photographers with way more experience than me in attendance. Then the first two photographers I tried connecting with, were pretty standoffish and cold, despite my numerous, and probably annoying attempts to strike up conversation. I am such a warm and gushy person, and often I have a real easy time connecting with people, so when I get a cold reception it sometimes throws me off. Especially if I am already feeling a bit insecure. Being that I always accept I may have read a situation wrong, I often will try again. Well these two ladies clearly did not want to connect. And that is really ok. What I noticed though was that because I was feeling so intimidated in general, I almost fell into a negative abyss. I almost made a stereotype that maybe no “classically trained” photographers would respect/want to talk/connect with me. Maybe “they” weren’t social. I almost took this as some sort of evidence that I didn’t fit. Wouldn’t belong. Should just pack up and go home. How ridiculous is that!? Writing it it out is so embarrassing. But it was a fleeting thought. I had a choice in that moment. Take the excuse, shut down and go back to what I know to be safe, or buck up, toughen up and move on and try to connect with someone else. To wait and gather more evidence before giving up.

So I chose the latter, thank goodness. And you know what? I was wrong. There were many friendly photographers there, and I got to connect with a good handful of them.  *I must admit that having my friend Michelle and her lovely friend Deanna there really helped when the fear was at it’s worst.

* Bounce on camera flash to create shadows. I have bounced my on camera flash to downplay flash strength, or to spread the light, but never did I think to use it to create depth or moodiness. A thank you to Seth Rubin for demonstrating this for me.

I am doing a 365 project and tried this bouncing last night in a completely dark room.

* Practice. I knew this already, but I gained even deeper understanding of it’s importance.

And most importantly,  I learned what I signed up for:

* Learned how to take pictures with hot shoe flash on camera- without that “flashy” look. This picture of Deanna was in a pretty dark broom closet with little ambient light. Hot shoe flash on camera pointing straight at her. This lesson was well worth the cost of the workshop:)

* Learned how to open up dark background using on camera hot shoe flash. Yipee! See before and after?

All in all, attending David Alan Harvey’s lighting workshop this weekend was amazing! I feel so grateful for what I learned, excited about all the things I have to try out, and determined to attend another DAH workshop.

Suzanne asked: “I’d love to know how to photograph animals! The pictures always wind up a blur with crazy eyes.”

My advice: The crazy eyes part gave me a good chuckle. Now I have photographed a couple horses and a few dogs, but I don’t have either as pets. We do have 2 cats and I do love taking photos of them.

Here are 5  suggestions I would give for photographing cats.

1. Put a cozy pillow near a window with good indirect light, see if they will take a snooze there. I know my cats seek out patches of sun, especially our Siamese.The good light means no flash ie-crazy eyes and less blur because shutter speed will be better-hopefully:) I find my phone has a really slow shutter no matter what the lighting so often I get blur with it. You could always throw on a sock monkey hat to really spice it up.

2. Open the front door for good indirect light take a seat and give them some snuggles, maybe they will give you some cute belly shots.

3. Put a teeny bit of butter on paw- could get some cute washing pics that way-may get them to stay still near window/door.

4. If they like to be groomed, give them a good brushing in a well lit entry way or near a window.

5. Put cat nip in an old sock and then rub the sock on a pretty throw rug or under a pretty blanket (near a window or the front entry way with the inner door open. In this weather this only will work if you have a glass outer door) and then capture them in kitty bliss.

If you have any questions you would like me to share my experience about please email me at thea@theacoughlin.com. I would love it if you would share in the comments any tips you may have about photographing your pets.

I am definitely not the end all be all in terms of knowing what to do, in fact I think I still have more questions about photography than answers, but I do have some experience that I would love to share if it will be of any help. Just know there very well may be an easier better way.

I learn so much from others, soif you have a suggestion or experience to share about the tip we are discussing, please leave a comment! If you have a question you would like me to consider for a future post, please email it to me at thea@theacoughlin.com.

On my Facebook page I requested topics for Tuesday Tips.

Renee asked “Any suggestions to get a toddler to sit still in front of the xmas tree??”

Toddler usually refers to 1-3 yr olds. From my experience there is quite a variation amongst children and across this age span. In general though, toddlers are toddling around, exploring their environment and not too keen on sitting still for very long.

I happened to be lucky enough to have photographed Renee’s son Jack when he was a few months old, so I know he is almost 21 months old. I would venture to guess he is pretty quick on his feet but may still be learning how to navigate around and as a result may stumble,bump or pull things down by accident:)

10 tips for photographing a toddler in front of a Christmas tree

1. Plan ahead. You must assume that you will only get a few moments where they are sitting still and looking at you, and this will be the few moments right after you plop them down in the spot, not a few moments each time you readjust them. The longer they are in the same room and the same spot the less likely you will be able to keep their interest. They have places to explore!

2. Have only one person involved in taking the photo. If there is more than one person in the room-especially more than one person trying to direct the toddler, it will result in the child most likely not looking at the camera because they are either trying to figure out who to listen to, or have completely blocked all of you out because it is too much to try to figure out, and the pretty Christmas tree is so much more fun!

3. Use a tripod. I just bought a gorilla pod for our point and shoot and hope to get one for Christmas for my 5d. This way you can set up the tripod aiming right at the spot in front of the tree exactly where you plan on plopping your toddler. In addition, you can interact with your child with one hand on the camera and the rest of you out and visible. Being hidden behind the camera composing the image can lose their attention. If you have a remote shutter, use that too!

4. Use  a prop to get there attention – I stress the “a”, use one prop and introduced after calmly placing them where you want them. If they see the prop before they are in position it may no longer be interesting. If you over stimulate them you can lose them too. Some Christmas bells or one of those hallmark singing displays come to mind as good possibilities.

5. Get animated. If done wrong this can backfire – especially if there are two or more spazzy people at once. Ideal would be if mom or dad calm and nonchalantly bring them into the room, sits them down goes right to preset up camera, puts finger on shutter, and then busts into a goofy rendition of jingle bells or something equally as silly. Remember we want silly not scary.

6. Keep their interest near the camera – if you are using a prop or if you are the prop- be sure you are standing very close to the camera, but are not blocking the camera. This way your darling little one will be laughing their tush off looking toward the camera.

7. Make it a game – if you try the plop and shoot tactic and that doesn’t work, you can always try a game. Peek a boo around the tree comes to mind.

8. Give them a job – if your toddler is mature enough you can give them a job of hanging, ornaments,  cotton balls ie “snow” or candy canes on the tree. Place a bowl on the ground near the tree and show them how to put them on and then sprint to the camera, while encouraging them in a sing song voice.

9. Hide an edible treat on the tree for a couple days – each morning we are at my in laws over the holidays, she hides a treat for each grandchild on the tree. Each morning the kids go right to the tree to find their treat. This could make for a good photo opportunity.

10. Keep trying- expect that it will take a few tries. This way you won’t be too disappointed or frustrated, and maybe your spouse or loved one will decide to hide and video tape you on your next try and you could win $10,000 on americas funniest home videos for your goofy rendition of jingle bells.

I couldn’t help but look back for pictures of Trey when he was 21 months old (Dec 2007).

There are an awful lot of blurry and poorly composed pictures from back then. Good to see where my photography skills were, just 3 yrs ago. Here is one of Trey right after finding his Christmas morning treat on the tree.

Today I needed to come up with a photograph for a magazine assignment. It was a small scale photograph, so I didn’t need to do an elaborate set up. It got me thinking about all the things I have in bins waiting to be put on Craigslist, that could be photographed the same way. Good photographs definitely help sell things on craigslist, don’t you think?

If you have any items you want to sell on craigslist, or artwork/school work from your little ones that you would like to share with grandma or grandpa, this tip may be helpful.

Good lighting is so important when taking photographs. If you shoot on auto you may notice that the darker it is the blurrier your photos are. This is because your camera slows down the shutter speed-keeping it open longer to let in more light. As a result any slight movement will result in blur. Often people think sunlight is good lighting, but in fact direct sunlight creates distracting shadows and is not ideal for most photographs. Indirect lighting is much better!

In most households the foyer is a great place to get indirect lighting! Open the door and see.

For my photograph of  this small collection, I opened the entry way door, I laid down a large piece of white paper and photographed straight down. The open white door acted as a great reflector.

Here is a pull back picture and the resulting image. Even though it is a rainy dreary day, I was able to get good indirect light just by opening my front door.

If your entry way is too cramped or in shade, you can also get this nice light by a window in your home.