I am a detail oriented person by nature, and motherhood has done little to change that. I have a habit of studying my children in snippets—as in, I’ll take an extra moment to notice how my 3-year-old’s eyebrow arches just like mine, instead of noticing the entire expression on his face at once. Part of me feels like if I focus on one thing intently for a few extra seconds, without distraction, I’ll always be able to remember it exactly that way.
Capturing your kids in full portraits is absolutely important. But their faces don’t always tell the story that you’re seeing. You may not be focused on their spaced-out expression while watching a cartoon, but rather, the way the light catches their hair to reveal it to be the exact color of their dad’s. Or, as you tidy up after them, you notice the way they arrange their dolls just so, every time.
Taking time to capture those details in your images is a way to remind yourself of how YOU saw your children at that moment in time. It’s how you immortalize the little things you know may change tomorrow, and want to be able to freeze forever.
Here are a few tips for distilling those details down into images you will cherish:
• Leave your child out of the frame. Do they have a favorite lovey? A habit of precisely lining up their little cars on the windowsill? Then find a way to shoot that, on its own. This is the easiest kind of detail to capture, because your subject stays where you put it. Don’t feel guilty about not being able to capture a scene at the exact moment it happens (as in the case of a doll arrangement, for example), and having to reconstruct it for the photo later. The image will still be meaningful, even if it is a “do-over”.
• Don’t fear the head chop. Sometimes a child’s body language is all you need to capture in order to convey what’s going on, and excluding their faces helps keep the focus on that.
• Composition is still important. Although lifestyle detail shots usually feel more spontaneous than fully staged ones, it’s still important to clear (or crop) clutter and frame your subject thoughtfully.
• Light is also still important. Take the image of my son’s “fauxhawked” hair, for instance. I tried shooting from a few different angles, most of which resulted in flat lighting and obscured the silkiness and fineness of his little strands, the exact features I was trying to capture. I still had to find the light, even for a tiny subject.
So the next time you walk by your child’s room after he’s left for school and you notice that, yet again, the bed is disheveled and there are books strewn everywhere, go grab your camera before you head in to clean up—years from now, the bed will be much bigger and the books may be gone, and you’ll be glad you can look back on it exactly as you saw it today.
Great suggestions! Thanks Parikha!
Love these ideas!
Great post and tips! TFS!
Thanks for the reminder to capture those precious details! These images are so sweet and the processing just lovely!
Love these ideas and the images that go with them 🙂
What a great blog post! Details are easy to look over but ones that I treasure the most <3
Oh my Parikha, this was so inspiring to read and your photos are lovely! Thank you for sharing your thoughts!! <3
Great post, great reminders for us!
love this. omg..that last paragraph got me. i love that.
Beautiful work and gorgeous details Parikha! Thanks for sharing!
Awesome read! Thanks for this Parikha!
Parikha wonderful article, I especially love that last paragraph – so true. Gorgeous images too! <3
Great post Parikha <3 Really love taking a shot of the toys WITHOUT the kids…
LOVE this. I pay particular attention to detail too but don’t always shoot and capture that detail. Thank you… I will now:)
I loved reading this, Parikha! <3 That last paragraph got to me too – as photographer's we always want to clear the frame but sometimes we need to remember things just as they are. What a beautiful sentiment!! <3
Love this article, Parikha! I’m a detail-oriented person as well, and really appreciate your practical advice and examples. Beautiful images too, as always!
Great post, Parikha!! A lot of good thoughts for me to keep in mind. 🙂
Perfect reminder, Parikha, that those little details are what make up our days and definitely are worth documenting beautifully! Thanks for sharing these tips here!
OMGosh! The last picture is PERFECT! Great blog post, it’s a reminder to slow down and capture the moments!
Love this, thanks for the suggestions and the beautiful photos!
Parikha! This was wonderful, thank you for such great (and beautiful) reminders 🙂
Oh, Loved this! Beautiful images too!
Love this! Love all those little moments & the reminder to capture them ALL!
So true! I needed this reminder today to go look for what my son has been in to 🙂
Great article Parikha…love the baby feet shot! And and great reminder to remember those special everyday details.
Wonderful suggestions! I can not wait to try some of these!!
Lovely post Parikha! A great reminder on many fronts.
Thank you so much for this post, truly inspiring and lovely images!
Omg I love this! I feel inspired 🙂
Lovely article and images! I really love your post-processing!
Great article. I so needed this. Thank you.
So true Parikha. Thanks for reminding us to take time to look at all the details!
A new perspective is very refreshing. Thank you.