Re: Photographing Kids
If you read into the article again you will notice many methods to distract children under various circumstances. Children are just small people and have the same mood swings as anyone else and some simply have a propensity for bad behavior. Understanding some of theses behaviors is part of the job of a photographer who specializes in children’s portraiture or does a lot of family work. Of course, much of this depends on the child’s age or stage of development. 2 and 3 Year olds will oftentimes say “NO” to everything- just to stay on the safe side.
Nowadays, in families, in many cases both parents have to work and place their kids in daycare. Many of theses children feel abandoned at times and when their parents are with them, they may experience a barrage of medical appointments for shots, dental visits, haircuts, and all sorts of encounters that they don’t particularly enjoy. By the time the kid gets to your studio the poor thing is a wreck full of fear and anxiety. Parents oftentimes lie to their kids and tell them things like “the shots wont hurt” and when they do sting a bit the child looses trust in his or her own parents. The same parents will then turn around at tell the poor kid that “the photographer won’t hurt you” and the kid is thinking “yeah right mom- just like that dude in the white coat who just finished shoving a needle in my rear end and it still hurts after 3 days”!
Sometimes I think that the kids misbehave because the really DO want to take revenge on their absentee parents. Many times the “nanny” does a better job of calming down the kids than the mom- what does that tell you? Sadly enough, there are children with behavioral issues such as attention deficit disorder or hyperactivity and sometimes they are just spoiled silly. Some kids are just plain shy and need lots of cajoling to get them to do what you need them to do.
NEVER ASK A RELUCTANT CHILD TO DO ANYTHING- THEY JUST WON’T FOLLOW COMMANDS. When you are confronted by a difficult child simply choose you method as described in my article such as acting like an idiot, bribing with forbidden pleasures, hitting, throwing things up in the air, making up silly stories, asking silly questions, balancing things on your head, making animal sounds, playing with toys or whatever method seem age-appropriate to you. Carry on theses activities in the direction where you want the child to look or turn his or her head- don’t say “look at the camera” and delete the word “smile” from you vocabulary unless you want the child to look like a jaccolantern with a hideous fake grin- real smiles come from your entertaining them.
If you enjoy working with kids, they will pick up on that and you will usually prevail. If you hate it, they will pick up on that as well and they drive you right into the old asylum. Hey- I never said this was easy work!
I hope this helps. Ed
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