Babies are cute and cuddly and make their parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, god parents, aunts, uncles and even neighbors very proud. They manage to make even the grumpiest of people put a smile on their faces. What is the problem with babies? Well, just like small animals, they get older and for those that are around a baby every day the differences are not so noticeable but everything about them changes daily.
So how can you keep those cute images for ever? You can take the cutest baby photos that you can and have a permanent reminder. You can also enter baby photo contests with great shots and share the cuteness of your child with the world. But the problem is how do you take cute baby photos, and ones that are suitable for entering into a baby picture contest? The following gives you a few hints and tips for capturing the right moment.
The Baby:
- Make sure the baby is well rested and not hungry or in a bad mood otherwise your baby contest entries will be have to be for pictures of grumpy babies. Often the best time to catch a little one full of smiles and mischief is just after a meal or bath time.
- When you have trouble taking shots of the active child then perhaps consider sleeping shots. Many baby contest pictures are of sleeping babies. This avoids any requirement to “catch” them in a good mood specifically for picture taking. They are also less likely to move just at the exact moment you are ready to take the picture and this is a definite bonus to your picture taking.
- The age of your baby will impact on the type of shots you can take and even the type of camera. For those that are already crawling, you need to make sure that any movement shots are taken with high speed film for normal cameras. If you have access to a digital camera it must be adjusted to correct settings (read your manual). With a digital camera you can delete those imperfect pictures but with normal film you need to be much more diligent with your shots.
Angles & Formats:
- Make sure that you are on the baby’s level whenever possible. Try not to shoot too many shots from above.
- Make sure the photographs are much more of the baby than the background. The cutest baby photos have more baby than anything else in the photo.
- With digital cameras make sure the “focus” is centered on the child and not on any items in the background.
- Try to take your shots straight on to them, these pictures generally look more lifelike and the ability to zoom in is much improved.
Readiness:
- Every minute of every day can be the perfect moment for that prize wining cutest baby photograph. So make sure to have your camera batteries charged and at the ready as babies will be offering up perfect picture moments continually, it is your job to make sure you are ready as well.
Those perfect pictures will be the moments when you are generally not prepared. During the “awhhh” noise that people make when baby is looking particularly cute are the moments when you need to be pushing the camera button. This is very difficult to achieve without being constantly ready with the camera. These special moments are sad to miss, whether your intention is to have the pictures for yourself or for baby picture contests so you want to try to catch these “awhhh” moments forever if you can.
The Camera:
- As above, the type of camera offers up some restrictions with taking your picture perfect shots. The most economical option is of course a digital camera because you can easily look through all those cute baby pictures and decide which to keep or delete rather than having to print all of them. The digital option also means that should you have the prize winning shot for the baby photo contest you can immediately upload or email the photograph for entry.
- Digital cameras also give you the option to change the type of settings easily, as well as being able to simply adjust any settings of the photos themselves on your computer. Depending on the software program you have you can change your photos to black or white or give different special settings to make the shots perfect for yourself or others.
These are just a few hints of how to gain that picture perfect shot, the rest is easy. Just get that cute child of yours to do all the cute things that they normally do and the photographs are bound to follow. If you are interested in baby picture contests entry check out the internet for places to enter your cutest baby photos. Just remember, regardless of the results, your child is the cutest thing and those memories you are collecting with your photographs will be something to cherish forever.
Michiel Van Kets provides article services for Liz Murphy, webmaster of The Great American Photo Contest, one of the oldest and best baby photo contest websites on the internet. To win $2500, enter your favorite baby photos. Great American Photo Contest provides a safe environment where people can show off photographs of their children and win money just for participating.
