Five Frames Beyond

I think that part of the process of getting better is learning to shoot five more frames after you think you’ve got the shot.  Yes, we’ve all lucked out on occasion and gotten one great shot the first and only try.  However, most of the time that is not likely to be the case unless you are a professional or a well practiced amateur.  Here is an example from my house yesterday.  I took the kids to the pool for a few hours and when we came home, my daughter – the girl who never sleeps – was so wiped out she took a nap.  Since she was sleeping during daylight hours, I thought I’d try to snap some shots of her sleeping sweetness.  This is the first picture I took.  A fine snapshot, but not fantastic.  Also, not terribly flattering to her with the up-the-nose, open mouth look of it.

Frankly, at the time I took it, I failed to notice the unflattering angle because I was thinking sweet thoughts of my sleeping angel.  It wasn’t until I saw it on the screen later that I realized that the angle wasn’t a good one.  After I shot this one frame, I noticed how sweetly she had her hands folded in her sleep so I peeled back the blanket a wee bit to get a shot of that.

Then I decided to walk around to the other side of the bed to try a shot from that angle.

 

A much more flattering picture of my girl.  After I snapped this picture, I noticed that she had her arm wrapped around her favorite stuffed kitten so I thought I’d try to get a picture of that little detail because someday it will be a nice memory of her at this age.  She’d had the animal in her arms in the hands shot above, but now she’d moved her hand to rest it on her kitty.

 

I wasn’t satisfied of the way the kitty looked in the frame so I thought I’d try a new angle that allowed my daughter’s sleeping face to be in the same frame with the face of the kitten. 

A much more flattering picture of my sleeping child and it included a sweet detail of her childhood.  This was my favorite picture once I pulled them up on my screen.

My challenge to you when you are photographing your life…  take that first snapshot to make sure you’ve got the moment captured.  Then, if you can, try to shoot at least five more frames to see if you can make it better.