Holiday Memories Start with Photos – a Review

It seems like we’ve all been through so much the last couple of years. Last Thanksgiving in the United States, with the COVID-19 pandemic raging, a lot of families opted to cancel their usual big gatherings to protect each other from the virus. Others went ahead with their traditions, then wished they hadn’t. Then there were the lucky ones with the best of both worlds. Quite a few things have changed for this year, access to a safe, effective vaccine being a big one. So maybe this year, traditions can be upheld without as much angst, although modifications might still be needed. Our layouts have gradually shifted to more hopeful thoughts, and the pandemic has been interwoven as a part of life as we know it. This run-up to Christmas and then the New Year may take a bit more planning than before, and planning how we’re going to memorialize our celebrations should be a priority too. We’ve played with a lot of techniques for editing our photos to make them worthy of scrapping, but why not skip a step (or ten)? Let’s review some tips for taking better photos. I know we’ve already talked about that before, but a few reminders probably won’t go amiss. Whether your photos are caught with a point-and-shoot, a high-end DSLR or a cell phone, there are some things you can do to get great photos.

• Right now, right this minute, make sure your camera battery is fully charged. If they’re replaceable batteries, put fresh ones in your camera NOW!
• Make sure you have an empty memory card (fully formatted, of course!) in your camera and a couple of spares so you won’t run out of space. If you’re using your phone, you should move some photos from your internal storage to your computer so you’ll have room for the new ones.
• Think about how your typical holiday events usually evolve. There will be some traditions that are carried out no matter whose house you’re having the celebrations at, so plan ahead to capture those moments. Make a list, if you need to.
• If you haven’t done it lately, review the manual that came with your camera. Review the settings and modes you’re most likely to use for your shots and remind yourself what each is doing while you’re shooting. I use the metadata from my most successful bokeh and full moon shots to set my camera up ahead of time so I don’t miss the shot.
• Practice a few creative techniques that you can memorize so that when you’re ready to take photos of the candles on your dinner table or that gloriously brown turkey, you won’t have to fumble.
• Refamiliarize yourself with your tripod, if you use one. I have two – an aluminum ball-head one that allows infinite adjustments but takes a lot of room and needs to be set up ahead of time and a Platypod Max, which looks like a little travel iron but is actually a very clever and sturdy tripod that can be set up in minutes on any surface. Why use a tripod? It lets you take longer exposures while keeping the images tack-sharp and it lets you be in the photo! Use the built-in timer and get in FRONT of the lens for a change.
• Keep an eye on the lighting. Natural light from a big window is fantastic, as long as it’s not backlighting your subject. This is especially important for those group shots we all love. You want everyone’s face to be evenly lit, without harsh shadows everywhere. So maybe turn on some lamps so your flash won’t be so startling. Shoot a couple of test shots so you can see what needs to be tweaked.
• Get in close to your subject! This “rule is even more valuable when that subject is a child. Get down on their level whenever possible so you capture their best smiles. Shooting from above should be reserved for those special-effect shots, not photos of kids having fun. For the most natural photos of people though, you can use a telephoto lens and shoot them from some distance. (As long as the light is right!) Some of the most memorable photos are those taken when the subject is unaware they’re being snapped. They’re relaxed, and acting naturally; smiles are genuine and emotion is often quite palpable.
• Don’t insist on smiles. You know what I mean… those cheesy grins aren’t going to be your favourite images. Rather than having everybody say “cheese” for your group shots, have them say “family” or “money” or “gotcha”. You could go with a made-up phrase, such as “moldy mozzarella”. Another trick is to tell everyone you’re going to shoot on “3”, then count, “1… 2… (shoot) WHOOPS 3!” then shoot a second shot right after that. You’ll get some natural smiles that way.
• When taking photos of food, again, get in close and vary the angles. Show the flaky texture of that piecrust, the glisten of the done-to-perfection skin on your turkey, the creaminess of your mashed potatoes, the detail of the frosting on your cupcakes. (That reminds me, I need to get some baking done!)
• Do you take photos of your Christmas decor? If you’re getting harsh shadows and lots of glare, you can drastically reduce the odds of that occurring by using a big sheet of white cardboard as a reflector. (Dollar store foam core board is perfect for this.) It’ll bounce and soften the light in your space to produce much more even lighting and much more interesting images. Hold it at an angle to the source of your light (windows, lamps, even your flash) so the light is reflected at an angle too. If you’re using a flash and find it too harsh, you can wrap a tissue around it or in front of it and diffuse the light that way. Here’s where test shots are really time-savers.
• Composition is key for any photo. Remember the rule of thirds, but don’t be a slave to it. Decide what your focal point will be and compose your photo to make it so – use leading lines where possible and don’t forget white space. Crop your photos in the viewfinder – so much less work later! And don’t forget the background. Is there anything growing out of someone’s head? Take a step to one side or the other and recompose.
• Take LOTS of photos. Take several of each subject from different angles and distances so you have a choice of which one is best. More is definitely better!
• This just popped into my head… Instead of an Ugly Christmas Sweater event, maybe this year you could do Ugly Christmas Masks. We’re still masking indoors in public here, with a government mandate. It’s such a small thing, but with such great potential for safer interactions.
• We should take a moment to talk about safety. If you’re taking photos of weather phenomena (like the “atmospheric river” that just devastated the Pacific Northwest), landscapes or nature, do it safely!! People have died trying to take that one spectacular photo. I don’t want it to be you!
• Last but not least, have FUN!

Next week I’ll be compiling a Challenge Spotlight post. Maybe one of your layouts will find its way onto the GingerScraps Blog.

PDF Version : https://bit.ly/3FXyoDW

Plan Your Holiday Photos NOW!

I took a look at the calendar this morning and got a bit of a shock. (I’m sure I’m not the only one losing track of days and dates…) It’s going to be JULY next week! My granddaughter’s second birthday is on Monday, her cousin’s birthday the next day and her big brother’s birthday is the day after that. And of course it means that Canada Day and Independence Day are also next week. So that got me thinking… maybe I should talk about planning your celebration layouts now, so you get the best photos. Even though many of the big events usually held on these national holidays have been cancelled this year due to the pandemic, I’m sure there will be events worthy of documenting. Don’t forget, you can always come back to this post next year for a reminder too. I try to have a rough idea of which shots I’d like to get so I went to Pixabay and had a look for the basic themes for Canada Day and the Fourth of July: parades, flags, food, family gatherings and fireworks. (The photos I found were all Fourth of July – we Canucks are a little less exuberant on our national holiday, but these tips are easily adapted for a made-in Canada celebration too.)

Let’s start with parades, since they’re often in the late morning or early afternoon, and kick off the day’s events. Try to think of interesting scenes you can photograph. Look for people in costumes and try to find a camera angle that will give you an interesting composition. This photo,  taken by the contributor beccajanef, caught my eye because of the Liberty hats. I’d love to have seen the crowd afterward, with all those hats on heads everywhere.

BigBearVacations gave us this shot. What I like about it is that the sun flare conceals the guy walking into the frame on the right, putting the focus on those hero-worshipping kids with Uncle Sam. At first I thought the photobomber should be cropped out, but a second look told me doing that would take away from the scale of the stilt-walker. I always wanted to learn how to walk on stilts, didn’t you?

The amazing Jill Wellington took this photo, which speaks to how patriotism is learned early. The sun flare adds a softness to the photo without distracting from the subject. I love her blue-and-white dress and red bloomers too.

There are so many ho-hum ways to photograph flags. But filling the viewfinder with the most recognizable area of the flag, along with the draping of the fabric, elevates this photo by TechPhotoGal to a much more interesting level. It also shows that you don’t need to include the entire object in your image to create a photo with impact.

When I look at this image, credited to OohhSnapp (aka Angelique Johnson), I get the impression of a huge flag and Angelique standing directly underneath it. It has a definite God-blessed-America feel. It’s a visually pleasing image for sure.

Ah! Food!! When you’re documenting the feast, look for perspectives that hint at how good the food will taste and how perfectly it’s prepared. It’s very easy to take boring food pix… but TesaPhotography (Tesa Robbins) captured a true delight for the eye.  I can almost taste the corn now!

Here’s another I-can-almost-taste-it shots. Here, utroja0 uses both composition and depth of field to give us a visual feast. The skewer in the foreground is in sharp focus and the grill is only partly in the frame. Between them they give the impression of lots of food and incredible aromas.

Here in Canada those ice pops (or popsicles, which is actually a trademark…) are called Rockets. And they’re my favourite. (I lived on them, literally, when I was sick last year.) No cookout or picnic is complete without the sweet finish. What makes this photo, again from the camera of Jill Wellington, so successful are the red-white-and-blue colour palette, the scatter of candy and the creamy background. The drips of melting ice cream hint at the heat of the day too, offering another clue to the kind of celebration going on.

Candid photos are almost always more appealing than tightly posed ones. This scene looks so natural and it’s easy to see the kids are enjoying their picnic with their dad. The background suggests it wasn’t taken in July, but that’s not the point… capturing those special moments when the subject isn’t aware you’re shooting them takes a bit of thought and some stealth, both of which Victoria_Borodinovea managed here. But… if you really want to have a formal-ish, posed group photo, try to arrange your people so their faces from visual triangles, allowing those triangles to overlap a bit. Use a small aperture so that your depth of field is large enough to keep all the eyes nice and bright. Another option is to line the kids up, shortest in the front, tallest in the back. If necessary, have them tilt their heads to one side, alternating sides so you can see everyone’s eyes, then snap away. Everybody will be recognizable in the shot, and everybody should be in focus.

Families who have cottages at the lake or on the beach may include a bonfire in their holiday plans. Photos of these can be incredibly beautiful, but can also be just okay. I like this photo by Free-Photos because it tells the story of a campfire through imagery.

I like this shot for the texture in the charring wood, the heat suggested by the flames and the containment of the firepan. flyupmike created his appealing image by getting in close (I’m hoping he zoomed the camera and not the photographer!) and intentionally cropping his shot in the viewfinder. This gives context to the image. Your could add context to your fire photos with silhouettes, or framing the flames in some way. Zooming in even more closely to capture the intensity of the burning fuel would work too.

Is there any better reason to have a bonfire than to make smores?? This tight shot of a toasted marshmallow, taken by skeeze, would immediately make me want to have a smore – and I don’t particularly like them!

Everything about this photo says “Fourth of July” to me: the flag in the background, the sparklers and the hint of a smile on the only face visible. The depth of field has the sparklers in sharp focus – where it should be, softening everything else into background. Free-Photos got it right again!

Doesn’t this photo just shriek JOY? Jill Wellington knows how to use her camera to capture the most captivating images. She has the children in silhouette to draw the eye into the scene and the upflung arms reveal the excitement of seeing the light show. The fast shutter speed she used froze both the girls and the fireworks, while her small aperture got the whole scene in focus.

Photographing fireworks is a real challenge. For more tips on how to get the best shots, Darlene Hildebrandt offers her tips here. The most important ones are the quality setting, figuring out where in the sky the bursts will appear, shooting into the eastern sky with a medium aperture, starting early in the show to avoid the smoke and using a TRIPOD. You want that camera stock still to get the best images. I just checked out the camera on my Android phone and it has some pro settings I’m going to have to play with. Our new house will give us a ring-side seat for any fireworks in our city, since we’re halfway up a mountain with nothing built behind us!

I’ve been gathering ideas for future tutorials and have some great ones lined up, so stay tuned!