chapter 516

2/3/2019

Child Photography

Super Sunday

Everything is created in an instant. It's the spark of an idea that has made all that we see manmade. Someone at one time imagined sending a television frequency across the airwaves or a binary bunch of digits thru some fiber optic cable to our homes; then it became a reality. 

I wanted to spark an interest in photography in 5 year old Lucas. He took to it as I had imagined and was so pleased when he spontaneously picked up the cam to record Gladys Knight singing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl without prodding.  He instinctively knew this was a special scene, a moment worthy of capture. The angels were smiling again. I can only hope this sense of artful creativity will last a lifetime as it has for me.

Gave him the 2004 Canon Elph like the one that was my primary camera back then. Mine had suffered a water bath while crossing the Adirondack stream at Shelving Rock so I got a cheapo used one on ebay for a few bucks. Knew he'd like playing with the buttons and if he breaks it, no matter.

Some examples of his early handiwork. Super Bowl, Melissa, Shawn, BPa and doggie. I turned it black and white like the shot I took of my GPa at age 12. Yes, I did some adjustments of the lighting as I always do but I did not crop or reframe any of his shots. He has learned by doing - and intuitively realized that you gotta take a lot of bad shots to get a few good shots. When I asked to recover his pictures after a week, he pulled out and handed me the memory card which contained 225 shots.

Mommie and his trusty doggie Mesha, one of his favorite subjects (as was mine).

I think he has a flare for the artistic colors, or maybe it's just flares. Dog on bathroom break in backyard is perhaps one of my favorites.

Then there are the ubiquitous selfies. There's always hope. You know they say even a monkey can take an award winning photo given enough time with a camera. So far, he hasn't lost interest in it after one week and I declare it a big success no matter what. Is there a lesson here, I think so.

Oh yeah, he figured out the video too although I wanted him to stick with still shots first. Not quite Spielberg yet.

Link to Lucas's first video. 

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