2 Month Daughter - Take 2

[Eegs]

Well, this isn't much better, but...

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/iamanoffering/2249610418/" title="2_months_curious by iamanoffering, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2179/2249610418_5550daa93f.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="2_months_curious" /></a>

The photo originally came out pretty dark..I adjusted the levels to get this one.

I'm looking for advice on how to take better pictures with these conditions: I have no external flash, we're in the middle of winter with not much sunlight right now and we don't have the biggest windows in our house either, and I'm a beginner!

Any tips on how to make the best of what I have? Jimminy Clickit mentioned using a reflector, but I'm not sure what to use or how to go about doing that.

Original Exif:
1/50
f/5.6
iso: 200
55mm
Flash Fired

[jdany]

Try to drop the shutter speed as much as posible I use 1/30 whenever I can this will allow the aperture to open. Also don't be afraid to bump the ISO to 400. And if your camera support it play around with light compensation. Ofcourse keep an eye on your white balance otherwise you endup with yellow pictures:

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdany/1976396249/" title="Untitled by jDany, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2253/1976396249_3fe7ae5ab2.jpg" width="333" height="500" alt="" /></a>

Exposure: 0.033 sec (1/30)
Aperture: f/1.8
Focal Length: 50 mm
ISO Speed: 1600
Exposure Bias: 1 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire

[Eegs]

Very nice! Thanks for the tips, very helpful. What was the white balance on that shot?

[Nicole]

Actually, while you should keep an eye on your white balance, it can also be really useful to use a white balance for a different situation in order to help improve the colours. While I think that this is a very nice looking photo, I also think the colour balance is a little on the cool side. If you use a white balance set for "Shade" it should actually warm the picture up a little bit. :)

For extra light, there's no reason why you can't work with the lights in your house :) Go to the brightest room, drag an extra lamp or two into the room and soon you'll have enough light to take pictures at a fast enough shutter speed and without using a flash.

For what it's worth, your picture still looks nice after adjusting the levels, it doesn't suffer from much noise (at least at this size). If you have the ability to do so, you may also try adding a warming filter in your editing program of choice to give your baby that warm, pink baby colour glow. :)

[jdany]

Very nice! Thanks for the tips, very helpful. What was the white balance on that shot?

I believe it was set to automatic.

[mattdm]

The photo originally came out pretty dark..I adjusted the levels to get this one.

I'm looking for advice on how to take better pictures with these conditions: I have no external flash, we're in the middle of winter with not much sunlight right now and we don't have the biggest windows in our house either, and I'm a beginner!

One thing you might try is holding a piece of white typing paper or a coffee filter a few inches in front of the flash. The camera should automatically compensate for the increase in flash brightness required (haven't tried this with Canon, so your mileage may vary) and this will provide a much nicer diffused light.

You might even do some folding or DIY construction to hold the thing in place — see for example http://www.diyphotography.net/diy-built-in-pop-up-flash-diffuser .

Or, you can buy some cheap plastic gizmos designed to give this same effect (http://www.stofen.com/Info/omniflip.htm or http://store.garyfonginc.com/puf-01.html), and they may be worth it for the convenience of holding the diffuser in the right place without any fuss. (I haven't tried either of them.)

Also, this isn't exactly working with what you have, but have you considered getting the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II? It's only $80, and at ~ 50mm, it'll let in 3¹/₃ more stops of light, which is to say 10× more. That'll let you keep the ISO low without requiring the flash, and still get good shutter speeds, and you'll have the advantage of being able to blur out backgrounds.

(Since you don't have image stabilization, you probably should avoid going slower than 1/50th of a second at 50mm simply to avoid blur from hand shake — but if your kid moves as much as mine do, you need faster than that anyway just to keep your subject still.)

[jiminyClickit]

Eegs,

Whatever your light source, if the opposite side of a face is in a shadow, hold anything white, flat, and about 18 inches square on the side away from your light source and reflect light back on your subject. Window on right side? Hold reflector in left hand and angle towards subject's shadowed side.

[KathrynWilson]

The only real tip I can offer is to get as much light as you can from the windows. I would think you're better off to up your ISO so you can get a faster shutter speed.

However, this is a lovely shot of her beautiful eyes, which have nice focus!! I have done a little play that highlights that, and may I add that though this is edited, I didn't boost the saturation to get that color in her eyes. I tried to even out the skin tones a bit too, and recropped.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2003/2249244225_22aa5c2ae1_o.jpg

[Sela]

Also try a different angle, it looks like you're shooting from below your daughter's face, shooting from slightly above usually produces better results (you can see that's how the nice example pic in this thread was shot)