My thoughts on the craft, the process and the subjects
I went into a false mirror room with my daughter when we visited an amusement park in Voronezh. This was a first time for her, and she really enjoyed it, but I think part of the fun was that I brought my camera and tried to snap as many photos as I could, capturing her reaction to the funny reflections.
I have been thinking about shooting a photo documentary of some sort, and recently decided to take an opportunity to practice by taking pictures of my daughter, who has been enjoying baking with her grandmother. I read
The reception at my conference in Genoa was held in the Aquarium, one of the largest in Europe. At that time, I realized that the most interesting photos of aquaria are actually images of the visitors, not the actual exhibits of fish, reptiles, etc. While the panorama of Genoa at sunset that I shot from the rooftop of the aquarium was impressive, I did not find many photogenic subject inside the exhibit itself.
A couple of weeks after, when we visited a much lower-profile “oceanarium” in Voronezh with my family, I shot almost exclusively my daughter enjoying the site, and the opportunities for interesting (from my, very subjective, perspective) shots were numerous.
From the technical standpoint, flash photography is usually not allowed in aquaria, so a fast lens is a must. I used my Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L USM 
The main challenge in shooting candid portraits is the lack of control in general (in terms of composition, lighting, etc.) This also applies to the colours in the image – the clothes of the subjects and the background. Sometimes, the colours are so loud and clashing that the best thing to do is to ignore them during the shoot, and simply convert the image to monochrome in post-processing.
When taking family pictures on a holiday like Mother’s Day, it is best to let the children and parents interact and play naturally, without imposing on them with lighting, wardrobe and posing directions. The profound nature of our relationships with our mothers makes it difficult to convey this connection in a picture, which freezes only one short instant in the relationship. It is common knowledge that conventional, posed family portraits are often boring (partly, because they reflect the experience of taking these photos – tired parents, uncooperative children, stressed-out photographers…) On the other hand, a candid portrait can potentially provide a unique glimpse of a genuine emotion that connects the family members through their “normal” interactions.
The same argument applies to adults (in this case, parents.) Despite the wide-spread obsession with selfies, typically, our mental self-image is different from the more objective view provided by the camera. This is why we often don’t like how we look in photographs. Accepting the image of oneself as others see it takes practice. A positive side effect of being photographed regularly is that we can learn which poses, camera angles, clothes etc. are most flattering for us and repeatably reproduce those conditions. Thus, we can objectively become more photogenic.
Russian photographer Elena Shumilova became famous online for idyllic portraits of her children that she has been taking at a farmland in beautiful golden light. Recently, she shared her thoughts on what makes a good children’s portrait.
Elena also notices that the most photogenic age is between three and five years old. This is a bit sad, as time flies incredibly fast, and my daughter will soon outgrow this “golden window.” Perhaps, focussing on child photography when his/her own children are of the most photogenic age is a good strategy for a parent-photographer.
Elena’s other suggestions are regarding persistence in photographing children and avoiding brightly-coloured, distracting clothes. Both are deceptively simple and obvious. In practice, even such trivial thing as wardrobe selection can be tricky, as modern children’s clothes are often overly bright and covered with cartoon characters and company logos. If we want to be able to capture spontaneous, genuine images that would have some artistic quality on a moment’s notice, it is not sufficient to keep the camera handy and have a good sense of composition. We also have to be conscious about colours, fit, etc. while picking the children’s clothes.
As I was taking headshots of colleagues from the mathematics department for their website (in case it is not obvious, the photos in this post are not of them), couple of things became apparent: (a) many math professors wear glasses; and (b) glasses are a big part of people’s image, and they are attached to them. From the photography standpoint, glasses are problematic because they reflect light and produce glare, which obstructs the eyes.
However, if removing the glasses is not desirable (see observation (b) above), it is useful to take into account the direction of the dominant light source. Specifically, it is easier to avoid the reflections in eyeglasses, is the subject is illuminated by broad lighting, where the most illuminated side of the face is the closest to the camera. In this case, the subject is facing away from the dominant light source, so the reflections of this light source are directed away from the camera. Broad lighting is the opposite of short lighting, where the most illuminated side of the face is farthest from the camera. It is more difficult to avoid the glare in eyeglasses in the case of short lighting.
The photoshoot at the grand opening of our university’s new athletic centre turned out to be much more excited than I expected. I only had about an hour to spend shooting during the lunch break of a research workshop that I was attending across the campus.
In retrospect, climbing seems to be a very photogenic sport. It is a skill that is well worth learning, even just to gain better opportunities to shoot those, who are really good at it.
Note: Our university’s media officials asked us not to publish the photos, so they could use them first to promote the new building. So the photos in this post are, in fact, from another gym.
The next day, I looked back at the set that I selected, and was surprised at how random and incoherent it was in terms of the subjects, the techniques, the composition. Perhaps, it reflects my overall experience from this trip: random, contrasting images of Eastern and Western architecture, rich and poor streets, hot days and cool nights,..
It seems that Shanghai is full of great opportunities, but people living there are prevented from grasping them. For me also, those few days away from the university were an opportunity to collect my thoughts, both on research and in general, to slow down and enjoy the new and exotic place. In reality, the trip was a bit of a blur: I missed my family a lot, and the conference was a rater high-level meeting, where we did not get into the specific details of our research.
The biggest positive aspect for me personally was the chance to get to know my colleagues, some of whom I have worked with for years. During our walks through Shanghai, we talked about children, and photography, and books, and movies, and work, and travel, and languages, and music,.. I would not say that doing so is enough to really form personal friendships, but it is a healthy start, without a doubt. “Collegiality” is a somewhat nebulous term in the academe. I read somewhere that you do not really form a working collaboration with someone until you share a meal together. Exploring an new city together is probably even better.
During my second visit to Yu Yuan Gardens, the light was much more conducive to photography than during my first visit two days ago: diffused sunlight through slightly close cover instead of harsh mid-afternoon sun.
Since I have already seen the gardens themselves, I ended up taking many more photos of tourists taking selfies with their smartphone. This seems to be a universal preoccupation and could probably make an interesting focal topic for travel photography.
