Hi! It’s Maggie Holmes, member of the 2010 Creating Keepsakes Dream Team. Since I am a photographer, I have a lot of “photo shoots” with my children. And while I do love candid shots (and take tons of them all the time) I also absolutely love to get my kids dressed up and take them out to fun locations to do more formal or planned shoots. But one thing I have realized is that it can be hard to scrapbook the more posed images because they don’t necessarily have a story to go with them. It can almost be harder to come up with a message or story behind the scrapbook page when it is just another smiling shot with no purpose or meaning.
My dilemma is that I still want to use all of these cute photographs, because I love the images! So, the solution I have come up with is to try to tell a story with the images I take, even if there isn’t an obvious story or event going on. I take a lot of different images with different angles and perspectives. I also take some images from far away and some up close. The last (and most important) thing I do is to watch and make sure I capture the more candid or unplanned moments in-between the posed shots. Doing this gives me more to work with than just a typical smiling head shot and it helps create more meaning for me in my images.
Now when I look at a series of images like this, I find myself filled with emotion and thoughts and feelings, all of which give me lots of stories to tell on my scrapbook pages. For example, I look at the photos, and I want to scrapbook about things like:
- How curious she is right now and how much she loves to explore.
- How girlie she is.
- How much I adore those chubby cheeks.
- How she tends to put her fingers in her mouth when she is being shy or silly.
- How she loves to wear her “oh cutes” (that’s jewelry in her terms).
- How much I love that pursed-lip smile she does and always has done since she first started smiling.
- How much fun I have dressing her and doing her hair (the fun stuff that having a girl brings)!
As you can see, now I have much more than just a head shot of my daughter smiling. I actually have a handful of stories to tell, and I have a lot of snapshots that are very meaningful to me and my family . . . even if they were taken at a planned photo shoot! So what are you waiting for? Dress up your family members, your kids, or your grandchildren, and have your very own photo shoot this weekend. You’ll come home with lots of fun stories to tell and even more great memories.
Maggie
P.S. Don’t forget to download today’s font as part of Free Font Friday! This weeks’ font is CK Flower Garden.
I can’t get over how adorable your daughter is!
Thanks for the great tips
Gorgeous photos Maggie! Great ideas too! TFS!
Cute photos & great tips Maggie
I seldom scrapbook event LOs & often tell stories that are more meaningful or capture little things that the photos don’t always convey.
Oh my gosh Maggie – she is SO adorable! I love all your photos! I want to dress her up too – haha! Suzy
Cute photos! Love the unplanned, planned shots.
Thanks for the great tips. I took posed shots of my grandsons last week, and now I have some ideas on how to use the out-takes.
I just love the photos and thanx for the lovely ideas. I think it is fabulous. Even though I don’t even know this little girl, I can think of hundreds of ideas to scrapbook these specific photos, because each and every one tells a story!Great stuff!
beautiful and priceless!
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I just love the unplanned shots. I am so looking foward to taking more planned and unplanned shots of my son and daughter. I also love the red suitcase and yellow tutu! Thanks for the inspiration about looking at the photos for other stories.