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Picture This : Tips for Great Photos of Kids with Your Phone

two boys standing on a golf course

10 Minutes and 10 Tips for Better Photos

Sick of the selfies? Trying to get just one good family photo for the holiday card? Did you ever get through the holidays and realize you didn’t slow down long enough to capture a special memory? Or maybe you took photos, but none of them do justice to the magic that occurred. You aren’t alone!

We can’t all have the talent of a professional photographer, and kids are extra tough! They move quickly, they make silly faces, and they lose patience with being posed (insert pre-teen eye roll here). But even beginners can learn to take better, and maybe even spectacular, photos! If you have 10 minutes, we’ll share 10 tips to get great photos of your kids with your phone.

Working at a school with 450 adorable children and a constant need to tell their stories, Marketing and Communications Director Anne Henry at Foothill Country Day School has become an expert on finding photos that capture joy. Here are her 10 tips that will help you capture the magic of the season:

1. Be intentional about the photos you want to capture. The best photos are NOT posed. Professional NYC photographer Omar Gonzalez shares practical tips for capturing natural photos of children without fake smiles, and bored poses.  Youtube Video (5 minutes).   

2. Decide on your orientation: landscape or portrait? In general, landscape photos are great for framed photos, but portrait orientation is better for immediate Instagram or TikTok sharing.

3. Set up the grid function on your phone camera in advance. That way it will come up every time you open the camera. On an iPhone, you can find it at settings>camera>composition>grid. This tool can will eliminate crooked photos, but even more importantly, it is a visual cue to be intentional. It is a reminder to take a few seconds to plan your photo before hitting that shutter button.

4. Clean your lenses! Try Jinkies for humorous (yes, funny!), non-scratch, microfiber cloths. I have one of these with me all of the time.  https://nerdwax.com/collections/jinkies

5. Hold your phone like a camera: both hands, no fingers on the lenses.       

6. Look away from busy backgrounds. Piles of toys or food on the table distract from your subject. If you can move around and get the shot from another angle to avoid the mess, do it!    

7.  Find the light, and be aware of the direction it comes from. Light is MAGIC. Most photos fail because they are too dark.

8. Use the Rule of Thirds to set up your shot in more interesting ways. The Rule of Thirds is an art and graphic design concept that helps you visualize composition. It breaks up your “canvas” into 9 equal squares. Usually, the center of the frame is NOT the most interesting photo. An example of this is the photo at the top of this page. The boys on the golf course were photographed by a teacher who put the boys' faces just off center so you can see the slop of the golf course behind them. If you turned on the grid function in your camera (see Tip #3), it is showing you the Rule of Thirds. Learn more HERE. 

9. Move. Get closer to your subjects. Even CLOSER.

10. Only use the lenses that come on your phone. Most phones today have at least one zoom lens and sometimes 3 or 4 options. Get familiar with yours, and avoid using your fingers to “pinch and zoom”. Your phone camera was designed to take fabulous with the tech installed. When you pinch and zoom, the clarity is unpredictable.

Bonus tip: Practice before the big day! Choose a subject. It could be anything – a rock, a human, a building, or a plant. Take a photo as you normally would. Then force yourself to take 4 more photos of the same thing, but this time you must choose a different angle, different light. For example, get on the ground, get above the action and look down at the subject, or look through a tree branch or a window pane. Try focusing on the background instead of the subject. Put the light to the side of your subject. Move our camera so the subject is in a different square in the Rule of Thirds. You are building a new habit of looking at the world in a different way, and practice makes perfect!  

You will find yourself seeing the world in a different light, and your photos will be much more interesting! 

Want to learn more about Foothill Country Day School?

Foothill Country Day School is a preschool through 8th grade school in Claremont California. Founded in 1954 by Howell Webb as a private independent school, Foothill offers the best education in the Inland Empire. We are educating the next generation of society's leaders in an environment of inclusivity and respect for all cultures. No matter what their talents, or what paths our students choose, they have the tools to become leaders. Get to know Foothill on our website and on Facebook & Instagram.