Tips for kids please

[mcnaldo]

My wife and I foster children up to 8 yrs old and I am keen to get a pictorial record of their time with us as the children will need memories in 30+ yrs time so I use film. I have tried several sustainable 'memory capture' options - DSLR, SLR and compact. I need quiet, small and unobtrusive, so after several attempts I have recently acquired a CLE which is fantastic (I have tried a few others since my debut Ricoh KR5 in 1981 - M6 TTL, HX RF, Nik 28/35Ti F100/D200/F5,...). I also have a CL I didn't think I'd like but do. No lenses over 50 as I'm close already.
For the life of me I can't figure out how to get the best from the manual settings on the CLE for this type of spontaneous recording. I can do "at the beach/zoo/party/nursery" ok but the real stuff is day to day at home in the living room catching a glance or expression which will be recognisable to the future adult. My reliance on auto settings is frustrating - I really want to use it creatively as my own interest and skills develop. I'm sorry if this is a well-worn thread but any advice on use or technique would be most welcome. I love the CLE but I have a growing sense I'm missing something.
Thanks

 

[sevo]

It is not wrong to rely on auto settings if these deliver better results... There simply are situations where you cannot control everything at once.

 

[d_c]

To be honest, I wouldn't worry too much about the aperture priority on the CLE being a hinderance, particularly with regard to photographing kids. You still have control compositionally over your depth of field, framing and point of focus, and once you've put enough film through it you'll understand enough how it will deal with the exposure to be exploit it's particular characteristics.
At the end of the day the CLE is a small quick camera, it's light enough that you'll be happy to bring it with you, which hopeful means that it'll be with you when you need it to fix something fleeting on film.

 

[FrozenInTime]

Indoors is always difficult:
By the windows there will be high contrast between in outside and room light levels.
By room lighting alone 1/60s f/2 ISO 800 will get you by during the day and 1/30s at night.
Fuji 800 superia colour negative film is very tolerant of overexposure and is still available from the likes of Jessops.

An alternative is to pick up a small micro 4/3 camera such as the E-P1 and a 40 f1.7.
Digital gives a couple of stops better shadow performance over film.

 

[mcnaldo]

Thanks for the advice. Yes, indoor light is tricky especially the contrast/shadow and yes I need to trust the meter and get used to it by trial and error. I'll try the Superia 800 as I haven't used anything faster than 400 so far. On the digital front, I have a Canon g9 but I'd like to improve my film technique so I'll persevere.
Great forum, thanks again

 

[rover]

Generally I would use the AE and trust the meter to be accurate in those tough lighting situations, unless it lets you down. When you can use a smaller aperture and zone focus so you can be more spontanious. The wider the lens the better for this as the DOF will be greater. You can turn the camera into a P&S, just a really good one. These were with a 28mm lens, and R4a Bessa.

Where you have to focus because you are using a wider aperture or longer lens, remember getting the shot is better than missing it because you are fussing over focusing. Even if you are falling down when you snap the shutter. I got lucky with this one, 35mm lens.

 

[oftheherd]

...

Digital gives a couple of stops better shadow performance over film.

Not to hijack the thread, but that is the first I had heard this, unless you mean a setting that blows out highlights. I had always heard that digital is closer to slide film, having less tonal range.

I use an old 6 MP Sony for a lot of snapshooting of family. I understand you reluctance to use digital, but isn't the likelyhood of their losing prints you give them about the same as any contact addresses or numbers?

For film, I also like the Fuji 800 ISO, which is sold by Walmart and many drug stores at good prices. I use it sometimes in a Leica Mini Zoom or an XA.

 

[Gary Sandhu]

Practice pre-focussing, pre-compose and meter on AE and transfer the settings to manual mode then wait for the moment-- which might not come anytime soon! 1 great picture will be better than a bunch of mediocre ones. No fiddling with the controls with the camera on your nose .

 

[FrozenInTime]

Not to hijack the thread, but that is the first I had heard this, unless you mean a setting that blows out highlights. I had always heard that digital is closer to slide film, having less tonal range.

Based on first hand experience, digital sensors seem to be more linear right down to their noise floor.
Film seems to get progressively noisy, muddy and loose color fidelity long before a digital camera does given the same exposure and ISO.
To compensate I give film more exposure, and this is ok as it retains highlights better.

All my digital cameras even the 4/3 E-P1 and small sensored GRD IV beat my M6 plus summilux indoors at ISO 800.

I found a graph to explain this on the Kodak vision 500 motion film info sheet: showing a grain hump corresponding to the lower end of sensitivity.

http://motion.kodak.com/motion/uploadedFiles/Kodak/motion/Products/Camera_Films/Color_Negative/Product_Info/EKEI-4032_Vision3Sellsheet.pdf

 

[mcnaldo]

Thanks again for the help. I read somewhere that digital will degrade over time and I do have digital images of kids- I digitise many images for portability on an Epson V750. I'm thinking children may be interested in their past 40 or 50 years time.

Thinking again about the CLE, my frustrations can be fixed by more practice with learning the best manual settings for the indoor light and zone focussing. The Minolta just seems to be a bit awkward on auto for me viewing the shutter speed and as I'm on low speeds and minimum DOF, I don't want shaky images. I need to move my eye a bit and can easily lose a shot but manual turns off the meter.
Thanks again for your time and advice

 

[mcnaldo]

Rover, that's what I'm trying for ...great!!

 

[rover]

Thank you.

 

[Graham Line]

Practice is the answer. There are no magic bullets for making pictures of active kids, other than honing your framing and reaction reflexes.

Probably 95% of the photos shot with my CLE are using the AE feature -- that's why I have that body. The only difficulty is confusion with strong backlight -- a bright background overpowers the circuits and you don't get much in the shadows.

But otherwise, I set the aperture to f4 or f5.6, load a fast film, and look for the photo. Just focusing is enough effort, without throwing shutter speed and aperture into the mix.