Birthday party - advice needed

E

Ellekes

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468
Name
Vicky
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Hi all,

I'm looking for some good advice on this one. My daughters birthday party is coming up on saturday, and I want to make sure I have some nice pictures after the party. But shooting groups and activities, especially indoors is not really my forte. How can I make sure that there are some good results though?

For info, my equipment is the following:

Canon Eos 1000D
50 mm prime
18-55 standard zoom
crappy 55-250 telezoom (which I hardly ever use due to lack of speed)
Speedlite 430

Thanks for all possible tips!
 
For this sort of thing, just go with the flow - if you try and organise things to produce photographs it'll be a nightmare - just sit back and enjoy the party.
Set the camera on auto+auto-flash and pop away.
The best images from this kind of even are often quite poor photographically-speaking - it's the party that matters most, not the photos of it...

Concentrate on having fun...sometimes we get so hooked-up in recording an event, we forget to experience it...
 
what he said and getting down to your daughters level will make the biggest single difference to your photos
 
Thanks all. I know enjoying the party and getting some nice family photobook snapshots is the main focus, but I would love to get a few exceptional ones. When she blows out the candles, singing happy birthday, that sort of thing.
 
Ellekes said:
Thanks all. I know enjoying the party and getting some nice family photobook snapshots is the main focus, but I would love to get a few exceptional ones. When she blows out the candles, singing happy birthday, that sort of thing.
Click to expand...

Have a quick practice at a mate's house in similar lighting conditions - that way you'll know how to set the camera up to record the candle-light on her face before she blows them out and the lights go back on...
 
as everyone said...be fluid and disappear into the crowd...be ready for snapping good shots i used to get down on the floor with the kids and roll around to take them where they were at...they love it...and you will love the results
 
I was at a party recently and watched a friend taking candid pictures. He used the nifty fifty, and a 430II flash with a CTO gel (very handy) and the shots are superb, very well executed. I can't wait to have a go and hope to use the same methods.

If you are happy using manual, put the flash on ETTL (auto) but bounce it off the walls/ceiling, and if the ambient light is low slow the shutterspeed down a bit, and use an aperture of around f2.8 to get enough DOF for the subject whilst maintaining decent bokeh. If the room is very bright a faster shutterspeed will be better.
 
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