Kids Make the Darn'dest Pictures

[Dawoofo]

A couple of months ago I was asked to be the photographer of a local annual Kids Fishing Tournament. Sounded like fun, and I thought "I can do that!" and it was the most fun I've had in a while—more than I imagined. :) I was going through the bushes, over the rocks, trying to get some quality candids as well as a few pictures where I was spotted but that turned out okay, and nearly got hooked several times as the kids repeatedly reeled in and recast with their enthusiasm to hurry and catch the big one. :p The parents were all hoping their kid's picture would be the one selected for the newspaper, but there were nearly 300 kids there. Anyway, the day went from sunny to cloudy to raining and then back to cloudy...kind of a challenging trying to switch WB and ISO with all the activity going on. Trying to get all the age category winners to look in the right direction and hold still with their trophies for the group photo was enough to make me want to chew my lens cap. :D What a blast though!

C & C appreciated.

[Dawoofo]

I've never seen such consentration and skill balancing on a styrofoam cooler, holding a fishing pole, and eating a popsickle. :D

[Dawoofo]

Fishing ain't just for boys. :p

[Dawoofo]

At the end of the day, it was time to load up and check in at headquarters for the weigh-in. I think the biggest fish caught was whopping 1.8 pounds, and that probably included the plastic bucket they put the fish in to weigh it. :D

Edit: hmm, looks like I set the JPEG compression a bit high in a couple of these for posting... :o

[adam75south]

these are all really great pictures. the second is my favorite. my only criticism would be to do a tighter crop and take out the lady in the background. also they could all use a little bit of sharpening.

[AdamW]

The little girl with the band-aid on her forehead--man, that facial expression is priceless!

[Dawoofo]

Thanks guys.

Yeah I see what you mean about the crops and sharpening, Adam. In the past I'd use Photoshop and reduce them with "bicubic sharper", but I strictly used DPP on these and lost some sharpness I think on the reduction without manually bumping sharpness back up.

I was using "standard" picture style and bumping the contrast up and down depending on clouds/shade/sun, but in retrospect I wonder if "landscape" style might've looked better for these types of outdoor shots. These were taken as JPEGs instead of RAW (I took a few hundred shots that wouldn't have fit on my card in RAW—going to upgrade soon) or I could've seen how it would look in DPP...

LOL yeah, I got three pictures of the little blonde girl and she had the same expression on her face in each one...even though she didn't have her fishing pole I couldn't resist. :)

[toriaj]

I _love_ #4. What a sweet shot, Dad helping son learn to fish.

You might want to watch the framing, though, to try to avoid cropping out just the feet.