Nick Kelsh

Photo by Nick Kelsh

Here is a story about the birth of Nick Kelsh's son. Nick Kelsh is the author of How To Photograph Your Baby. Here is another of my blog posts about Nick Kelsh.

Teaching Photography and Nick Kelsh

This fall I am teaching Comm 220 Basic Photography at Harding. I have a small class and I am really excited about the semester. Tomorrow I am lecturing on the very basics of how to take photos and no one teaches that better than Nick Kelsh. I found his book How To Photograph Your Baby when Jenna was a baby. Kelsh gives three basic rules for good photography.

1. GET CLOSER: especially physically closer don't just zoom in tight move closer.

2. TURN YOUR FLASH OFF: Let the natural light sculpt the image with highlights and shadows. Kelsh suggests window light or softly diffused directional light. I apologize to all my Strobist friends,but, Kelsh says no to flash.

3. SHOOT MORE PHOTOS: the more you shoot the better photos you get, work on a variety of photos including vertical, horozontal, wide shots, tight shots, and shots from different perspectives.

New Photography Book

Yesterday I got to spend a little time at Barnes & Noble. I love going into true bookstores, here in Searcy we just have Hastings and they are more about video rentals than books. I found Baby Photography Now on the shelf beside my favorite photography book ever: How To Photograph Your Baby by Nick Kelsh. I also got to look at Ansel Adams 400 Photographs which is a very cool book as well.

Sunsets Never Get Old and a Photo Lesson

I was driving to jail tonight to get things ready for church and I saw this beautiful sunset. Lucky for me I had my P&S camera with me and my iPhone. As Jay Maisel would say, “Carry a camera. It’s tough to take pictures without one.”


Picture #2 is a wide shot of the previous sunset. I tell my class all the time, there are more pictures out there you just have to find them. This one was easy. When I ask my class for Nick Kelsh Rule #3 they all chant in unison "take more pictures." I took about twenty photos of this sunset before it slipped away. Sometimes you have to work fast.


Now,I know your thinking I have lost all sense of taste with this image, but let me explain. I have been telling my class that you have to develop the ability to see the world in 3D. I mean you have to imagine what the subject might look like from a different place. I mentioned that I was driving to jail when I saw the sunset and the beautiful tree skeletons. I had to drive a ways before I could pull off the road and the parking lot was the wrong angle. I headed out into the field because that is where my 3D radar told me I needed to be to get the trees and the sunset to line up. This really ugly photo shows how far out in the field I had to go to get things to line up. This 3D idea is not rocket science. Sometimes you just have to keep moving around your subject or move until your subject lines up like you want it to.


Remember I mentioned that there are always more pictures to take. Hello, I was standing in the middle of a field of tall grass. Pay attention to whats around you.

I am sorry this post seems like a little rant. I just get frustrated when people don't try to make their pictures more interesting. The world is filled with wonder and with a little effort great photos can be had.

Thanks for reading.

3 Ways to Get an Offbeat View

Originally uploaded by jeffmontgomery

When I am teaching photography I am always saying that there are more photos there than people are taking. I suggest trying both verticals and horizontals, wide shots and detail shots, wide and detail in vertical and horzontal. Shoot profiles, front lighting backlighting (silhouette). Try something different. Well as I wait on Lightroom to convert a bunch of raw files to jpegs I am reading the June 2007 Popular Photography and I see this short little column called Prescription For Better Photos by Timothy Edberg.

3 Ways to Get an Offbeat View

1. Take a Worm's Eye View

2. Take a Bird's Eye View

3. Take a Inside Out View

There it is use these three rules with Nick Kelsh's 3 rules and have a fun weekend photographing.

How To Photograph Your Baby -Revised

Nick Kelsh has revised his classic photography book to include digital discussions. This is the 10th anniversary of this must read photo book. I have given the earlier edition book to many friends for baby gifts. I have loaned out and never gotten back I don't know how many copies of this book. The lessons contained are practical for every level of photographer. When you get a chance check it out.

Lucy, Camera Timeline, and a Decisive Moment

This is another small grouping from my last roll of film. Lucy is taking my picture as I am taking her picture. A very normal thing to do. She is using a very old 3MP Kodak camera. That was the third digital camera that the office bought. The first digital camera was a Kodak DC290 a 2MP p&s camera that we paid about $500 for and a 48MB CF Card that we paid $150 for in 2000. After the Kodak 290 we bought a 3 MP Nikon 990 because it had a manual exposure mode which was a big help in controlling exposure. After we bought the Nikon My boss started using the Kodak which he wore out shooting Optimist Club events. The Kodak no longer worked but Kodak offered a rebate to buy back a bunch of their cameras and they were paying $250 for the DC 290. I called and checked to see if it had to function and was told there were no conditions on taking the cameras back. So we traded the DC290 in for the Kodak DC 4800 and only had to pay $50. After the Nikon 990 we stepped up bigtime to a Nikon D1X in 2002. We later added a D100 and Then the awesome D2X and D2Xs.

Just as Lucy was about to take my photo Jackson put his hand in front of her lens and I got this decisive moment. You have to be thankful for motor drives. I was using my Canon T70 film camera so motor drive might be a stretch. Auto winder is more what that camera has since it operates at about a frame per second. I love the total look of disgust that she is giving Jackson. I feel the same way, it is never funny to put your hand in front of someones camera lens.

In this last picture, Lucy is giving Jackson the you better not mess with me because you will loose look. One of the reasons that I got this sequence is that I am staying with the subject and the action which is easier with a film camera because you can't chimp. The other reason that I got that sequence is that I am a highly trained professional- at least that is what I tell my boss when he asks how I got some cool photo. I often refer to Nick Kelsh and his three rules for great photography and rule three is shoot more photos. I would be out of line to not give credit for The Decisive Moment to Henri Cartier-Bresson.