By Kristi York
When I asked professional photographer Julie Tauro for some sample holiday shots of her three children, she flat out laughed. Although she has owned and operated her Kitchener-Waterloo studio, Tauro Photography, for more than 10 years, she confessed that when it comes to pictures of her own kids, “it’s a case of the cobbler’s children—no shoes for us!”
After a bit of digital digging, Tauro did find a few candid shots on her iPhone, and was more than happy to share her thoughts on holiday photography.
To start, she has some “big picture” advice for parents feeling stressed about getting the perfect shot of their little one, to preserve the memories of this special time of year.
“Just enjoy the process of taking photos of your children,” says Tauro. “You want to capture moments and expressions in your photos, not necessarily perfection. Those images will mean far more to you later on, when your children are surly teenagers who don’t bounce out of bed on Christmas morning.”
Next, she offers some general tips when you do pull out your camera:
Photo by Julie Tauro
In addition, Tauro suggests these special considerations if you’re “tapping” (rather than snapping) pictures with your smartphone:
Photo by Julie Tauro
Finally, while smartphones are a wonderful repository for photos (and an easy way to show images of your little one to friends and relatives), Julie implores parents to “please print your photos. I have heard too many sad stories about people losing their photos to corrupted phones or hard drives. It is simple and inexpensive to upload your images to an in-store photo lab and pick them up a few hours later. You will enjoy them for years to come, rather than just for a day or two on Facebook. My teenagers love pulling out the photo albums and flipping through them.”
Candid family photos courtesy of Julie Tauro’s personal collection. For more information about Julie’s professional work, please visit www.taurophotography.com. For Kristi York’s adventures with DIY Christmas card photos, click here.