Every other Thursday night, my friend Bree and I go and volunteer at a shelter in Phoenix. We entertain the kids, so that their parents can have a break from them for a couple hours. I try to think of fun activities or games or stuff to bring that they would like. It's kind of hard because you never know if you will show up and it will be mostly babies or if it will be big kids. Lately it's been mostly very little kids. When we first started volunteering there, it was a bunch of girls, ages about 9 - 12. Honestly, I prefer it when it's older kids. I just get antsy holding babies (which actually works out perfectly, cuz Bree is great at holding babies - you are Bree!) I prefer to go outside with the bigger kids and run around on the playground equipment and be silly and just talk to them. This Thursday, there were just two older girls and a few litttle boys (around age 5 - 7).We went to the playground and I gave them glow sticks to play with.
I bought the glowsticks ages ago, because I had planned to use them with my clients to create cool images at night for their engagement session. I never got around to using them with my clients, though, because by the time it was dark, they were just DONE. Getting your photos taken for a couple hours is just exhausting, so I completely understand. (When Becky and I take photos of you, we tell you that you will usually have to tell us when you are ready for it to be over with, because we can definitely just keep going and going.)
Since the glowsticks were old, they definitely weren't as bright at new ones would be, but the kids still had fun with them.
Except the kids stopped having fun when I told them we were going to make it into an art project. So what, kids! Sometimes you have to suffer for art.
I had the kids sit right next to each other and move the glow sticks slowly so that I could take photos with my cell phone camera. I got very particular about how and where they had to move the glowsticks. That is why they were no longer having fun with them. "Wait do that again!" I kept saying. "No, like this." I am sure I was pretty annoying because all they wanted to do was run around like crazy with them and do whatever they wanted. Understandably. But at least they put up with me for a while and this is some of what we got:
When I am taking photos, I am always trying to keep a bunch of stuff in mind. A few of the things I am looking for when it comes to composition, is framing, leading lines, and rule of thirds. Another device I try to remember is this: the the golden ratio. When I was making these cell phone-glow stick photos, I was definitely thinking about the golden ratio and wondering how these would appear. I like the way they turned out.
