My son took this spider picture

He took a few using my Kodak camera when we were on vacation and I was rather surprised when I downloaded them because they were really neat.

Here's another spider photo he took. He calls it "Charlotte".

This one he really loved, he named it "Tunneler".

pretty good I'd say..especially the first one. Creepy, I hate spiders !

The first one is great. I told him so. I think we might have that printed on nice paper and framed.

He took a spider photograph here just before we left for vacation and I'll post that too. He likes spiders.

Gosh, those are wonderful photos. He should be very proud!

Great shots! I like them All! Me thinks that has a tallent....

Joey

Awesome photos! I try to stay away from them. But seeing them from his perspective, they are really beautiful. Thank you for sharing them. Please tell him to keep up the good work! I'd be framing them too.

Janet

I'm only going to frame the first one. That one to me is impressive.

He's working on a Merit Badge for Boy Scouts on photography so when he asked me to take a photo of the spider for him, I handed him the camera and showed him how to move the dial to the flower setting for close ups and also told him how to hold down the button a little bit before actually clicking to get it to focus.

He took several landscape shots but got one particularly nice landscape photo while we were on vacation. Other than that, he wanted to do his thing and not be bothered with the camera. The camera is simple. It has a dial that you move to a little image of a mountain for distance shots so I showed him that feature. When we got home, I downloaded the images and used the Kodak software and showed him how to crop. Once he cropped, he had two nice landscape shots. Here's the first really nice landscape shot he took-

Here's the other which turned out really nice after it was cropped. It was difficult getting him to realize that he could hold the camera sideways to take shots but I think he will experiment a little bit more in the future now that he took this picture. I think we will frame it.

His preference is to take photos of insects and arachnids. He all but tossed the camera back at me for the landscape shots but I wanted him to try to take a few just to get a taste for it. He says he'd prefer to just stick to bugs.

Say, OMH, Joey, and Janet- I'll let him read your comments and reply back to you himself.

Does anyone know if there is an entry level photography book out there for the younger set or the camera challenged like myself? Perhaps a book that focuses on getting the most out of the point and click cameras? I think at his age that if the book got too detailed that this kid would lose interest real fast. He really is a bug boy.

Cropping was really a pleasant surprise to him. The spider photos were all taken as horizontals and I showed him how to change them to verticals by cropping in the application. The last landscape shot was actually taken by him turning the camera sideways. I think if I figured out how to do that, a book might have other tips to get him going. He took a few photos of walls inside a nature center and they turned out so so. There's probably a setting on the camera for inside photos but I don't know what it is. I'm just happy he started taking a few photos because the only other time he took photos was when he first started his carnivorous plant project and he hadn't touched a camera since then. Here's one of his wall shots-

This kid wants to go into the sciences. I suspect he will actually go for it since he is unwavering where the others have been flip flopping. Here's the other wall painting he was attracted to and let me tell you I'd love to have this on a wall in my house -

This message was edited Apr 12, 2008 12:27 PM

Yep, VERY Talented! And could go far! Amazing Shots!

Joey

Fantastic photos! Wishing him the best in his environmental engineering goals!!

I'm very impressed Equilibrium!
Excellent thing for a young fella to do. Tell him he has a good eye for taking pictures!
My Ben loves bugs and he's taken some really cool pics too. He took this one ... I thiink the Stingray was smiling at the children. Maybe nature is a little less threatened by them than us big people.


Deb

Lemme go run upstairs and get my kid. Be back.

Shoot! Ran all the way up the stairs to get him and forgot it was Monday night- Boy Scout night. Oops.

Thank you all for your comments but now it's time for me to go to bed I guess. I will try to take more photos when we have more spiders. Thanks again.

editing out my son's name.

This message was edited Nov 6, 2006 9:28 PM

The stingray does look like it's smiling. Too cute. Did your songet a chance to feel one? They feel like silken rubber if that makes any sense.

Yes they did get to 'pet' them too.. He took lots of great pictures there at the Dallas World Aquarium.

Here is one of my fav pics he took..

Beautiful. My kids particularly like seahorses because the males are the "Moms". They think that is so cool.

Thx!
Yes I think it's very cool too the males carry the babies..ha Only a few creatures do that... I think those are also aquatic.

horrible spider...great photos...how old is he?

This son is 10! He says to tell you he has a new dog that has hangy lips just like the dog you lost named Levi. We lost a few animals to old old old age earlier this year and ended up with a young loose lips that came with the name "Twinkletoes". How anyone could name a dog that size "Twinkletoes" is beyond us but they did and he knows the name now so it's sticking. I just love going to the vet sitting there with my dog sprawled out on the floor extending well over 6-7' when they call his name. Cracks me up to see the expression on some people's faces but then again there was a woman who had a little chihuahua x thing that was named "Killer" or something similar and I about fell over when they called them to put them in a room to be seen by a vet.

rofl Equil!! hahahahaha Our Chihuauah's name is Itty, after a Doberman I used to have a long time ago..


hahaha killer lol

Equil -

Your 10 year old took some fantastic photos! He seems to have a natural talent for composition. There are many adults who can't be taught what he is doing on his own. You may want to encourage him to enter some of his photos in contests - there are many of them and some are especially for kids. Good job!

Debra

Hey Debra, those photos were all cropped. I helped him. He's doing better but not quite there yet in the cropping department. I'd like him to enter the first one in some sort of a contest... perhaps the County Fair? I'd also like him to enter one of his landscapes. What I'd like doesn't count though as It's ultimately his decision and this kid is on the meek side. I don't know if he will pursue entering them anywhere but he is going to use them toward his Photography Merit Badge for Boy Scouts. We are having 8 x 10's made of the first one and we are putting them in frames to give to his Uncles and Aunts for the holidays. Here's hoping they find a place to hang the spider somewhere as he is proud of it.

Hey debnes, a Doberman named Itty??? That's right up there with a loose lips puppy mutation at 180 lbs and still growing named Twinkletoes which is right up there with a Chihuauah named Killer. I will say one thing, that Chihuauah was not a real social animal. It was barking, snarling, and charging to the end of its leash at my dog while my dog simply sat in the same spot looking like the big doofus he is cocking his head from side to side looking at it rather perplexed. Get this, when the Chihuauah thing barked, it's front legs came off the ground which I thought was incredibly funny. The woman kept apologizing. I felt sort of bad for her.

Oh boy Itty is a big dog in a little dog suit for sure...He charges at anything intimidating to him..He tried it with the neighbors chow Chuy. She took his back in her jaws and swung him around like a rag doll. He was pretty stoved up for a few days, and still hasn't learned his lesson. Now when he runs after things bigger than him he is Itty-it, but we say it in a really loving way...

LMRO!

Itty-it! ha ha ha!

When your Itty barks, do its front legs come off the ground? That was about the silliest thing I had seen in a long time.

Yep, (and the hair on his back looks like a razorback), when he is lucky enough to be on a leash his front legs do rare up... We love this dog to pieces though, he is a really sweet companion. DH would not take it well if anything happened to him. We bought him when he was a puppy (he's 5 now), solid white, and about 17lbs, a Chihuauah Grande, not a lil pip squeaker exactly.. kinda looks like a darling little lamb.


We wouldn't take anything for the little upstart!

17 lbs... almost as big as a few of my cats... almost.

I've never heard of a Chihuauah Grande before. That's a much better size than some of those really tiny ones. I always worry about those teacups and miniatures getting their legs broken around kids. They don't know their size and they do like to romp like the bigguns.

Could we see a picture of Twinkletoes?

Yes ! Please????

Ta da! This is Twinkletoes a few months ago.
We love the lips of GDs and Mastiffs. We have placed an order with the shelter to get another Mastiff- the ultimate lots of lips dog. When one comes in that is NOT a puppy and is "bomb proof" with kids and other animals, they'll call us and we'll go pick it up. We could get called tomorrow... or we could get called next year. One thing is for sure, we will get called as there aren't a lot of homes out there willing to take the jumbos.

awwww i love those hangy lips!! Mwah Twinkletoes, you sweet lil goggie awgie!!

Hansome pup there Equil!!

Well he sure looks like he could eat an entire kitchen! Cut pup and your son's photos are excellent.

We don't think he is all that attractive and he reminds us of a junk yard dog but this dog is the sweetest galoof with people and other animals which is what we wanted for our home. He does chew but we put him in a crate when we go to work which minimizes the damage. He should grow out of that in another six months or so.

HAHAHAHA...another 6 mos....LOL...ROFL...

Oops, posting when aprilwillis was posting... he has been teething a lot. He teethed off the bottom tread and riser to our stair case (that will be repaired after he is out of this phase), three lower kitchen cabinet doors were reduced to toothpicks (had to replace those), countless shoes, two kitchen rugs, two kitchen chairs that he knocked over and "teethed" on s we had to level them down by cutting off an inch or so (nobody wants to sit in the chairs that are lower), a brand new winter jacket, countless puzzles, oven mitts, and I could go on but his all time favorite is paper towels which he gets up on the counter top and steals and paper napkins which he opens up the drawer with his teeth and helps himself to. Well, he does also like our mail. He is a shredder I'm afraid and can shred in the blink of an eye as is in when you go to the bathroom. Did I mention he used to help himself to snacks from our frig? We had to put a bar through the handles to the frig so he would stop helping himself to leftovers which gave him the runs which was an even bigger mess to clean up then when he starts shredding.

He doesn't like oranges or pineapples- imagine that. Something he doesn't like to chew. Will wonders never cease. Everything else as you can see if fair game. Our vet says he has separation anxiety. Uh huh!