© Tim Pannell Photography

Shoot through stuff guys…..now that’s real technical sounding isn’t it?  If any of you have watched the show “24″…..they do it all the time.  There is almost always something very out of focus in the foreground of most of their shots.

If gives the image a little bit of mystery, a little bit of depth and a little more interest than just a straight photograph.

I love depth in imagery.  I usually want my images to look as 3 dimensional as possible.

For this shot of my neighbor’s daughter I thought it would be much more interesting if I shot the image through the French door rather than on the inside of the room with Jillian.

She’s by far the cutest little girl on the planet….she comes over and visits 4 or 5 times a week to eat “white” cheese and “good” pickles…”not the icky kind.”

When we lived in Arizona we had neighbors with 2 little kids that would come over and visit us as well…..we miss them dearly…..Jillian’s visits have helped us through our “withdrawal” period from Trenten and Cadyn.

As always, when shooting 2 or 3 year olds you can’t get too technical in terms of directions……gently nudging is about all you can do.  Let them have fun….see what they naturally come up with……you’ll be surprised what great images you can make just observing what a 2 year old invents on the spot.

The next time you shoot, find some different objects with varying degrees of opacity to set really close to your lens in the foreground.  See what happens to your image when you shoot through it.  Play around with different things until you find something you like.  Shoot through windows……play around with reflections.

If you go too far with something, just dial it back a little.  Experiment with different depths or distances from your lens.  Try different f-stops……typically wide open, or close to wide open works best, but try stopping for a few if only just to see what it does.

Most of all…..just have fun playing around with your photos.  The beauty of digital is that it costs you nothing but your time to experiment.

Good luck!