Sean Esopenko

Marko in the Forest

August 1, 2010

Little Marko is such a cute baby and I got my camera out for some shots while he was at the gift opening of my wedding. When Marko’s parents take him for a stroll in the park and are bringing him through some low-hanging branches of some bushes, they’ll say “We’re going through the forest, Marko!” He closes his eyes and squeels as the branches pass over him. He loves the feeling!

The Zeiss 35mm I was using is a 100% manual focus lens and thankfully it’s designed with this in mind. I focused on him and then pulled my body forwards and backwards, keeping the distance and frame, instead of relying on a servo focus to do the job. How can you expect a servo focus to stay focused on a certain area with the sliver of deapth of field F2.5 gives you? I was sitting on the floor and it was fun when little Marko was smiling and laughing as he crawled up my legs. I just leaned further back, calling “Marko!”, keeping him framed in the shot.

I have to say kids are fast and a real challenge to photograph but it makes it fun. If somebody says they need the latest and greatest in auto-focus and auto-exposure they don’t know how to use their camera and honestly I think they’re just lazy. I only shot about 18 pictures of little Marko and ended up with about 6-7 that the mother (and myself) liked.

Comments (0) | More: People & Events