If you had to choose one moment at a child's birthday party that perfectly sums up the entire event, it would be the moment the birthday child blows out the candles. The candles are lit, the child blows them out, and suddenly they are another year older. Unfortunately, this is also one of the hardest moments at a party to capture well, especially indoors. It is fleeting too: once it is over, it is over. So how can you capture that elusive moment as effectively as possible? Read on to find out.
To capture such a fleeting moment, you need to be thoroughly prepared for what is about to happen.
Set Your Camera in Advance
Make sure your settings are ready beforehand. You do not want to be adjusting ISO while the birthday child takes a deep breath before blowing out the candles, because you are almost certain to miss the shot.
Because this is almost always a difficult lighting situation, it is a good idea to plan the shot in advance so that you already understand the setting before the moment arrives. For example, buy some candles the day before, set them up at the time and place where the cake will be presented, and test the exposure with someone standing in as your subject.
Candles can create a difficult exposure situation because they are a very bright light source, possibly in a fairly dark room. This may cause your camera's light meter to underexpose the image. The meter assumes that everything in a given shot averages out to roughly a middle-gray tone, and the very bright candle flames disrupt that calculation.
Use Spot Metering
That is why spot metering is the best option here: you need to expose for the birthday child's face rather than the candle flame. To use spot metering, switch to manual mode (M) and place the spot-metering area in the center of the viewfinder over your subject's face.
Your spot meter will now assume that your subject's face is also a middle-gray tone, so you may need to make further adjustments depending on skin tone. Many light-skinned faces are about one stop brighter than middle gray, while some darker skin tones may be about one stop below it. For a very light skin tone, try +1 exposure compensation; for a very dark skin tone, try -1; and for a tone in between, you can probably leave the setting near the midpoint.
Keep in mind that a reading taken the day before may not exactly match the conditions on the day itself. Other factors, such as people standing in front of a window or changes in the weather, can affect the amount of ambient light in the shot.
Do Not Use Flash
Flash completely ruins the atmosphere of the moment. The main appeal of candlelight is the candlelight itself; adding flash removes that mood from the image.
You also know that you need a relatively fast shutter speed to freeze the action—at least 1/125 in this scenario, and perhaps even 1/250. That can be challenging in low light.
There are several things you can do to address this:
• First, try turning on a few nearby lights . Avoid overhead lights, because you still want the candles to create the atmosphere. Instead, turn on a few lights in adjacent rooms, or use a subtle light source such as a table lamp elsewhere in the room.
• If that is not enough, raise your ISO. You may have heard that you should always keep ISO at 100, but that is simply not true. When photographing people—especially people who are moving—you do not need a low ISO .
In fact, accepting a little noise is far better than ending up with motion blur, so feel free to raise the ISO as high as necessary. Start around 800–1600 and go higher if it is too dark; modern cameras can handle this well.
• Also use a wide aperture (a low f-number). A 50mm prime lens is an excellent choice for indoor low-light photography because it may offer apertures as wide as f/1.8, or even f/1.4 for some mid-range 50mm primes. A wide aperture lets you use a faster shutter speed in low light, which may provide the extra sharpness you need.
Remember, however, that wide apertures produce a very shallow depth of field. This makes it especially important to select a specific focus point—ideally your subject's eye—so enable eye-detection AF if your camera has it.
White Balance
White balance can be challenging when photographing by candlelight. You want to capture the warm glow associated with candles, but not faces that look too orange or red. Some cameras have a "candlelight" mode that helps with white balance, but it is not advisable here because it gives you no control over settings such as shutter speed and aperture.
Built-in white-balance presets such as auto, tungsten, or daylight—experiment with the different options—may get close, but they still may not produce the result you want, especially when other light sources are present. Instead, use a custom white-balance setting on your camera. Every camera handles this a little differently, so consult the manual; photographers traditionally set it with a gray card.
To be safe, it is also best to capture the moment in RAW if your camera offers that option. When you shoot in RAW, correcting white balance afterward is straightforward.
Shoot at Eye Level
Now that the settings are under control, let us look at how to capture the moment. The rules are the same as for any other photograph of a child: get down to the child's eye level.
Do not shoot from a standing position, or you will create an image that looks exactly like the view every adult has at a children's party. Instead, photograph from a child's perspective; this makes it much easier for viewers to connect with your subject.
Use Burst Mode
Set your camera to burst mode. The actual moment when the candles are blown out happens quickly, so keep your finger on the shutter button until the final candle goes out. More importantly, start shooting well in advance, because there is no guarantee that the exact instant the candles go out will produce a great photo.
Do not release the button until the moment has passed. There will almost certainly be a gap between the cake's arrival and the candles going out. The cake is usually placed in front of the child with the candles lit, and the child does not blow them out until the song has ended.
Do not release the button until the moment has passed.
Start shooting as soon as the cake appears in front of the birthday child. They probably will not move much during that time, and the smile will be genuine.
Smartphone
Several of the tips above are also useful when photographing your own child's birthday party with a smartphone. Here are some additional smartphone-photography tips for capturing the cake-and-candles moment more easily:
- Use Night mode or Portrait mode (but note that Portrait mode sometimes blurs the flames).
- Tap the face to focus.
- Adjust the exposure by swiping down on the screen for a moodier image.
- Turn the flash off!
- Hold your phone steady or brace it against something to reduce motion blur.
- Shoot from a slight angle in front so that both the candles and the face are clearly visible.
- Afterward, apps such as Snapseed or Lightroom Mobile let you lift the shadows slightly or adjust warmth (color temperature) for a golden atmosphere, or apply noise reduction to high-ISO photos.
Conclusion
Birthday parties happen only once a year, and blowing out the candles lasts just a few seconds each time. If you are not ready, another opportunity will not come for a full year, and you cannot recover that lost moment. So be prepared. Check your settings and make sure your camera is ready. Make the final adjustments as soon as the cake arrives, then press the shutter button. Do not release it until the moment has passed. If you have done everything right, you can be confident that you captured it all on camera—so in a sense, the moment is not over after all.
