The Illusive Smile of a 4 Year Old Boy Finally Caught On Camera

Deep in the burbs of Southern California roams a striking rare breed of brown boy. At only 4 years old, this young cub possessives a fascinating smile that is both adorable and illusive, enchanting anyone lucky to witness the authentic version in person. Various replicas and less fascinating variations are more common, but the Pure Smile is still the most coveted by hunters. This is especially true for a particular smile-obsessed hunter (that’s me), who waits in anguish to catch the illusive smile in it’s natural state.

Armed with impression equipment, the hunter recently designed an elaborate trap with the most enticing of baits: a bounce house. On the morning of this boy’s 4th birthday party, the hunter carefully positions herself – mindful of light direction and composition – and sets up. With exact ISO and remarkable shutter speeds, this professional smile-hunter believes that, this time, she’ll come out victorious in capturing the beauty of this boy’s electric smile on film….

Hahaha! OK OK, so I’m not really hunting… but I feel like it sometimes! I love photography, always have, and especially so since becoming a mom. I’ve taught myself some pretty decent skills and have some created some images that any amateur mom-tog would be proud of…. until this kid started to hate the camera!

My son makes some of the best faces of any human I’ve ever met, but unless you know him well (he’s either reserved or straight loco, depending on how well he knows you), you wouldn’t know it because I can’t catch it on film. And that’s been driving me INSANE! There’s a reason why you hire professionals for this kind of work, people. It’s not easy to capture pure joy, smiles, wonder and all of childhood’s beauty.

Oh my goodness, I love these pictures so much! My heart skips a beat when I see his excitement and pure joy when realizing that a giant bounce house was being filled up in his backyard and for HIS birthday. My sweet boy was all joy, all happiness, pure 4 year old magic… AND I FINALLY GOT IT ON FILM!

I have no tips for you today…. just evidence that capturing their illusive smile on film is possible. I sat my wild child in a specific place to watch the bounce house unroll and fill up with air; I set a high shutter speed to prevent blur (while keeping that ISO as low as possible because I knew I’d be zooming in during post processing); I stayed out of his line of sight/focus; I got down on his level (like laying on the ground), shot LIKE CRAZY and finally capture his smile in all its boyhood glory.

The picture above is adorable, too. We were about to sing Happy Birthday to the birthday boy, he had only his best friends around him, he was tired and full of contentment from such a wonderful, small birthday party…. yet he gave me this: a contrived, resisted effort of a smile. Poor guy can’t help it.