proud moment for a proud daddy

[Ultra Magnus]

Yesterday my 3 year old son mastered the use of a throw away camera. He ran around taking pictures of everything that was interesting to him. His toys, his slide, the rope to his tetherball. Anyway, it was way cool. His mom we getting on me about letting take pictures of nothing, but I think he should be able to take pics of whatever he wants. call it abstracts of a 3 year old. I feel stupid for not taking a picture of him taking pictures because it was so cute whatching him try to look through the viewfinder, feel around for the shutter button (sometimes he had to take the camera away from his face to find it) and then wind the film after his shot. Last time we tried to give him a throw away camera, about 6 months ago, he couldn't coordinate himself enought to look through the viewfinder and press the button w/o covering the lens with his fingers.

[Charles Hess]

I think it's great that you are doing this...just like giving them a ball and glove, or a football, or whatever. I've seen some really creative images form projects done with kids and their disposable cameras. Thanks for sharing this neat story... maybe you could post one of his shots for us all to enjoy.

[Ultra Magnus]

My parents weren't the most encouraging. Kids stuff to them was just kids stuff, that should be grown out of. Beleive me, he's got balls, gloves, bikes, trikes, crayons, paint, play doh, you name it. We (wife and I) strongly belive in finding something they (both our boys, and I suppose any kids on the way) are interested in and not limit them or say anything negative to them about what they like to do, but rather encourage them even if it's something we're not really interested in.

[Spike]

Yesterday my 3 year old son mastered the use of a throw away camera... it was so cute whatching him try to look through the viewfinder, feel around for the shutter button (sometimes he had to take the camera away from his face to find it) ...

I've had to look to find the shutter button! My excuse is that it's been when I'm wearing heavy gloves or mits in the winter. Can't feel the controls.

I remember how much my 3 and 5 year old neices wanted to use my digital camera. I was warned by my brother about the camera they'd dropped and broken. So the rule was they HAD to have the wrist strap on, and even then I didn't relinquish the camera very often! The kicker was that the 3 year old had great compositions.

Spike