If you're in the US, go vote. Preferably for a candidate who isn't barking mad, but ultimately that's between you and your conscience.
If you're not in the US, or you've already voted, enjoy some cute, as SteelyKid is first skeptical about the idea of lots of kids in masks visiting the house:
Then happier once she heard about the candy:
(She's home sick today, and thus somewhat less cute than these pictures from Sunday. But, you know, even when sick, she's pretty cute.)
These are also another flash/no-flash pair, which is a slightly better comparison than the previous round, given that they're basically the same composition. I had what would've been a better no-flash picture, but sadly, both Kate and SteelyKid were blurry. This is the best of the half-dozen no-flash shots.
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Terribly cute!
I like the no-flash photo better, though it does have blown-out highlights from the overexposed windows. But I think the added texture from natural light works well. The flash photo tends to remove all shadows from the faces in photos like this, which hides details like the shape of the chin and cheeks. (Which are, as I say, terribly cute.)
But the flash photo isn't bad at all -- the exposure is well balanced and there's no red-eye. With an active kid, I guess you'll often have to rely on the flash unless you have enough light for quick shutter speeds, as she just won't hold still for a natural exposure. Looks like your camera is well up to the task.
The hat and mittens were her own idea, for no reason she could explain to us.
Hi,
Imagine what it must be like to be a kid with a relatively "clean slate" brain and have your first exposure to so much that our society offers. You're minding your own business, everything is pretty normal and then all of a sudden a gorilla and Darth Vader show up at the door and your parents give them candy.
I think her skepticism was well founded.
I like camera stuff, so I'll chime in on the flash business.
To take no-flash pics of little kids inside you need 1) a fast lens (e.g. f/1.0, f/1.4, f/1.8) and 2) a high iso that looks good (e.g. 1600, 3200, 6400). The exif data from the pictures was removed in the posting process so I don't know the exact numbers, but clearly the shutter speed was borderline.
Otherwise the shutter speeds will just be too slow and you'll get blurry Steelykid.
What would make pic #2 look better is a little less flash. I don't know what type of camera you have, but odds are that somewhere on it is a way to adjust the FEC, flash exposure compensation. Dial in -1ev or -2ev (not electron volts) and you'll stop the kid without the flash overwhelming the main subject.
The not that tricky thing about this scene is that it has two parts with very different exposure values (the window and the kid). The dynamic range of the sensor in your camera cannot cover both of these in the same frame. The way around this is to set your exposure for the brighter part and then add fill flash for the darker part. That's essentially what happened on pic #2, but the fill flash was just a tad too strong.
On the election - What percent of the world's leaders have been (are) "barking mad"? It seems an odd feature of humanity that so often in our history really crazy people end up leading groups and even countries.
For flash pictures indoors, you can try to bounce the flash off the ceiling. I've had good luck with DSLR built-in flashes by taping an index card at the appropriate angle onto the flash. If you have a fancy external flash, it's way easier since they often have tilting heads.