Here's another out-take from our Christmas card shoot. I like to do these up-over-the-head shots with families (which is to say, I've done it on both of the family shoots I've done). It may be kind of a cliche angle—I don't really know—but it's fun, and most of the kids I know like to be played with this way, so it makes for easy smiles.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in aperture priority exposure mode. Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/400 (+2 EV, center-weighted average metering), ISO 200. Post-processing in Aperture 3: crop to 4x5; pushed recovery; curves for black point and contrast.

Thoughts for improvement: The major thing that could be improved here is the focus. I was shooting fast and didn't move the focus point to the upper part of the frame, so Jason's face ended up a little soft. That can be OK sometimes, but I tend to prefer sharp pictures, especially for this style and angle.

This year, we decided to skip the studio session for our annual family portraits—which is to say, our annual Jason portraits—and instead opted to have me take the pictures. This was a bit of a money-saver, of course, but it also gave me another opportunity to practice my technique and how to run a shoot. Plus, this way we could get the more natural style that you get from a location shoot. It turned out to be fun, and a good exercise for me as a photographer. I still have a ways to go, but I'm getting there.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in aperture-priority exposure mode. Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/1250 (+1EV, matrix metering), ISO 400. No post-processing.

Thoughts for improvement: For being straight out of the camera, I'm pretty happy with how the lighting and color came out. Compositionally, I'd get rid of the people in the background and position Juliette and Jason so they weren't lined up one behind the other.

It often feels to me as though Jason has been in my life forever, but from time to time I'm reminded of just how short a time it's been. His baby years are already starting to fade in my memory, yet it's only been two years since his first Christmas.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40, Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, and Vivitar DF-383 flash (with Gary Fong Lightsphere). Manual exposure mode and TTL flash mode (-1 EV). Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/500, ISO 400. Post-processing in Aperture 3: slight curves adjustment; polarize brush over the ornament; burned over Jason's head and shirt.

Thoughts for improvement: I could do without some of the stuff in the background, though the round highlights in the bokeh are nice. Otherwise I really like this shot.

Jason is fascinated by photographs of people he knows, especially ones of me, Juliette, or himself. Just this morning he was shouting excitedly about the background image on Juliette's laptop, which is a picture of him that we took at Legoland. When we were decorating the tree on Saturday, it was very important to him that I know that one of the ornaments had a picture of Mommy and Daddy.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40, Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, and Vivitar DF-383 flash (with Gary Fong Lightsphere). Manual exposure mode and TTL flash mode (-1 EV). Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/500, ISO 400. Post-processing in Aperture 3: cropped out elements below and to the left; slight curves adjustment; polarize brush over the tabletop and central ornament.

Thoughts for improvement: The composition is a little cluttered and I'd like for the wood grain in the table to come out a bit more, but I like the little bit of storytelling here.

We got our Christmas tree on Saturday morning and decorated it in the afternoon. Jason was an enthusiastic participant, though his sense of Christmas tree aesthetics doesn't yet include concepts like spreading the ornaments around the entire tree. (Juliette had to do a bit of redistribution after Jason went to bed.)

This little guy is one of my favorites of our ornament collection. He looks so jolly, out for a little Christmas stroll. Right on, I say.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/30, ISO 800. Post-processing in Aperture 3: cropped out a bunch of stuff to the right and above; slight curves adjustment.

Thoughts for improvement: I went back and forth between this shot and another that had a slightly different angle. I decided on this one because the angle was better on the subject, but the bokeh in the other one was much nicer, with nice, round highlights. In this one, the background looks a little muddy. The focus is also a little soft on the subject.

Long-time readers (and, most likely, if you're reading this, you're a long-time reader) will know that I'm a big fan of the movies. Going to the movies used to be my and Juliette's main weekend activity. In 2004, for example, we saw 56 movies in theater—a bit of quick math will tell you that that's more than one per week. Indeed, it wasn't unusual for us to pack in three in a single weekend, not even including the times we spent an entire day at the Newport Beach Film Festival.

But then we had Jason and we had to change our habits, temporarily, at least. We still go, of course, usually when a parent is visiting and wants to provide free babysitting—it works out to about one movie every other month or so.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love my son and not only do I not regret our decision to have him, but I have found the experience rewarding and enriching (and sometimes challenging and aggravating) and I wouldn't trade it for anything. Still, I do miss being wrapped up in film culture the way I used to be. I used to know the release schedule weeks or even months in advance—these days I not only don't know what's playing, but even when I bother to check I still don't recognize most of the titles.

This past Saturday found me with a mixture of excitement and apprehension as we decided to take Jason to his first movie: Tangled. Excited because of the prospect of finding a new way to connect with my son, to introduce him to something that had been such an important part of my life. Apprehensive because, well, he can be kind of a handful.

Some people don't seem to care if their kids make a scene in public, but that's not me. I remember once sitting through a movie—I think it might have been Batman Begins—during which an infant in the audience screamed the entire time, and the father's only response was to get up from his seat and stand in the aisle. That guy? Not me.

Nor would it have been me this time, if Jason had decided to throw a fit. No, Juliette and I agreed that if he didn't behave we would just take him out.

Now, Jason does have some experience watching movies and TV at home, so we were hoping that he would be ready. On the other hand, he also has a tendency of getting up to do something else thirty minutes into a movie, so it was hard to say how this was going to go. We did our best to prepare him, telling him that once the lights went down we all had to be quiet. We picked a relatively short movie and didn't get there too early and give him extra time to get bored. And we made sure we got enough snacks to last him through the film. Even with all that, when the first preview started, I held my breath.

Turns out I needn't have worried. The previews rolled and he didn't make a peep. He didn't get scared by the monsters in the trailer for Voyage of the Dawn Treader. He didn't even get vocally excited during the preview of Cars 2, despite the fact the Lightning McQueen may just be his favorite person. (Or, as Jason calls him, "Mata Teen.") The movie started and not a sound. Five minutes passed, then ten, then fifteen. I looked over and there he was, eating his popcorn and paying rapt attention to the screen. I was so overcome by pride and happiness at being able to share this with him, I actually got a little misty.

The movie was good, too, and I'll have a review up this week. But for now I'm still basking in the glow of a successful family movie outing. Hopefully, the first of many.

This Thanksgiving, it seemed like every time I turned around, I saw Jason putting on the clown nose his aunt gave him. He just loved it. If I make my guess, he's going to flip out at the chance to play a red-nosed reindeer in the family performance of "The Night Before Christmas."

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/60 sec, ISO 1600. Post-processing in Aperture 3: white balance correction; curve to increase exposure; slightly desaturated yellows and greens.

Thoughts for improvement: This is obviously a grab shot and I put little to no thought into the composition. So from a purely visually aesthetic perspective, it's not a great image. As a capture of a moment, though, I love it. I love the excitement and furtiveness about his body language, and the way he's kind of tucked in between the shoes and handbags. About the only thing I wish I'd done differently is that I wish I'd thought to put the flash on my camera, as that would have let me shoot at a lower ISO, producing less "grain."

This year we had Thanksgiving at Juliette's brother's house in Massachusetts, and among the many things that delighted Jason during his week-long trip to the East Coast were his aunt and uncle's napkin rings. There was a pig, a giraffe, a lioness, several kinds of insect, and—as you can see—a zebra. Juliette asked me if I staged this shot, but as far as I remember this is how I found it.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/60 sec, ISO 800. Post-processing in Aperture 3: white balance temperature 2500K, tint -3; curve for highlight recovery and contrast.

Thoughts for improvement: It was a little difficult to balance the light color properly—aside from the candlelight, there was also an incandescent overhead light and a compact flourescent floor lamp in the room. In a more controlled environment I'd have made sure that all the lighting had the same color. I like the candles and highlights in the bokeh, but the background does feel a little cluttered—possibly it might have been better to move the rear plate out of the shot and put some more candles in its place. It also might have been good to stop down a bit in order to get some of the salad on the foreground plate more in focus, but given how poorly the D40 does at ISO 1600, I was a bit constrained in terms of exposure.

On Saturday I went on my first real portrait shoot. Some friends agreed to help me practice my technique by letting me do some family portraits of them. Juliette and Jason came along as well, since we figured we could get in our Christmas card shots in at the same time.

Leading up to the shoot I was a nervous wreck, even though I was working with friends in a very low-pressure situation. Once we actually got there, though, and started shooting, it was actually kind of fun. I think I learned a lot, too. For example, the next time I do a beach shoot, I'll either do it in the morning or bring a fill light. I also won't try to cram in two shoots into the same session.

Anyway, the kids had fun, as you can see. And hopefully my friends will find a few keepers out of the set.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/4000, ISO 200. Post-processing in Aperture 3: yellow filter BW preset; curve for contrast; burned the highlights in both kids' faces; added edge sharpening.

Thoughts for improvement: A fill light on the left would have been a good idea, although the shadows in the current version do look kind of dramatic. I also wish I had framed the shot just a little bit lower, to add a sliver more space below Jason's foot.

With both our Christmas card shoot and a family trip coming soon, Juliette and I decided it was time to get Jason's hair cut. Last month I took him to the stylist on my own and he ended up with such a slight trim that you couldn't even tell he got it cut. This month, Juliette was there and so he got a real haircut. I think it makes him look older. I swear, sometimes I can hardly believe that less than two years ago he couldn't even stand up.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/800, ISO 400. Post-processing in Aperture 3: curve for highlight recovery; separate curve for slight contrast increase; dodged over the shadowy side of his face and a bit down his left sleeve; burned over the bright side of his face; burned the background.

Thoughts for improvement: The tree trunk to the left and behind him is a little distracting; ideally, it wouldn't be there. A 4x5 crop might also look good, excluding much of the space above his head. Not sure about that one—on my laptop monitor the leaves add some nice texture, but on my desktop monitor they're just a dark smear and could be excluded. I think some fill light on the left side (his left) of his face would also be good, though it's hard to get a two-year-old to sit still while you get a reflector in place.