What's a good photography project for my sister (who's almost 10) and I to try?

Go to some place where there are abandoned farm houses or barns, or even where there are many abandoned industrial buildings.

Each of you photograph the same subjects and try and capture the feeling of what you see.

Compare your pictures afterword and discuss why you photographed the subjects the way you did.

@Dr_Lawrence That sounds fun, and I might try that in about a month with a friend who’s going to be sibling-less for a week, just like me that week. But for this, it kind of needs to be something I can do around the house/yard. We have 10 acres, with woods, swamps, all that. So I can do certain things…but we’re really busy this summer and getting a ride somewhere is kind of hard. And we can go biking for a little area around our house but not very far (like a mile).

Before your friend shows up, you and your sister take one of your stuffed animals or dolls and take it for a treasure hunt.

Take photos of the doll and then photos as if they were of scenes/surroundings as seen through the eyes of the doll. (like an close up of the wood pile and looking towards the swing set, from under the porch looking at the car tires,etc)

Have each visual clue lead to the next photo…until the very end where there can be a simple prize waiting for your friend to find.

When your friend shows up, she has to look at the pictures (in order taken) and follow the clues to solve the case. Hide something fun but inexpensive for the prize (maybe mom can help with this part).

Then she can take the camera and do the same to you (no peeking!)

Or you can take pictures of ordinary things around your home from extraordinary angles and then guess what these items are. For example a super close up of a leaf can look like many different things…as can carpet fibers.

Try some shadow photography. It’s an exercise that will help you find the light- and give your sister a starring role. Basically, figure out poses (she can be a big help here) and take pictures of it- but only the shadow and the background. See what interesting things you can do with her shadow as the subject. Also good on rainy days and nights- interior shadows can be really fun to capture. Also- shadow puppets always win.

Fve people doing something they love. Sports, hobby, crafts, reading,etc.

Five pictures showing the same pattern. Circles, squares, red, blue, stripes etc.

Take turns setting up a little scene for each other, then take your pictures, while practicing your acting. Try to think of ways to make it obvious what emotion you are feeling.

Like being sleepy, you could be lying in the grass and yawning.
Frightened, maybe standing by a high drop or up in a tree.
Other scenes might be angry, lonely, hungry, surprised, in pain, curious, cold, lost.

Then you can show the pictures to someone else and see if you were good actors.

I am taking it that your old camera is a film 35MM SLR camera.

Project #1: Using the timer you and your sister and maybe 2 to three other inanimate objects line up in the frame 2 yards part or more. Then you take a series of photos with out changing the angle or distance of the camera but change only the aperture and exposure to match it. Then see how the focus changed just by how much light was let in or not.

Project #2: Near dark have your sister tape or tie a small flashlight on to a bike or seat on a swing set and use a long exposure to record the trail of the light and the blur of the motion.

Project #3: Construct a pinhole camera out of thin cardboard or thick poster board and see what type of images you can get. Did that one and it was quite interesting.

Good luck.

When my husband was seven or eight, the kid next door was a photography student, and used Jason to practice action shots. We still have the pictures of him jumping way high in the air, and catching a football in midair hanging on our wall.

Action shots are just so cool. ^_^

“The decisive moment” see here for a definition. This is great training and there are flickr groups for posting and reviewing other’s work, as well as ask question

@Hypocrisy_Central—See the “P.S.”

My daughter is ten and the things she likes to most photograph are dogs, cats and furry creatures. Sounds like you might have annimals around. By a good 2gb memory card and let her go crazy.
Another cool project would be 12 photos from the same spot of the same thing at 12 different hours.

@ChocolateReigns Then skip project #1 and try number 2 if your camera has different speed settings, but you sure as heck you can do the last. :-)