Event Photography: Wedding
I shot my first wedding a couple weeks ago. Not for fun, but for real. Not “for real,” like I was the principal photographer (no way, that’s too much stress), but as a second photographer for candids.
I learned a lot doing this, and made a ton of mistakes too. Wanted to share some lessons learned, and also picked out a couple shots that made it into my final set and why I chose them.
- Lessons learned
- Get a fast lens, preferably one with a substantial zoom. I used my 50mm f/1.4 and borrowed a 70-200mm f/2.8 for this event. Glad I did that. Lighting conditions in churches are often fantastically bad, and to get the shot I wanted, I needed a lens that could do event/indoor shots in sub-optimal lighting conditions.
- I opted for no flash. Partially because I haven’t experimented with it and don’t feel so good about it. But also because I didn’t want to distract those who were attending nor the main players (bride, groom, officiant, etc.). I figured, I would be taking shots of the critical moments. The last thing they want is to see a flash bulb and blue light filling the moment.
- Think through the shots you want before the event. It’ll help you get to the right places so you’re not scrambling and tripping over stuff during that important moment. I kicked myself after the actual event because there were a couple good shots that I didn’t think through, and consequently didn’t get. Total bummer. Jenny reminded me that a picture of the hands (especially as the older people are praying a prayer of blessing and protection for the bride) can communicate really powerfully.
Couple as part of the larger context, but in the background.
Laughter is one of those things that when you catch it, people simply understand it. It’s a different quality than saying, “Everyone look here: 1, 2, 3…”
It’s just funny seeing how happy the bride is here, in this symbolic gesture of binding the other person to herself. My one regret is not getting closer and framing the shot tighter.
I like it that Pastor Ed Kang is there in the background, clearly smiling, very happy for the new couple, taking their first steps together.
Flash fill-in part2
Just wanted to follow up with Maurice’s post with some different scenarios in which i’ve tried to use flash. A key principle I try to use with flash is that i want to make the shot look like there was no flash. i hate the extra shine and bouncing light that i see from a lot of flash-driven shots. This is the beauty of being able to manually adjust your settings. Again, I don’t have a lot of before/after pictures that are identical but I have a few sample shots that show these principles.
Basically there are 2 principles to keep in mind. Actually 4 according to zack arias, but i think these are the easiest to start with.
- Shutter Speed – controls ambient exposure (background)
- Aperture – controls flash exposure (how bright the flash lights up the scene)
Setting 1 – indoors with low light. You want to light up the whole scene – not just the subjects in the foreground. You want to include the background. Aperture around f/4 is good. play with it for necessary lighting that you want.
- Lower the shutter speed – like 1/20, 1/30
- the first picture has a shutter speed of 1/100
- the second picture has a shutter speed of 1/30 and the background comes in a lot more.
Setting 2 – outdoors and heavily back-lit. This is right from Mo’s tutorial.
- Key here is to increase the Shutter speed and decrease aperture.
- the first picture shows a great background but my daughter’s face is a little dark b/c it’s caught in the shadow. look at the railing. this was at 1/320 and f/16 but no flash. any more adjustments and i would have blown out the background although she would have been lit better.
- I added the flash here with the same settings and you can see how well and evenly it’s lit-up. I would say part of this is b/c of the Nikon TTL, which rocks, in my humble opinion.
