szerangue
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May 29, 2007, 10:23 PM
Post #4 of 7
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Ok... This evening I have been going over some of the shots I took and am fairly happy with some of the photos. Considering this was my first time, it was not too bad. A bit of issues with exposure and some focus issues, but not terrible overall. Lucky for me I shot in RAW. I have been able to really tweak the shots that were under-exposed and most of them were under-exposed.
There were a lot of mistakes and I was glad that I had my second shooter with me who has some experience with photgraphing weddings. So here is the rundown:
I arrived at the wedding venue at 3pm as planned and the bride and groom were both at least 30 minutes late. I parked my car and grabbed my Canon camera bag and a tripod (which I did not use, more on that later) There was not much decorations to shoot but thinking back I should have went outside and shot some of the Hotel while it was still daylight. My second shooter was about 30 minutes late but arrived just as the bride and groom arrived so that was good. I found myself familiar with what I was doing and lost at the same time. My second shooter and I talked for a while about camera settings and started getting cake shots and what not. I basically followed her lead early on.
We started shooting some bride prep, wedding gown, shoes, flowers, hair, makeup... usual stuff. I soon found out that some of the shots that look so good on video don't really work well for still photos. One shot I tried to get was a close up of the eyes but after chimping the shot it was just scary. My second shooter and I spent some time arranging the gown and shoes and it was great to bat around ideas with her. Some of the shots were pretty good I thought.
I then left and went to shoot the groom while my second shooter stayed with the bride. I got the usual shots of the groom getting ready.. Here is was helpful to have experience with wedding prep work so I knew what I was looking for. Shortly after that I took the groomsmen and the groom outside to shoot some simple formals and this was where the fun started. The sun was at 1:00pm and beating down. I positioned the group with thier backs to the only place that had a decent background which left thier eyes facing the sun, causing them to squint just enough to lose the whites of their eyes. Not good. I was shooting from the hip, the first batch was over exposed so I reshot everything and this time I had the exposure much better. In hindsight it would have been better to shoot them inside. Basically I just stood them up, posed them just a little and snapped the pictures, nothing fancy or unique.. probably not much better than cousin joe could have done. My second shooter caught up with me and she took more shots against a different wall so those are probably much better.. (I will be getting all of her photos also, she had been getting shots of the bride getting ready)
Pretty soon it was time for the ceremony to start. I felt myself a little lost because this is the time I am turning on the audio equipment, the unmanned cameras, doing last minute checks, getting crowd shots.. but now I found myself just waiting on the ceremony to start. It was very nice not to have to worry about all of those details. I was able to spend some time with the bride and the wedding party getting a few shots before the ceremony started.
During the ceremony I was a little unsure about what to shoot and moving around, but I moved up and down the aisle a little. I used a Canon 17-55 IS lens so I had to move up to get any kind of closeup. I moved and got shots from the grooms side then brides side (this was at a hotel so there were no restrictions for movement but I felt uncomfortable a little moving and snapping photos) The ceremony went well and other than being a newby and not getting great shots, it was pretty easy work.
After the ceremony I just moved to the reception. It was so wonderful not to have to worry about moving equipment and capturing audio. I just spent time shooting guests and decorations. Plus when shooting guests, they actually stop and pose for you. Or if you ask them if they want their picture taken they gladly say yes. The hotel coordinator came up to me and said that the bride and groom and included myself and my assistant in the food plate count. We did not even have to wait in line...
While eating, Amy, my second shooter, said there was going to be a toast... the cool thing was that even if the toast started while I was eating, all I had to do was stop eating, go over and shoot some pictures... no need to worry about capturing the audio and video from start to finish. Very nice.
We were basically the wedding coordinators for the day, we did everything from gathering folks for photos to telling the DJ he could announce the bride and groom to directing the cake cutting.
The only thing about shooting photo is that I am still a newbie at it. Exposure was much more difficult to get right. Framing was harder. Getting a really cool shot of someone dancing was more difficult. Just knowing what to do was harder than video, but I think that will get easier. I am looking forward to the new adventure.
Photo samples to come.
Miracle Pictures
"If it's a good picture, it's a Miracle!"
"Life Productions, coming out of the dark, into the light"
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