Living Through the Stress of Wedding Photography

Of all the various types of digital photography wedding photography is perhaps the most stressful. Following some simple rules will help you make it through this assignment relatively unscathed.

The List of Shots

Prior to your worrying about your gear, you have to ascertain exactly what shots are wanted and needed. You can sometimes discover that the bride has done this already. You need more specific directions than that to capture the mood and happiness of the occasion. If your client says anything like this be afraid, be very afraid. Ask for a shot list.

A shot list should be separated into three broad categories:

1. Before the Ceremony
2. The Ceremony
3. Following the Ceremony

Before the Ceremony

These shots can consist of the following:

* The bride dressing
* The bride and friends
* The bride with her parents
* The groom with his friends
* The groom with his parents
* The wedding dress
* Getting into the limo
* Sitting in the limo
* Arriving at the church

Several of these can be candid shots. Some work better if you pose them.

The Service

These shots depend on the location and whether you are allowed to photograph the actual exchange of vows, etc. You may or may not be able to record the service – ask the bride to find out. If so, make sure you position yourself unobtrusively on the groom’s side so you can shoot the bride. Remember, always concentrate on getting good shots of the bride.

These photos should include:

* photos of the bride and groom showing their outfits and celebrant.
* First take some frames showing the bride and groom from the waist up.
* Three quarter length to full length of the entire bridal party including the maids and groomsmen.
* Close-ups and medium close-ups of the new couple.
* The ring (close-up on the hands if you can zoom in fast otherwise go for the semi-close-up)
* The kiss (semi close-up)

Lighting plays a big part in the service shots. Flash is a no-no, so make sure you have worked out how to use the available light. How ell or how poorly the scene will be lit on the big day can be evaluated by attending the rehearsal. Make sure you use a tripod.

Use the ‘silent’ option on your digital camera. Do that so you can shoot many frames without disturbing the event. The more the better. Set the camera to multiple frames and hold the shutter down at the important moments. Nothing else known to man has spoiled more photos than the frozen blink. Blaze away during the important moments.

Some fancy footwork may be needed to photograph the new couple walking towards the front doors. Now this is an important wedding photography tip: Plan your return route to the front door at the rehearsal.  When the new couple turn and move down the aisle, use your flash. For more information look under ‘Equipment’.

Following the Ceremony

Again some of these could be candid and some ought to be posed. These should consist of:

* The bride and groom outside the church/venue with well-wishers
* The confetti moment (just hold the shutter down!)
* The bouquet
* Groups of bride and groom and all parents
* Getting into the limo
* Sitting in the limo
* The limo itself if it has been tricked up with cans and graffiti etc.

Following on-After the Ceremony

These usually need to be planned ahead. Take the happy couple to a park, a beach, some location you have scouted out beforehand. This is when you can shoot the dress to good effect. keep an eye on the background but otherwise just allow them to relax and behave naturally. Posed shots should be done first, then move off for photos with the zoom so they can be more spontaneous.

The Reception is included in this segment. Stay with the main action and resist being pulled away by enthusiastic guests who will probably never remember those photos they just had to have on the day.

Make sure you get the cake cutting. You may have the bridal table on your list – if not just do a general coverage of the toasts. On the day you’ll be asked to photograph everything, but the most wanted pictures after the event will be those of the ceremony.

Recruit the matron of honor if possible to help you stay on track at the reception and organize the group photos.

The Finished Product

It is better to supply a CD or DVD with the duds edited out. Duds make photographers look incompetent. For added effect you can use video editing software to quickly make a slide show of the event in sequence. An image that can’t be printed out at A4 size and be clear and sharp is also a dud. If you are selling the pictures you can place a watermark on each one that says ‘Proof Only’, or simply include the whole finished CD in your overall fee and don’t worry about orders.

Basic Exposure Techniques

 

Lighting plays the major role in the photographing process. This is because bad lighting will obscure the photo’s subjects and composition, leaving little to be appreciated. Good lighting, on the other hand, defines the form of your subjects and show them in vivid colors. That’s why the camera should be set to collect the correct amount of light.

Exposure is the amount of light that is collected by the photographic medium, whether it is a film or a digital sensor, while shooting a single photograph. There is no fixed value of a correct amount of light, because it depends on the available lights, the objects, and the photographer’s judgment. However, it is safe to say that there’s an acceptable exposure and an unacceptable exposure. Most exposures that obscure details while not adding any artistic value are considered unacceptable.

Low lighting conditions require high exposures to allow more light into the sensor, brightening up the final photograph. If less exposure is used, the photograph will become darker as a result of the underexposure. As for bright light conditions, low exposure will be enough to gather sufficient amount of light to produce a photo with good lighting. Otherwise, the photograph will be overexposed, having too many bright areas, the bright subjects loosing their details, and the dark subjects looking too bright..

Exposure relies on two factors: shutter speed (exposure time) and aperture. Shutter speed determines how long the sensor will be exposed to light. Slow shutter speed means more exposure, while fast speed will allow less exposure. As for aperture, it determines how wide the lens is opened. Narrow aperture will let less light pass through it than a wide aperture. ISO speeds also affect the degree of exposure. Higher ISO speeds will make the sensor more sensitive to light, reducing exposure, but it will add undesired noise to the photos.

In manual exposure mode, aperture and shutter speed are usually set independently. As for automatic exposure settings, the camera will determine the degree of exposure needed according to the light metering technique used. Exposure compensation is a method of adjusting the exposure by adding fixed exposure values, which is also very useful for camera owners who don’t have manual exposure settings.

Photographs with very dark and very bright spots will not show correct exposure on all their parts using any type of cameras. Usually, photographers take the same photograph at different exposures, and combine them together using software programs.

A good approach to learn more about exposure is to look at the exposure settings of your previous photographs, and compare them Look for the exposure time (shutter speed), the aperture, the ISO speed, and the exposure compensation in the data that is stored in your image files. As a result, you will get a clearer idea on how exposure can impact your photos.

Go to CanvasPrintsOnline to get a copy of your free eBook

 

Close Ups – Filling the Frame

An ordinary composition of a photograph will contain one or more subjects as focal points and a surrounding consisting of other objects. Based on all these elements, an observer will be able to recognize, the subject, the environment, and the message. All this is good, but what if another impact on the observer is desired? What if you want to leave little hints, in order to keep him guessing?

Boring surroundings may have a very bad effects on your subject, because, most probably, they will not have elements to balance the photographs, leaving a lot of empty spaces. An effective remedy to this is to fill the frame with your subject, so as to get rid of these empty spaces.

Sometimes it is even better to include nothing but your subject. For example, consider this situation in which you are photographing a wild animal at the zoo. With a normal composition, you will probably include the animal, the cage, and maybe some spectators. Getting rid of all the element except for the animal itself, may make the photograph look as if it was taken in the wild. The ambiguity resulted from close-ups lead observers use their imaginations to complete the picture .A close-up on two hands holding each others will strike a certain emotion that may be different from one person to the other, depending on his experience. Here, all you did is that you removed the subjects’ personalities, so as to give a space for the observer to think.

Portraits are usually a strong candidate for closeups. Sure you can take a great portrait with your subject in an interesting environment, but you can also get a very nice one too with just focusing on him. Filling the frame with your subject will produce a very personal look. Getting even closer to just include the face – sometimes with eye contact – can bring a feeling of amicability, as if you were staying face to face with the subject. Close-ups on other body parts produce great photos too; they may create an abstract feel, or emphasize a certain action.

Close-ups also suit still life photographs very well. This allows you to see usual things in very unusual ways, revealing many details that were not obvious before. This kind of photography is usually used in stock and product photography.

A frame can be filled by walking towards your subject, zooming on it, or by cropping a photograph. While zooming is an on-camera process, cropping is usually done using photo-editing software, giving you more flexibility to set your composition, but with sacrificing the image’s original size.

The simplest compositions may sometimes be the richest. So use your imagination, and make your audience use theirs.

Go to CanvasPrintsOnline to get your free ebook and get more photography tips.

Next Page »