Practice run - wedding shots

[bigsarg7]

Hello everyone, I've got a busy month this month, last weekend was the 1st of my weddings for the month and I have 2 more to go. So i used this wedding as a practice run with permission of the bride and groom and their photographer (grooms brother). Now as i wasn't the main photographer I didn't achieve to many eye contact in the shots but these are a few of the shots i liked from the day. All these have had little pp except maybe a crop etc and getting rid of a few flies and mosquitos that were captured in the shots. But thats pretty much it. I would love some feedback, as I take it all onboard for the weddings to follow. All shots taken on my d200 and shot just out of moama at a place called paradise gardens on the mighty murray!

thansk for looking

[Mr Darcy]

I really like #1
#2 would have benefited from a fill light (reflector?) to get some detail into the groom's face A VAL (Voice Activated Light stand - i.e. assistant holding a strobe or reflector)would be a great idea. Can you manage it for your real shoot?
#3 I would prefer them both looking to the same place. Or each other.
#4 is better, but ditto
#5 the highlights are a bit too blown. Did you use a softbox? It would help I think And perhaps just a little more DOF

[bigsarg7]

thanks for the comment,

#1 i loved as well,
#2 was a tough one, as looking from the other direction you had better light on the grooms face and you can see the brides face as well, but saying that you would miss the back of the dress flowing like it is in this shot, and in the background there were some hideous massive big porta loo (toilets) and also the catering trailer and employees standing around watching, so it looked horrible. As to using a reflector my assistant wasn't around to do it that day as i was at a friends wedding just tagging along and she wasn't interested in doing it. grrrr lol but i totally agree that the grooms face needs a lot more light on it, but they were dancing pretty quick it'd be pretty hard to follow them with the reflector i think. please tell me if i am wrong! lol
#3 the main photographer (he was located down underneath me to the right looking up at them) asked the groom to look down at rings and asked bride to look at the camera but as he (photographer) was in the way i couldn't get down to the angle i wanted, and my dress didn't help that matter either!!
#4 this shot i loved his angle on it, but i couldn't get around him (narrow path) and all the bridesmaids and groomsmen were all hovering around that side and blocking any free areas, but yeah i totally agree.
#5 No soft box used, it was actually shot outside on a bit of black bark off one of the murray gums, i've got other shots of the rings on it with the flowers and shoes too, but the reason why i liked this was probably more personal i guess, the birde and groom are actually youth and yound adult pastors and they chose their rings around scriptures about 3 cords are uneasilly broken eg. bride groom and god as centre of their marriage. So i think this shot was relevent to their personal likes. I agree about the DOF i had put an extension tube on my 50mm but i think it was too big, but the light was disappearing quickly and i just wanted to get a shot- a bit slack on my behalf no doubt. but i would have like to have fiddled a bit more absolutely.

thanks for the comment, my novel sized response is probably too much, but it might explain the shots a bit more!! lol

[spesh]

I really like no 1 and it has captured the moment well.

With all of the other shots the lighting needs a lot of work in order to improve the shots. I would suggest a flash on the camera or if you can a cabled flash so that you can hand hold it slightly away from the camera to light your subjects.

The close up of the rings is overexposed in too many places and the DOF makes it difficult to recognize. As previously mentioned a softbox and turning your flash down a stop or two would really help.

Good luck with the weddings.

Andrew

[Wink]

I like the concept of each shot, however all the people shots are screaming for some fill flash or some form of directional light.
Shots 3 and 4 look a bit fuzzy to me. 1 and 2 are much sharper.

Keep practicing.

[aim54x]

#2 is my favourite of the lot, but as already mentioned it can be improved with some extra light.

Keep it up!

[ozimax]

Bigsarg, they're too dark/soft for my liking, but that may have to do partially at least with internet compression etc. As has been suggested, a reflector or fill flash (using a light softener of some description) may be advisable.

Thanks for posting.