[PPPPPP42]

I shouldn't say everything, a few shots came out nice. I went to a late afternoon outdoor wedding today (complete with trees to shadow things all wrong) and decided to bring my cameras (both K20D and Super Program with Kodak BW400CN). I deliberately stayed out of the way of the real photographer and didn't order people around to get shots, but still, I think I invented new ways to screw shots up. I haven't seen the film yet, who knows what I got there, I used the Super Program on M except when I was using the AF280T in TTL mode indoors.
I can't imaging why people who do this for a living and actually have to get results don't go home and drink heavily afterwards.

Things I learned today:
I don't even begin to have a good enough understanding of lighting.

To really cover a wedding well you have to be willing and able to boss people around and get in everyone's way.

You also need a really good P-TTL flash with a DSLR to do anything at a wedding even if its just for fill light, especially indoors at the reception after.

Shooting with the sun low behind you puts your shadow in the picture, you'd think I woulda remembered that one.

The K20D likes to totally under expose several shots in a row when you hit the button on the remote a lot, not sure what happened there, but it screwed up all the photos of the kiss even though the ones before and after were good and I didn't touch anything.

The Tamron 70-300 (see signature) is unbelievably crappy for chromatic aberrations, I mean you have no idea. Never had used it for underexposed people with background in sunlight or high contrast clothing before. Thankfully it didn't even cost me $100. Shoulda tried the A70-210 F4 on it but I was too busy to look that close at what I was getting.

Skin is CRAZY reflective in sunlight, it blows out super easy (at least on white people). The damn wedding dress wasn't even quite as bad (mainly because there was only one of those). I still don't know how to get a brightly lit person with a dark surrounding.

Both cameras should have been set to M the whole time instead of just the film one, but the lighting was so dynamic that I got lazy and left it on A which cost me a lot of shots. Same for focus, auto focus sucks.

More than a generic free version of Photoshop and the skills to really use it are critical for getting pro level people photos under many if not most circumstances.

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Last edited by PPPPPP42; 09-22-2012 at 09:10 PM.

[jatrax]

I did a wedding last year under similar conditions. Stayed out of the way of the 'pro' or rather 'pros', they had two shooters and a coordinator to line things up and generally organize things while the shooters did their thing. Very slick operation with people who obviously knew their job. Right up until someone gave them the wrong directions to one of the sites the bride wanted pictures at after the wedding. A red covered bridge out in the country. After some frantic cell phone calls I was asked to fill in and take the shots for this location as the 'pros' could not get there in time, they were already at the reception.

So, fun and games and playing with the camera suddenly becomes, you are IT. No excuses, no re-do's, make it happen, your shots are the only ones that will ever exist.

Things I learned:
Always have a coordinator or assistant, the shooter should be shooting not lining up the subjects
You need to know your gear blindfolded. Seriously, if you cannot make all the changes to the camera settings without looking at the camera, you don't have enough experience
Working outside in 100% sunlight at 3pm really, really s&*ks
I don't think anywhere near fast enough to do this
Shooting a bride in white dress next to groom in black tux is an interesting challenge in exposure
The hardest part of any human endeavor is dealing with the humans involved

The most important thing I learned though was that I never, ever, ever want to do weddings professionally

[Ex Finn.]

Working outside in 100% sunlight at 3pm really, really s&*ks

Not nearly as much as shooting the reception under high-pressure sodium.

[littledrawe]

My Brother in law and his wife just got their pictures back and they hate all of them, I felt really bad. I had my camera but my wife was not happy about me focusing on it and not the family that was there so it quickly made its way back into the bag.
The "photographer" that showed up looked like he just got done shooting yearbook stuff at the homecoming game the night before so I was not optimistic. The lighting is definately the key I think when it comes to weddings. I don't think it matters as much what you have(I'm being general here)to shoot with as it matters wether or not you know how to use it. I know I need to read the manual on my flash cover to cover 10 or so times before I can really use it in this type of setting.

[maxfield_photo]

Things I learned today:
I don't even begin to have a good enough understanding of lighting.

This is where you should start.

You also need a really good P-TTL flash with a DSLR to do anything at a wedding even if its just for fill light, especially indoors at the reception after.

This is not


The problem with pTTL is the camera is doing all the work for you. That sounds like a good thing, but let me say it another way: You are surrendering control to the camera and letting it make the decisions. You want to be in charge. At first you're going to fail. Don't give up, that's one of the most important parts of the process. Think of it like eating your vegetables, it's good for you!

Practice, when the pressure isn't on. Go to the park with a sucker patient friend. Take your camera out of auto mode, and take your flash out of auto mode. Full manual is the best way to learn, and thanks to digital you now have instant feedback. Get a light meter. Can't afford one? Get a gray card. Spot meter off of it, you'll be astonished at your new found accuracy. If there's something wrong with the frame that you just shot, you can adjust because the settings won't change unless you change them. Use a scientific approach. Adjust one variable at a time until you have it where you want it.

Remember that with flash you are taking two pictures at once, a flash exposure and an ambient exposure. Shutter speed, aperture and ISO control the ambient exposure; get that where you want it first. Aperture, ISO, flash output [edit: and flash-to-subject distance] control the flash exposure. Notice that aperture and ISO will affect both flash and ambient, so if you aren't happy with the balance between them, fiddling with those settings won't help.

Is the ambient light under exposed? Then slow the shutter speed. Is the flash exposure too hot? Then reduce the flash power. There really is no one correct balance as long as your subject is properly exposed (i.e. the flash exposure), it's just a matter of taste. Some people like a little bit of flash, some like a lot.

Just don't be afraid to make mistakes. As long as you're willing to learn from them, they'll teach you at least as much as your successes. Back in the days of film this would have been an expensive endeavor, and you would have had to take careful notes, now you can't use that excuse. Good luck, and don't hesitate to post your questions.

[PPPPPP42]

I do need a new flash anyways, the 280T I have is a great flash for the price, but it only has 2 manual settings so its basically worthless for complex lighting though I make do with creativity and it does wonders in TTL for indoors film on the Super Program. I have been looking at the mid priced metz stuff since the Pentax stuff has laughable features for the price and the top range metz stuff seems to be loaded with crap I would never use for twice the price.
This is the one I think I will get when I get around to doing more people stuff, which I rarely do and that's 90% of where flashes are used.
Metz mecablitz 50 AF-1 TTL Shoe Mount Flash for Pentax MZ

[JimJohnson]

I'm laughing. In my much younger days my sister pressured me into shooting her low budget wedding. After all, I had a 35mm camera and flash - that made me as good as the pros, right? I KNEW better and tried to say so, but got pressured into it any way. Maybe it was good my sister divorced the guy a few years later. It was a good reason everyone stopped looking at my wedding photos.

Last weekend I attended a relative's wedding. Mostly I grabbed table shots of family members we haven't seen since - the last wedding or funeral. And I screwed up several of those shots by accidently setting my flash for full manual instead of P-TTL. and overexposing them. I could salvage the images somewhat in post processing, but I'm sure glad I won't be showing those shots around.

The #1 rule for weddings hasn't changed. You can't be both a guest and a photographer. The #1 general rule hasn't changed. Haste makes waste. And the #1 rule for digital photography hasn't changed. LOOK at the previews before calling the shot good.

Good wedding photographers work their butts off.

[HockeyDad]

I want to extend a heartfelt "Thank You" to everyone in this thread and others like it. It's because of these kinds of posts that I didn't even hesitate to say, "NOPE!" when my wife's cousin recently asked me to shoot their wedding. "But, it's informal and low key", he tells me... "You take really good pictures", he tries to butter me up. All in all he was kind of taken aback until I explained that for every 10 photos of mine he likes, I probably shot 100 that he never saw because they were crap. When I asked him to imagine posing to cut the cake while I snapped 100 pics he started to see the light.

That said, I will of course have my camera at their wedding and take some photos. I want to get good at it . But, as a former Firefighter/EMT, I'd rather deal with life & death situations than have to explain to a bride why I missed critical photos of her wedding day.

[redrockcoulee]

At our niece's wedding last month I took a borrowed X100 with as did not want to be a photographer and a guest but wanted some family shots as well. My wife and I did take some shots but not that many. The card on the wedding photograph's camera got corrupted so he had no images from the cutting of the cake on so it is good that we plus others had taken some shots. The wedding photographers could have been a husband and wife team who seemed professional with one of them shooting video and the other stills and had props set up for silly shots during the dance etc. Guess this was not one of their days. I shot a few weddings in the 70s with Spotmatic Fs and thanks but no thanks

[mtansley]

Remember that with flash you are taking two pictures at once, a flash exposure and an ambient exposure

Sorry for interjecting here but that statement is so profound. I'd never thought about that before even though I do use my camera in manual and the flash in old-fashioned thyristor automatic.

Nicely put, I'll remember that next time as an aide-memorie (or however you spell it!!)

Thanks.

[hks_kansei]

Unfortunately we've all had days like that.

about a month ago I went with a few mates to roam around the city at night and take photos.


All seemed well, but when I got home and looked at my shots, there was only really 2 or 3 that were any good.

Turns out I had accidentally stuffed up the diopter adjustment, so all my shots were out of focus.
And of course, many of them were also a bit shakey since I have great difficulty keeping my hands steady.

[Blue]

Not nearly as much as shooting the reception under high-pressure sodium.

Hotel ball room events screw me up very often due to the lights, especially sodium vapor.

[Kerrowdown]

I knew there was a reason that "I don't do weddings", just couldn't put my finger on it.

[magkelly]

I am by preference a portrait photographer and I prefer to do most of my work in the very controlled setting of a studio. I will occasionally venture outside to do a second set of shots for a client but I will only agree to do that if it's relatively cool outside because baking in the sun for too long usually equals hospital time for me. It's just not really all that negotiable.

I make it very clear that I won't touch weddings but I've still had people pull that "but you're so good and it's just a little backyard wedding" routine when they invite me to come. I'll gladly come and be a guest, but I will not just "bring my camera and take a few shots" for them. If they rescind their invitation at that point, and yes it has happened, then I chalk it up to them wanting a free photographer for their budget wedding and leave it at that. I don't want to be invited if that's all someone wants anyway.

I've had so many people offer to let me "practice" with their wedding it's not even funny. I'm not a big wedding kind of person. I'll never likely get married but even if I did I would never want any of that, the dress, the church, the tons of people, the expense, it's just not something I'd go for. I don't even much like attending weddings let alone the idea of photographing them.

Personally I think it's a bit rude to invite someone as a guest to a wedding and then ask them take your wedding photographs too. Talk about singing for your supper, laugh....

[jatrax]

Personally I think it's a bit rude to invite someone as a guest to a wedding and then ask them take your wedding photographs too.

Beyond rude!

I'm not a big wedding kind of person.

Historically big weddings were because a marriage joined two families not just two people. And it was a good idea for the families to meet and get to know one another. Lots of business sometimes got conducted, and children that might need an apprenticeship or at least a start in one trade or another were introduced around to those that could help them. Family was important because those were the connections you needed to get a job or a start.

These days the "big" wedding is more to show off than anything else. And the two people involved sometimes just get lost in the hoopla. I see too many young people (or their parents) insisting on a wedding that costs as much as the down payment on the house they need a lot more than the wedding. Which is better, spending a ton to show off to neighbors and friends or giving the kids a good start and a leg up on their future?