Wedding Shoot

hawee99 · Jun 27, 2007

hahahahah elsaspet your post was awesome and extremely humbling. It totally put into persepctive the knowledge and equipment needed to shoot a wedding and make it amazing. Website is badass as well

. I would love to be at that level someday. If I lose her as a friend, f^ck it, she's just a co-worker i've known for four years anyhow. Plus I don't wanna work there anymore! We've never hung out outside of work and I need the experience anyhow. I've set her expectations low and she promises she doesn't care. hahahahaha we'll see. I am gonna get a bigger aperature lens and a flash. I think it will be ok/mediocore (spelling) and I can't wait to post some pictures. I'm gonna post alot. Thanks for advice, it's helped alot and any more advice can't hurt and will be appreciated, but bottom line....I can't back out now!!!!!! :lol:

Cullen

EOS_JD · Jun 27, 2007

hawee99 said:
hahahahah elsaspet your post was awesome and extremely humbling. It totally put into persepctive the knowledge and equipment needed to shoot a wedding and make it amazing. Website is badass as well . I would love to be at that level someday. If I lose her as a friend, f^ck it, she's just a co-worker i've known for four years anyhow. Plus I don't wanna work there anymore! We've never hung out outside of work and I need the experience anyhow. I've set her expectations low and she promises she doesn't care. hahahahaha we'll see. I am gonna get a bigger aperature lens and a flash. I think it will be ok/mediocore (spelling) and I can't wait to post some pictures. I'm gonna post alot. Thanks for advice, it's helped alot and any more advice can't hurt and will be appreciated, but bottom line....I can't back out now!!!!!!

Cullen

We've all done a "first". Be prepared..... Don't panic and check the histogram often. Also keep an eye on your ISO. You don't want to be at 800 or 1600 inside then move outside and forget it was set for that!! Easily done.

rmh159 · Jun 28, 2007

I'm in a similar boat but I have a little more time to prepare. I've already sunk about $400 in equipment and will likely spend about another $650 till it's said and done. I'm taking this very seriously though and want to make sure I'm delivering some awesome photos.

My advice would be to get some primes. Like others have said, don't plan on using a flash during the ceremony but on the plus side you shouldn't have a ton of movement. Maybe use a prime while people are walking in & out and use a tripod with the telephoto during the ceremony (I'd still try to get a faster lens and maybe a prime with good tripod spots picked out before anyone shows up). When you can use a flash you can either use a bracket to get it off camera or you could get some Nikon Speedlights and take advantage of their CLS system (lets you control all of the off cam flashes from on-cam SB-800 or your D80). Maybe rent some stuff.

I'd also study the sh*t out of lighting in general. Yeah it's a wedding but it all boils down to shooting well in low light conditions which you can practice or control using flashes. Check out this site. That guy is pretty good.

My last words of wisdom are to set their expectations realistically and then work your nuts off to blow those expecatations away. I see a lot of posts where people warn of suicidal brides if the pics don't turn out to be amazing but it really just depends on what the couple wants. I had a friend shoot my wedding with a P&S cam (granted it was on a beach and not traditional) and I ended up with about 20 good shots that sit in an album somewhere and 1 that's hanging on the wall. I can honestly say the best thing about our wedding photos is the $3000 I DIDN'T spend on a photographer. You just have to make sure you know EXACTLY what they expect to get and they understand you're ability to deliver that.