My first wedding

[12sndsgood]

Yep, since there was so much love on the other first wedding post I'm going to share my first wedding which took place about 4 weeks ago. I never intended to do a wedding and surely wasn't planning on being the main. That in itself show's my stupidity, but after turning my friend's down a few times and then talking to them seeing how the search went and them saying the ones they wanted were out of there price range and the ones they could afford were worse then the snapshots I had taken at my nieces wedding. We talked and I agreed to shoot there wedding. Im not going to mention the cost but lets just say after going out and buying $1800 in new lenses to make sure I had good low light capability I was wayyyy in the red on this event, but they were friends. I secured a buddy of mine as a second shooter because being stupid enough to do this I at least wasn't stupid enough to go it alone. I read every wedding book the library had, visited the location a month in advance to find a spot suitable for the wedding. I met with the bride about two months out to go over what she wanted to have photo wise and see what kind of portraits she wanted (that being my biggest fear, shooting large groups of people) and then met her again about a few weeks before to go over things again, show her a timeline I had of all the photos I thought we needed and to see how she was doing.

The friday before the wedding me and stephen(second shooter) went out to the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner to get some photos. Something being good friends with the couple allowed us to do. Upon seeing the church I thought okay it seems pretty well lit. Start taking test shots. okay iso 800, okay iso 2000, okay iso 3200 at F\4 at 1\60th a sec. okay, not as much light as it looks. I now know my D3000 is worthless as a backup camera. I had a park picked out to start shooting the bride and groom early saturday morning. Of course it rained over night so that idea was nixed and we shot everything in the church, using a small sanctuary with stained glass windows as a backdrop. At first I had planned on just doing everything natural light, but I had my lights with me so i setup the softbox and went to work. which I think worked out well for the smaller groups. Once i got into the larger groups I saw where my skills were lacking. I'm not the best at posing. and when it came down to more and more people i just ended up lining them in a half circle basically. Fail on my part. esp looking at a picture of 21 people all spread out, seeing the hard shadows on other people.

They started seating the grandmothers before we were done shooting family shots on the alter. they seated the mothers before we were back in place. My 2nd was just watching the portraits, looking for out of place things as I shot. I should have had him watching for them to seat once the grandmothers were seated, but I didn't think about it. The ceremony was short. She had kept telling me they had cut more and more out of it and it lasted maybe 10 minutes. I tried to get all the shots I could. We were told we could use flash if we wanted, but I didnt want to become a distraction to the wedding so we went with available light, Although there were a lot of photos trashed do to blur I still feel that was the right decision.

The reception was more relaxed. very dark, but we used flash working with about a 20' ceiling. The bride and groom have seen the photos and they loved them. we even went thru all the photos and she picked out more that I had deemed as scrap that she really wanted me to edit up. Not something I would do for a stranger, but these are friends.

What have I learned. I have learned that I'm not a wedding photographer and don't have any business running a wedding. I lack the skill needed and I need to spend more time working on my photography. I think in this case I was able to get what they wanted me to get but there was a lot of misses and I don't think I really came out with anything great. I do plan to continue my search to become a second shooter and try and stick with that route and get better. Weddings were never something I intended to go into in the first place so it's not I guess a huge shock. I think i'm more just dissapointed I didn't get something better.

As always good or bad i'm posting up a few pics from the wedding for everyone to have a look at. as always, C&C as you like. I've never been afraid of a harsh critique in the past so why start now. And if you read thru all of this, I thank you for that.


1.)


Richwine0021 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

2.)



Richwine0049 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

3.)



Richwine1119 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

4.)



Richwine1135 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

5.)



Richwine1143 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

6.)



Richwine1150 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

7.)



Richwine2199 by Square1 photography, on Flickr

 

[tirediron]

For your first go, these aren't bad at all. I really like the look you've captured in the bride's eye in #3! You've got good exposures and preserved white detail; admitedly, the lighting is a little flat, but it's a lot better than many first-timers. :thumbup:

 

[12sndsgood]

Thanks John.

 

[ChrisedwardsHT]

#4 is my favorite by far. Great colors and composition IMO..
Looks a littttlle washed out in the windows can't quite tell.

Great set overall..

 

[bunny99123]

I think you did a good job. I don't plan on being a wedding photog either, but when family and good friends can't afford one there is no choice. I like 1 and 7. The bride portrait is so clear. The pic of them kissing is priceless

 

[12sndsgood]

Yeah I tried to work with the windows a bit to keep them from being too blown out. probalby could have spent time isolating the window itself perhaps and working with it that way. but dealing with editing this many photos was a time issue for sure. I definatly need to get my work flow a bit more organized and find some processes to speed up editing. i need to start practicing with batching and the whole automation side to speed things up.

 

[skiboarder72]

Like others have said, not a bad first wedding at all! You will dramatically get better just going out and shooting wedding number two. Some general comments though: It sounds like you have some nice lenses, don't be afraid to shoot them more wide open to really shorten that depth of field to help your subject stand out. Also, don't be afraid to let things blow out in exchange for getting the lighting exciting on your subject. Instead of worrying about getting that stained glass window perfectly exposed behind the bride, try a silloutte or turn her and use the window light to add a bit more contrast to the lighting! Keep it up though!

 

[Robin Usagani]

what skiboarder said. When I shot with 24-70 and 70-200, I pretty much shoot everything in a church (without additional lighting) at 2.8. Why would you want to use anything else? Your ISO is already high, your shutter is already kinda slow. If you zoom in, you need more shutter speed... but then your DOF gets thinner.. so might as well shoot it at 2.8. If you go wide, your DOF gets deeper, then might as well shoot it with 2.8 and lower your ISO to improve the noise. These two lenses are pretty sharp wide open. No reason to shoot them at f/4 if you dont have much light.

 

[12sndsgood]

Although I didn't feel it. a lot of that was probalby nerves, me trying to play it safe. I have noticed on my 70-200 that it loses sharpness at 2.8 so I have been trying to stay out of that range on things like this where I was allready worried about blur with such a slow shutter. I probably would have been fine at 3. but again, was problaby me trying to play it safe. Also bringing this up I'm not sure how much I lose on the 24-700 at 2.8 Think that will be a test I do this weekend. I might have been able to go with that. I also think that played into my shot selection, I feel I have the basics down and when i'm a bit out of my cofort zone I just kind of go back to the basics and try to make sure I have the basic shot. the originol plan was get the basic shots and then try and get creative and I think I kept it basic all day.

We ended up doing a lot more family shots then planned. and when we went for some creative shots the bride just wasn't having it. She was just beginning to stress before the wedding. Luckily her sister suggested the fun shots so I didn't take any of the heat fo that lol. I really got no where near the shots of the bride that I had wanted. This was kind of a reverse wedding since this was his (groom) first wedding, but it was her second. She would have rather just gone to vegas and eloped so she did this for him. wich I expected him to whine and moan about it cause hes just not big on pictures being taken in general. and he works off shore for weeks at a time so she had to pretty much plan everything, and I think she was just stressed to the max.

Thanks for the advice.

 

[Robin Usagani]

It is like this... you got to choose between the 2 evils. Yes, I know you will lose sharpness at wide open, BUT you are also in a dark room.

which of these 2 is better? Shoot at 2.8 with twice as fast shutter? Or at 4 with half as fast shutter. Unless you are a robot with arm that wont shake, the answer is always the first 1. Going from 2.8 to 4 will improve your IQ just a tad while going with twice as fast shutter will minimize your shake blur a LOT. If you have plenty of light, then yes.. really think about your aperture.

 

[12sndsgood]

good point. I think maybe i'll take some time and try out the situation and see what the outcome is. My other thought was maybe going ahead and upping my ss a bit and going a tad underexposed and bumping that up in post. but then I started thinking how much time I spent going thru these photos and pp and that's definatly an area I dont want to slow down. and area I definatly need to work on to get a better and faster workflow and processing abilities. Definatly a lot to think on and work out.

 

[jamesbjenkins]

Great job for a first time!

As John said, your lighting is really flat and it's stealing your pop. If you bumped the midtone contrast and played with the levels a bit, I think these would really pop.

For what you had to work with, excellent work. Welcome to the wedding world!

 

[12sndsgood]

I really didn't expect to like it that much. I have never been big on weddings. But I liked it enough to want to start working on second shooting and becoming more comfortable with it. Just know I have a long way to go before i'm happy with things.