Slightly Frustrated - What am I doing wrong?

[cgipson1]

I would start here, if I were you: http://www.amazon.com/Understanding...9390/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1338995985&sr=8-1

Good equipment still need good knowledge and skills!

 

[Robin Usagani]

this is what happen when you use a nikon

 

[cgipson1]

this is what happen when you use a nikon

hahaha.... not even going there! YOU know why this happens... and it ain't the camera! lol!

 

[theonlysteviet]

Hey.

Why don't you look up the mentoring section of this forum? I recently got myself one

 

[IByte]

this is what happen when you use a nikon

Blasphemy Schwetty!

 

[chuasam]

Hey Sue,
are you picking your autofocus points or are you letting the camera pick the autofocus points for you? The pictures seemed to be focused on the nearest point to the camera.

 

[pipesintune]

The basics are what so many people new to the industry seem to lack, and choose to rely on the technology of the cameras to 'fix'.
Exposure, composition and white balance are the keys to making a great image. Post processing is OK for a few images from the day, but you don't want to go crazy with them.

I rarely use any effects with my images...I'd rather get it right in the camera. My post work is mostly all done in Lightroom to fine-tune the images to perfection.

I'd suggest to learn to use a light meter. Set manual exposures and learn to use fill-flash outdoors (as well as using flash indoors, correctly).
It's a big job, but a wedding is an even bigger job that you cannot go back and re-shoot, or make excuses for.

One way to get a good grasp is to work for another photographer, first by shadowing, then by shooting with, to get the hang of things.

 

[gsgary]

Yes my photoshop skills are quite horrendous and I'm afraid I don't know what IQ means. I also get the metaphors, but I've already written that I know its going down hill for me...and I would like to know what to do correctly, i'm throwing myself out there to make myself better, so I will take the critisim, but if its useful, I dont see the point of a post that says...oh, you just shouldnt be doing this at all, I would like to learn, perhaps some reading material that would assist me? a website? more schooling?
Thank you

How about taking a few years learning before you wreck someones wedding

 

[Robin Usagani]

Yes my photoshop skills are quite horrendous and I'm afraid I don't know what IQ means. I also get the metaphors, but I've already written that I know its going down hill for me...and I would like to know what to do correctly, i'm throwing myself out there to make myself better, so I will take the critisim, but if its useful, I dont see the point of a post that says...oh, you just shouldnt be doing this at all, I would like to learn, perhaps some reading material that would assist me? a website? more schooling?
Thank you

How about taking a few years learning before you wreck someones wedding

She is not wrecking anyone's wedding. The clients should expect similar photos based on her portfolio.

 

[Dillard]

She is not wrecking anyone's wedding. The clients should expect similar photos based on her portfolio.

Very true. If you were to hire a photographer for your wedding without looking at their portfolio, you honestly couldn't complain

 

[gsgary]

Yes my photoshop skills are quite horrendous and I'm afraid I don't know what IQ means. I also get the metaphors, but I've already written that I know its going down hill for me...and I would like to know what to do correctly, i'm throwing myself out there to make myself better, so I will take the critisim, but if its useful, I dont see the point of a post that says...oh, you just shouldnt be doing this at all, I would like to learn, perhaps some reading material that would assist me? a website? more schooling?
Thank you

How about taking a few years learning before you wreck someones wedding

She is not wrecking anyone's wedding. The clients should expect similar photos based on her portfolio.

Blown whites and out of focus, not what you expect from a D700 i thought they had a perfect light meter

 

[The_Traveler]

it is really sort of difficult to see where the problems are occurring.
why not post a lerge jpeg or a link to a raw image so we can see what they look like straight out of the camera?

Lew

 

[KmH]

The basics are what so many people new to the industry seem to lack, and choose to rely on the technology of the cameras to 'fix'.
Exposure, composition and white balance are the keys to making a great image. Post processing is OK for a few images from the day, but you don't want to go crazy with them.

Yep! No doubt, the fundamentals have to be mastered before one can effectively use advanced techniques. With the advent of digital photography the photographer has had to become much more involved in the post production work, and more importantly has a much more complex pre production learning curve to master.

Image editing is it's own specialty, and is akin to film photographers learning how to develope, process. and print in a wet darkroom. Photoshop and similar aplications are based on wet darkroom techniques. I highly recommend putting together an image editing (Photoshop) reference library.

What is see from so many new photographers today is a poor understanding of how to control depth-of-field, a poor understanding of how to effectively use light, and an general lack of understanding technical things.

 

[suzzie_stretch]

this one is essentially straight from camera, it was processed from raw to jpeg, but if I've uploaded it correctly, it should be full image size.

When I did my schooling for photography, it was all still film, and that to me was so simple, so manual and easy to get, theres soo many possibilties with my digital now, that perhaps its overwhelming.

MY portfolio is online, as well as printed for clients to see, so they know fully ahead of time the type of product I can offer them for the price they are paying. I've only ever had happy clients, but I KNOW I can do better, I may just need to update my skill set to stay with the new equipment and everything.

I appreciate the helpful insight so far, I want to be a sponge and take all this on, I will look into the provided links as well, thank you

 

[gsgary]

Everything is the same shooting digital only thing different is white balance i still shot film as well as digital