Quick Cheat Guide for Shooting Your First Wedding

I got an email from my friend back home. She's may be getting roped into doing a wedding for a friend this Saturday (yes Valentine's) and she asked for any pointers I can give. So, excuse this post...because it's not well-thought of but I only had an hour to work on it...but this is my barebones start-up guide to approaching a wedding. Low-level tips...it really is a quick cheat guide.

1. Charge up your battery fully the night before...be aware of how long your battery will probably last

Hopefully, if you have only one camera and one battery, you have an idea of how long the battery should last you. The LCD display, a flash, and the actual action of taking pictures will drain your battery faster than idle sitting. So, it's kind of hard to test it out if you're not already aware.

I have always made it through 1.5-2 hour ceremonies but the first time I did back to back weddings...well, it gave out as the bride was walking down the beach aisle in the second wedding. I was saved by the fact that I brought a back-up camera from work.

2. If you're outdoors, try to photograph during the early mornings or late afternoons.

Bright sunlight can create uneven lighting. Glaring spots on the forehead and cheeks and shadows that hide the eyes. Outdoor shoots are great before 10 am and the golden time for afternoons is the two hours before sunset.

3. If you need to photograph with an overhead sun, try to put your subjects in the shade.

The last beach wedding I did, was at noon at Kailua Beach. I couldn't really choose where the ceremony was...but for their portraits... I looked down the beach until I saw where there was shade under the trees. The wedding party really appreciated the coolness and behind them was nothing but beautiful ocean.

4. . If you're going to put them in the shade...try to make sure it's not a sp0radic shade like a barely leafed tree.

I have so many pictures from my early weddings where I put them under trees but ...oops, there's clear outlines of the shadows from every single leaf outlined over their faces. Avoid avoid avoid!!!

5. . Keep it on P-mode, A-mode, or S-mode but bump up the exposure to +1/3 EV to +1EV.

People think you have to operate on M-mode to appear professional. Blarmey!! If you want to play safe and try to have everything focused well, keep it in A mode and keep your aperture around 10-16. If it gets lower than that and you focus spot is just a little off of your target...you're getting blurry pictures. And they look great in your LCD screen since your bride is all of 1.1 inches high...but wait until you see it full-size on your computer screen.

The dreaded blur can also be caused by movement. In weddings, the times with movement luckily are limited to the walking up and down the aisle unless the ring bearer takes off with the rings in the middle of your ceremony. Oh, and blur can be photographer-related. Keep those elbows in and hands steady. You can up your ISO so your shutter speed can stay pretty fast...but you really want your ISO as low as possible so you can later crop in on teary faces and sweet moments. Always aim for ISO around 200 to 400...no higher than 800.

P-mode...P mode is awesome.

My biggest tip is to overexpose a little. The biggest difference I notice in regular snapshots versus professional photographs is that regular snapshots tend to be on the underexposed side. Use your camera manual to figure out how to adjust your exposure value to 1-3 stops over zero.
Trust me...so many of my post processing steps is always to lighten and bump up the light...and that's after already having a slightly over-exposed image. You might lose a little bit of the intensity of colors in the sky but it does wonders for people.



I have many examples of low-lit photographs but I usually don't have them up on the web. This one is a okay example of not bumping up the exposure enough. This was taken with a flash...normal exposure...I wish I had bumped it up even more.


This is an example of overexposing it a stop or two. Before the ceremony, I'll usually take a picture...look at it...bump up the exposure a stop...take another picture..look at it...and so on so forth until I find the look I like

6. . Ask the officiant if he minds how close you get...and if you can walk behind behind them during the ceremony for different angles.

You don't want to be intrusive...but you do want to get other angles beside the back of the bride and groom for the entire ceremony. Take a picture of them holding hands. A picture of the mother of the bride with the couple in the foreground.

7. Give the bride and groom the goal of holding their kiss for five seconds and ask the officiant if he can step to the side just for the kiss.

Scott tells all the couples he marries to hold it for five seconds. Not just for the photographer...for every family member who has inevitable brought their personal camera. I've heard many a dad bellow "Eh, do em again...I never catch em." And I have never asked the officiant to move...but I thought about it after the last one. I usually just kneel in the aisle and kneel down until I find the angle where the bride and groom hide the offiiciant and you only see them.

8. Get the detail shots:
The little things that make the weddings theirs...it may seem silly but most likely, everything has a story behind it.
The ring pillow on the sand
the bouquet
the sash on the back of the chairs



9: Portrait time:

9a. Have a checklist in your head

Bride
Bride and bridesmaids (group and one by one)
Bride and flowergirl
Bride and her family
Bride, Groom, her family
Bride, Groom, his family
Bride, Groom, both families
Groom
Groom and Groomsmen
Groom and ringbearer
Bride, Groom, all wedding party

Bride and Groom (looking at you, looking at each other, hugging, kissing)

9b. Ask bride and groom not to let anyone else take pictures with personal cameras at same time.

It will slow things down and the worse thing is that you'll have one group picture and sister of the bride is smiling like a fool looking somewhere off to the left (probably at proud grandpa holding his camera). Set up the group...make sure they know when you're about to click so you have all eye contact..and click three times quickly (hopefully one of them will have all eyes open)

You can have people with personal cameras stand behind you and let them take their shots only after you have yours.

10. You can use a simple photo-editing software like Google Picasso (free) to touch up pictures and do any simple conversions.

Give yourself ample time to go through them. Let the bride and groom know it's going to take days...maybe a week or two. I let them know on the wedding day as I'm saying good-bye. I've never had anyone email or call asking where the pictures are. I give them a deadline and they know they'll get it by then. And I try to tell them a few days extra so I can surprise them by giving it to them a little early.

Kindness kills them every time

Well, I responded to all the emails I received with a light-hearted and humble attitude. Yup Yup, I know I do that angle shot way too much. Har har har...well, I think it works out well. The third email writer has been shooting emails back adn forth and just offered to meet with me with the possibility of training me as a second shooter and maybe eventually a primary shooter. Now I'm nervous.

Then I received an email from the woman I did five weddings for last year. She has requested my services on two weddings in the next three months. That's awesome. I wish I could quit my real job just so I could focus on this and make sure I'm leanring everything I need to do.

I still need how to figure out how to use my new camera and read the manual. I need to figure out how to send it in for a cleaning because it badly needs it. I want to make real business cards. I have a friend who is willing to help me make a new website and I've been putting it off because I want to think about it and make sure i get it right.

*sigh*

Is it going to keep on ticking?

So, in response to the five inquiries I sent out to companies that seriously pay their photographers like $100 for weddings, all work and prints included (I thought, I might have enough skill for that), I already received three responses.

Email #1:
*_()##,

Thank you for your email.

I trust we will get busier soon, but the last two weeks of January we only have a few weddings, not enough to pay our Office rent.

Our usual pay for Photographers is $100.00 for area 1, and $150.00 for area 2, and $350.00 for area 3.

Your photography is awesome. Hope we get busy enough to see your work soon. We'll keep your contact number on our Photographers List.

Wow, that is so nice. I responded that I would love to be kept on their list and appreciated the quick response. I just kept thinking, that was so nice of the owner.

Ego check=still intact, feeling good

Today, I received
Email 2:

Thanks for your introduction. We do have other photographers on Oahu but it's always nice to have more resources. I've looked at your blog site and you seem to have an eye for it - one suggestion would be to not over-do the dutch angle thing.

As a professional photographer myself, I've found that it's not so much the technical as it is the personal. Getting the right mood out of your subject is everything. Getting them to smile naturally (without asking them to) and capturing the love between them.

I'm going to make a vendor sheet on you to keep in out files. Please send back the info below. Nice talking to you!

Oh, that's nice. I guess the second paragraph is in response to me saying that I want more experience to keep learning. How nice of him to give me a little lesson. The "dutch" angle thing made me laugh cause I do the angle shot way too much. I can't help it. Those photos look way more appealing to me than up and down subject photos. It makes it interesting to me. I brooded a little but, heck, he's right about the too much angle shots...and he said nice things.

Ego check- still good

Then later today, I got

Email 3:

Thanks for your inquiry regarding becoming a photographer for my company. Well, first of all, I'd like to say is that your style of photography is much better than what I've seen out there, but you still have a ways to go when it comes to implementing photography techniques. It's probably because you don't know when to apply effects....or are just doing shots which look cool, but don't do anything to add to the story telling of photographing.

I'd like to give you a few tips here:- photographing is all about storytelling.... A few things about story. Story is king...and story equals conflict, and then resolution. So right now, I'm looking at your shots, I don't see any conflict in any of your shots. There's no nervous brides, there's no nervous groom. There is no romance in the posing, there needs more intimacy in the shots. Here's what I mean:

This is conflict...... to shoot these pictures is not just a matter of luck. If you see children there, get ready for their reaction when the bride and groom kiss..- you have way too much "dutch" on your shots. Dutch means "camera tilt" Too much dutch implies NAUSEA to pictures....just the right amount of dutch implies "motion." So you usually only want a little dutch when couples are kissing, or walking towards the camera. Less than 45 degrees....the close you get to 45 degrees the more nausea you start to imply. Plus, use if very sparingly.... Try to keep that horizon level for most shots..-

Lastly, I am seeing too much portrait shots, when you should actually have more landscape shots than anything else. Most amateur photographers will shoot more portrait than landscape shots because they don't know what to do with the extra space on the left and right of the frame...... Well, the truth is you don't have to do anything with it...other than to compose the background with the foreground. When you shoot portrait shots, you only have to really worry about the foreground...shooting landscape, makes you think about both...So a little dutch can imply a little motion...it works in this case because the water is moving...if the water wasn't moving, I would probably shoot it flat.....Dutch really works well in walking shots....But don't forget about shooting regular shots.... and in landscape....using the background as a way to fill the space to the left and right...or vice versa...What I call the master shot...... not many wedding photographers shoot this. Remember you can always crop

Right now, you are shooting with way too much dutch shots, and not enough landscape...that's basically about it.....

About partnering with me. That may be a possibility if your skill level comes up to where I would love it to be. You have the potential of being a great photographer, possibly even a better one that myself.

Ouch. At least he ended with a positive remark...nothing better than potential, huh? There's a lot of pictures he included in his email that I won't transfer over. Proud part of me says, I like my pictures waaaay better. He had some weddings in the exact same spot and most of them looked like any snapshot out of some point and shoots. He had three on his website that I really really liked so I know he can do good work. So, maybe, this is a part of the dropping the pride and trying to learn from a professional. I'm part of a forum where I thought the photographers were brutal but, this is definitely the first time I got a good few kicks to the pride. Sigh, let's take his advice and learn.

Ego: whoa, took quite a licking...

Wish more people got married in the winter

October was crazy and busy, but now I'm going through withdrawal. I actually felt like I was doing something, growing and learning. And it seems the south swell has disappeared and I'm staring at nothing. I have cabin fever and I'm going crazy. Craigslist ads don't elicit much response. I had one inquiry and she ended up booking through a wedding planner before I even emailed back. So, today, I emailed the top five wedding package companies that came up in google. Maybe I'll catch a break.

The great news was that I'm still receiving business from those weddings in October, which I did through a local wedding planner. The bride wants to purchase a CD of her images. My set price is $200 which is a steal, comes out to like $2 something per picture...plus, other photographers I read about charge closer to $650 to $1000. But I was still so nervous putting $200 down. I struggled with knocking the price down. I mean, I'm not going to make any more money off this wedding. People don't like to sell the CD because then there's no incentive to buy prints. There's no harm in selling a CD cheap. I don't know...I took a gamble and sent the email with the standard quote. Oooh, I would be real excited if she purchases. I was looking at all these cutesy newborn props, a fluffy white rug, baby blanket wraps...all cost money. I can't justify spending the money when I don't have any newborns to photograph. Whe I say "I can't justify"...I mean, I am holding out for a day or two until I can't take it anymore and buy more than I even planned on in the first place.

Lions and Tigers and Flash Photography...oh my!!!

I finally got to do my first family shoot. For free of course because it was PB (portfolio building) and actually, I would chalk this up to PPB (pre-portfolio building). They wanted to do it at night and in front of lights and I warned them...."I'm mainly a natural lightist, my flash photography sucks big time.

The original plan was to have dinner at Hale Koa and take pictures there but "Mr. Speedy Cashier" Paul had to work that night so we had to have the pictures at church. I thought about it for a few days and my plan of action was....

1. Long shutter speed to get enough ambient light like the tree and Christmas lights in
2. Quick flash at end to light up the family

Looking over my pictures later, lessons learned:

1. I wish I had less of the background in the pictures...maybe not such a long shutter speed. Our church is having a series on villains and heroes in the Bible, thus, the cityscape in the back. But I let too much background detail. The buildings which just distract me...the folds in the tent overhead (our church is a temporary building) which I cloned out as much as possible but still not ideal.

So, I thought, oh, I'll just take an underexposed picture to get the lights all pretty and combine it with another picture that has the family well-lit. Hey, it takes effort to combine two pictures. I spent a lot of effort combining the two...and you work so hard to fix things that as it gets better and better, you start to think it looks perfect. Tim Gunn said it best on Project Runway. You know when you're at a farm and all you can smell is the s*** but then you get used to and you start to think it's fresh air. Sometimes you need someone to come in and tell you it smells like s***.

So, I show this photo to Scott and instead of being stoked, he just goes "hmmm, can you make them more blurry so maybe it matches the background more." I was so disappointed at his lackluster response but when you flip from a normal pic to this pic...then it is so blatant obvious, you're like "How did I think this looked natural?"



See, a little more natural. Not perfect, but better. Notice the top of the tent. I cloned out the side of the screen and this ugly lighting fixture. Oh, and I painted the top of the tent red just to be Christmas-ey.


Sometimes a crop creates a completely different feel. Same photo but with a landscape crop. This is the one they used for their Christmas card. Now, there was some artful work with it. The chances of having all ten people looking at the camera with non-weird expressions...Pretty slim. I had to photoshop some faces from other pictures in. I already forget which ones. Haley looks out of focus but I think she was moving so it blurred a little.

Taking Junior Portraits

Until I get better and busier, weddings are still too far between for that to be the only thing I rely on. I constantly look for any opportunity to practice and progress. I actually like children's photography and would love for that to be my specialty, but weddings are way more easier to book...especially here in Hawaii

My niece Darilyn just turned sixteen on Thanksgiving Day. Last year as a sophomore, she asked if I would take her senior pictures. I have some ideas and I took few pictures of her outside our rental over thanksgiving vacation. Man, the new challenges that this presents:

teenagers are a lot more unsure about what they should do. She automatically hits the pose in the second picture. It's cute..but she seems unsure of what else to do. I try to direct her but you can sense there's a lot more uncertainty. She doesn't want to look uncool.

2. Second challenge: I cropped the first picture because it showed her stomach. I wasn't too bothered by modesty concerns but I was more concerned if she didn't feel it flattered her. She's so petite and skinny but the side profile might have her saying "auntie I look fat!!!" Which she's not.

I do take pride in my post-processing. I used a "overlay" layer over the second picture and painted with a low opacity black brush and created two vertical lines on her stomach to give more of the illusion of a "toned" stomach. Then I selected the area of her tummy right below her piko (belly button) with and lightened it just a tad to lessen the shadown and make her tummy look flatter.

I was not happy with the colors. The golf course was right behind her and had such beautiful greens....they came out too yellow in the picture for me. I tried to green and darken it up but not super happy. And there's a grayish tone to her skin tones in the black and white conversion. I suck at black and white conversions, i use an action to get them but I don't know how to get the look I want.

What I really want to say-A beginning in reality blogging

I started my first blog because I've always journaled...ie...xanga followed by myspace. And I just wanted to incorporate my efforts to include my learning experiences in taking photographs. I wanted a real glimpse into the struggles of trying to better myself in photography and share the things I've learned. However, I found that since I have had a few people who paid for photos, that I had to adopt good business practice of watching what I say. And it lost it's journal appeal to me. Especially since I put my full name in the website. So, I've started a new blog, no name blazed across the URL and hopefully I'll figure out how to make it private so people can't stumble across it.

One thing I've learned about myself is that I love the tilt in photos. I angle the camera when I photographs a single person, it feels the frame more and it adds interest. Looking at my photostream in flickr, now I wonder if I am caught in a rut. Especially since every photo angles the same way, from the top left to bottom right corner. I mean, it doesn't matter which way to angle it, but maybe I'm overdoing it. Hmmm...food for thought.