How would you plan to shoot this?

[jml]

I would like to hear how you personally, according to your

experience and preferences would 'plan' to shoot an outdoor wedding

and reception late afternoon into evening light. I don't mean for

this to be too broad a question, but some set their cameras on P on

go for it. Some prefer manual etc.

 

So, first of all if you were new to shooting weddings (or when

you "were" new and wanted to just be sure to get good shots and not

get too worried about different settings how did you do it? And

after you gained the experience, did you stick with tried and true

or how did your preferences change and how would you plan this type

of shoot now? Thanks.

[wedding-photography-denver]

Camera 1 and 2 set to AV. Center weighted metering. Flash on e-ttl and HSS, with -1.5 comp set on flash. Iso100-400 (depending on light, which I use a Sekonic to meter when its difficult).

 

Turn off flash if you like the way the light is hitting.

[EricM]

bring straw, or 1/4 cto, gels for your warm your flash so you're not pumping in cold hard light against a warm soft back ground

[EricM]

"gels for your warm your flash"

 

gels to warm your flash...

[picturesque]

Now: I might use AV during the day (depends on what kind of lighting) and switch to manual during the evening. Vary fill flash from -2 stops in the day in the shade, -1 in the bright sun to gradually full flash exposure as it grew darker, dragging the shutter. Natural light whenever it is beautiful. I use a handheld meter. I shoot with a manual medium format system too. I started shooting with a manual medium format system so nothing along those lines has changed except I now don't use manual flash all the time. I now use multiple lighting.

[derek_c.]

That's what most of my weddings are like.<br>

I use 3 cameras to start.<br>

I use M mode (with lightmeter) until I cannot hand-hold my camera.<br>

Then I retire my meter & the day camera.<br>

I finish off the event with two cameras & two flashes at M modes.<br>

<br>

Now, about your remark on "worried about different settings.."<br>

If you are worried about settings, you ain't ready to do weddings.<br>

It's as simple as that, everyone should agree with me.<br>

But people here are polite, that they will not tell you that...

[________1]

If you put the camera on P and just go for it most of your shots will<b> probably</b> be ok. The <b>probability</b> that some critical shots will not be ok is also pretty high. Are you willing to take the <b>risk</b>? Is the bride? I'm not a statistician, by the way.

[lb-]

hi jan,

 

there's no way I'd even think about shooting an outdoor wedding without a 70-200 2.8 IS

lens. In fact, you'll be doing the client a great disservice if you don't buy that lens. If you

need me to explain that to your husband just have him call me :)

 

er, yeah.

 

anyway..........

 

as is usually the case all I can say is.......

 

do like Nadine. It's how I shoot too.

 

I'd only add that if you've got some pretty clouds you may want to experiment with setting

the camera to manual mode, metering for the sky and letting the flash fill the subject to

preserve the detail in the sky. Leave the flash in ETTL mode.

 

oh, and depending on the angle, we usually try to 3/4 backlight the subject with the sun

and use a bounce card for front fill (for the formals). If you have them facing the sun

you'll just get a bunch of squinty eye pix.

 

have fun!

 

cheers

 

lucas

[jml]

Thanks all, informative as ever.

 

Derek-I think people (if they work at it) can be both "polite" and honest at the same time, so let no one worry about offending me, I thrive on candor. That aside, let me clarify my question a bit. As with any new venture or career or job or whatever, we usually posess enough skills in the beginning to get started. Obviously over time we improve. Example...a person graduates from medical school with a degree that says he can practice medicine. Key word here is practice. He is deemed "ready" to practice what he has learned but is in no way possessed of the more finite skills he will acquire with each new patient experience. So, the point of my question allowed that, as a new wedding photographer ones skills and methods would perhaps have been different than they evolved into as experience was gained. Thus, as a newbie, I wanted to compare what I "think"....and what I "hope" I'm doing right with what you experienced wedding photographers started out doing on your first shoots. Certainly I would think that the "settings" or whatever that one had to be so conscious of early on would become more second-nature and refined as time went on. Back to my illustration, a new doc. can take out a set of tonsils, but he/she is going to be stressing to trying to put into practice all he has "book" learned, and experienced limitedly in med. school, it doesn't mean he isn't ready to see that first patient. (God help the poor soul..;-) Does this make sense? I hope so, but yeah I do stress over my "settings", and everything else involved with this...but with time and practice that will lessen I'm sure. I know I'm good enough and prepared enough to not screw things up and kill my "first patients"...but I certainly want to do more than just that as I progress, thus my questions will keep coming and thanks to you and all who keep answering. It will only make me a better photographer in the long run!

[fotografz]

Jan, fortunately, photographers can shoot a lot of people without killing them ; -) Some

people assist prior to doing a wedding themselves. Other's refine their skills elsewhere,

like street shooting or journalism, until they are extremely confident in the mastery of

their tools... then drift into shooting weddings.

 

Weddings are often controlled chaos requiring the abandonment of your best laid plans. It

makes it difficult for those experienced in this work to advise a beginner to just jump right

in and "remove the patient's tonsils". However, it is inevitable that is going to happen, so

reliance on Automation can help. When in doubt, set the camera on Program, and use a

dedicated TTL flash. Doing this puts you in the camp of all the guests with their auto

everything wonders. BUT, hopefully you aspire to this work because you have an eye that

others don't possess. In the end, that's what counts most.

 

Best of luck and keep on truckin'.

[jml]

Thanks Marc, your views (as usual) are right on the money. Let me ask though this and get your (and please anyone elses) thoughts. I asked recently via e-mail a working pro. everyone knows here on PN how he/she shot. He/she said that most of the time they put it on P on went for it! And this person is a wonderful photographer and has been working at it for many years! I asked my local and only camera store owner/photographer a while back how he shot, his view was to set the camera on aperture priority and felt the camera was smarter (hmmm) than he was, so why not let it choose the speed. Then others, I think most of the pros here prefer manual.

 

So then, is it a case of the human brain not keeping up with the technology, or the technology not equal to the human capacity, and they just put those cute little symbols and letters on the camera dial anyway? Or is it neither?

 

I guess I'm wondering why many if not most progress eventually to shooting manually, what limitations does one eventually experience that makes using any of the settings such as AV or TV of no value.

 

Thanks.

[jml]

Lucas my friend, why your statement on the 70-200? Seriously, you would never shoot an outdoor without it? Why? Besides your portraiture, how else do you find it a must have?

 

And while I can almost hear the collective sighs now, anyone have a suggestion for a good light meter? And okay, okay, never had one, never used one. Need a little meter 101! Maybe I should do a new post on this huh?

[chris m., central florida]

You don't need a 70-200 IS lens to shoot a wedding. I used to use (gasp) a 70-200 f4 lens I bought for $150 used. Worked remarkably well, and sold tons of images with it. When you get into the game a little more, I'd say a 70-200 f2.8 is worth buying. The Sigma is a reasonably priced alternative and it performs well.

P mode will work for many shots if you have to shoot fast and lighting conditions are changing rapidly. I really like aperture priority and using a tripod occasionally to drag the shutter and bring in ambient light. Not hard, you should do okay. Just take an extra second or two to think through your shots. Shoot more, so you have greater chances for success.

 

There are a few things you can learn that really help: 1. Bounce your flash off low white cielings - use a card for forward fill as well 2. Learn to drag your shutter - most cameras have a mode for this 3. Experiment with a 2nd off camera flash unit either bounced off the cieling or diffused. This can really add a beautiful dimensional quality to your images.

 

Not sure if you are shooting film or digital, but the above things really helped me on my way a couple of years ago!

[lb-]

Hi jan,

 

Just joking around with you on the 70-200 as you had indicated something of a desire for

this lens in previous posts :)

 

sorry if I got you worried!

 

"Weddings are often controlled chaos requiring the abandonment of your best laid plans."

 

I would take out the "often" but that's pretty much the deal. Make plans but don't get too

attached to them!

 

"I guess I'm wondering why many if not most progress eventually to shooting manually,

what limitations does one eventually experience that makes using any of the settings such

as AV or TV of no value."

 

AV and TV modes are of great value and I use both regularly but they have their limitations

just like any other tool.

 

The camera will happily drop your shutter speed as low as it needs to in AV mode (or your

aperture in TV mode) to make

a correct exposure regardless of whether or not you have a flash on the camera. This can

be a problem in low light as the camera very well may set a shutter speed that's too low to

handhold or an aperture that gives too shallow a DOF for your subject.

 

P mode isn't bad, it just takes away a few important choices that I prefer to make myself.

 

I find manual mode when using a flash to be the fastest way of working. In it's way it's still

an "automatic" mode because I rely on the flash and it's automated exposure system to

make a correct exposure. I choose shutter speed and aperture for both technical and

creative

reasons but the exposure is made by the flash ETTL metering.

 

Once you get used to working this way it's really quick.

 

In P mode I think I'd be slower in

a way as I'd always be checking my settings to see if they match up with the lens I have on

(1:1 rule with handholding) or if they will provide adequate DOF, allow for some ambient

light to contribute to the exposure etc. Theses are creative and technical choices that get

taken away in P mode.

 

You dont' need a handheld meter to shoot a wedding with the 10D.

 

but.....

 

a nice simple cheap meter is the Sekonic L-308B. It's the one I carry in my bag at all

times. I'm sure a post in the lighting forum will bring many more suggestions on meters.

[picturesque]

Jan, re shooting with the automatic modes vs. manual--manual allows you to have control over the exposure, which is why, I think, many pros use manual. I use AV on my 35mm camera during the day sometimes because I am also shooting a medium format camera, for which I calculate exposure manually, to avoid having to work two different sets of exposures at the same time (sometimes I have different ISOs on the camers). Otherwise, I would probably use manual all the time.

 

The automated modes can be useful, but you have to test the camera extensively to get to know how it reacts to different lighting situations so you can anticipate this and perhaps tweak the settings it chooses based on previous testing. Program used to drive me nuts because in many cases, it chose the widest aperture on your lens, and combined with flash, was not very flexible in any lower light/indoor setting because it automatically sets the shutter speed to a fairly fast setting--you can't drag the shutter. Outdoors in fairly good light, it is OK.

 

AV is OK, although again, shutter speed control in lower light is a problem. Also, in certain types of light, such as one where you have bright spots of light and shadow, it will average the exposure (same with Program and TV), and you end up with blown out highlights and not quite well exposed shadows. In even shade, it can be great, depending on how well the camera does it's automatic metering. In the above mentioned situation, you often want to fill with flash on the shadow side and retain some detail in the bright spots--AV or any automated mode does not do well here. Manual is the only way.

 

When you find pros who use Program, ask them if they tweak the settings based on the lighting situation. Also, if they are using the Nikon D70, it has a function where you can set your own lower shutter speed limit with the automated modes, something Canon does not have.

 

In learning about exposure, I'd recommend forcing yourself to use manual until you feel you have a pretty good handle on exposure, both ambient and flash. Once you have this, you can then set the camera any way you want because you know what you're (and it is) doing. If during the heat of shooting, you have a brain meltdown, do as Marc suggested--set it on Program or AV until you recover.

[jml]

Lucas- You're a cruel man and no longer my ally in the 70-200L wars. :-P. ha. Thanks for your observations on the other. I did experience exactly those issues a couple days ago shooting my friends reception on TV and AV and P when I tried that mode. And as with Nadine, it drove me crazy on Program where the aperture was concerned.

 

Why did you say a meter isn't necessary with the 10D?

 

Chris- Thanks for your input, am already employing those suggestions on bouncing the flash etc. I have a Canon 10D, which mode for shutter dragging? Thanks again.

 

And Nadine, I'm going to take your advice and use only manual for awhile, that will hasten my progress in the long run I think. Could you explain a bit when you like to drag the shutter?

[picturesque]

Re the handheld meter. I have a Sekonic 408 because it has a 5 degree spot mode built in. Don't know what the latest, greatest model is, but a simple meter like Lucas suggested is just fine, although I like having the spot meter for measuring stained glass windows and sunsets. Minolta also makes good meters. You can get the effect of an incident meter by using your camera's meter and a gray card. If you know what you're doing, you don't need to use a handheld although to me, it's easier since that is what I'm used to.

 

Do a search on dragging the shutter. William Au wrote a whole thread on this topic on this forum. I do this inside when using flash to help bring up background detail. Too fast a shutter speed and you end up with black backgrounds. I also use this technique during the formals, with a tripod and during the reception, without a tripod...other times too, depending on the circumstances. You are not exposing for the ambient light but underexposing the background some while maintaining good flash exposure on your subject.

[jml]

Hey David! I was curious, why did you suggest center metering rather that the evaluative metering? And does not the flash adjust the fill?