thomas_wakefield

Best belt systems i have used are:

www.thinktankphoto.com

Make sure to check out www.thinktankphoto.com

 

They are relativly new, but hands down the best system i have ever used. I had both tamrac and lowepro belts, and hated them. But i wear the Speed Deamon pack with 2 extra tubes for every wedding, and LOVE it.

I also use a Dyna-lite Jackrabbit, which i love. Pretty small and light, and really quick to recycle. And you can get it for about $280 shipped with the needed cable. A pretty good deal for the speed.

We shoot PJ weddings in Maryland in the $3-5K price range for reference.

 

I wear nice black slacks, belt, comfortable black shoes, and either a dark grey long sleve dress shirt if the wedding is mostly indoors or a black polo shirt if the wedding is outdoors for a long time. I switched to the polo after soaking to many dress shirts in a day, plus the more comfortable i can be, the more creative i get. Once i get hot and tired, i do honestly loose some of my creativity. I also tried wearing a tie, but all it did was get in my way, and since it never layed down straight it didn't look very good anyways. So no more ties for me.

I shoot with 2 cameras at all times, one color one b&w, each with a Canon 550ex. The color one most of the time is on a bracket.

I use a bunch of lenses, really to many.

 

canon 50mm 1.4

 

canon 85mm 1.8

 

canon 80-200mm 2.8 (yea the old verson, but it's black.

 

Tamron 28-75mm 2.8

 

Tamron 17-35mm 2.8-4

 

Next on my list is a Canon 135 f2, or a 70-200 2.8 w/ IS, but i haven't decided yet.

I have 2 Elan 7's and they are basically all i use for wedding photography. They focus pretty fast under decent light. The 7n is supposed to be even faster focusing than the normal 7's.

We shot film, 2 photographers average about 30 rolls for 8 hours of coverage, 18-20 rolls for the lead photographer, 10-12 for the second photographer.

 

I only know what i get as a second, but you can roughly double it and assume it's what a lead photog for my team gets.

5 - 100iso Fuji Superia

12 - 400iso Fuji Superia (more if the customer doesn't want b&w)

5 - 800iso Fuji Press (i think)

6 - 400iso Kodak 400CN (black and white)

 

 

But it all really depends on what your package is, ours states a minimum of 500 photos, but the closet we come to that is 600, we average closer to 800 images. It's what we budget to shoot in the price of the package.

 

Enjoy shooting.

 

Tom

As someone else suggested a detail shot makes a good first album picture. In our albums we typically will do a shot of the brides flowers with an invitaiton or program leaning on it. Makes for a great opening shot. We then go mostly based on the timeline, bride getting ready, groom getting ready, ceremony, formals, reception, ending with either a cute dancing or walking secuence of the bride & groom.

It is an interesting point that you blame the short count on the formals being cut short. I am assuming you were there for the whole day and shot the whole reception, if this is incorrect skip my post.

 

If the formals were cut short, then you should have had more time at the reception. And the reception is where we get in the most trouble at my company for abusing our film count. So unless your entire shooting day was cut short because of the formals stoping early, i don't see how you can blame that for your short count. If you still had the same X hours that you were working, you should have been able to get to your expected proof count. You should have known you were a little short going into the reception, and should have maybe shot a little extra just to be on the safe side.

 

We state in our contract 500 proofs (with a stuff happens clause), but we have never given a bride and groom less than 600, and we average closer to 7-800 proofs.

I think most Nikon flashes have PC-sync plugs. I use canon flashes which don't have a pc-sync on the flash :(. I just mount the sender to the top of the flash with velcro and a rubber band, velcro to keep it from twisting, rubber band to make sure it won't come off.

 

For the remote lights, look at Alien Bees (which i am about to buy) or White-Lightning's.

 

I work on a 2 person team, and very very rarely are we both shooting at the same exact moment, so it's rare that we don't get a flash.

I use a pair of Elan 7e's for my wedding work. Although i don't use the eye control, i got them used and they just happened to have it. I like them because they are quiet and pretty light weight.

 

Remember with film it's more about the glass and less about the body, so the Elan's will do just fine with formal pictures. I do find that the in camera metering is pretty good even with flash, much better than most digital cameras (Drebel, or 10d).

 

Plus the price is right to get an elan7 used, about $200-250 with grip. You probably won't find the 7n used yet, and i have a feeling canon is going to have a tough time selling them, but we will see.

When i work weddings it is alway part of a team. A minumum of 2 pro quality photographers, and sometimes an assistant. One goes with the bride one goes with the groom before the ceremony. All 2-3 shoot the ceremony (normally 1-2 on the floor and one in the balcony), and we continue to shoot though the reception. Normally the assistant leaves after an hour or 2 at the reception.

 

It works for us because we get so many more candids this way, and it's a redundancy thing, someone always has a camera and is ready to shoot. It makes it less likely that we miss a shot because we are reloading film or something.

I agree with the assistant idea. The team i shoot with sends a minimum of 2 pro photographers (a Lead and a Second, both equally good) and hopefully one assistant to every wedding. One photog covers the bride, one covers the groom(the assistant normally goes with the groom side), we all cover the ceremony, the assistant sets up lights for the formals if needed, the Lead shoots the formals. Then we all move toward the reception where the assistant and second photog set up lights for the dance floor. Normally the assistant only hangs around untill mid way though the reception.

 

And this is for a PJ style wedding, with 3 people shooting you get so many shots that one photographer alone would miss. And it's all about capturing the moment. The assistant doesn't shoot much, but the little they get can be very helpful, and sometimes people open up more to them since the maybe don't have that same "Pro" feel that can sometimes make people nervous.

 

 

About me, i started as an assistant in March, and 2 weeks ago i shot my first as a second photographer. If you love to shoot, and don't want to deal with the headaches of running a business, shooting for someone else can be a great deal. Just a thought.

For me on film one of my most used Lenses is my 80-200 2.8L, yea it's 10 years old, but still sharp and focuses decently. You can pick on up for about $600, less if you find one slightly beaten like mine.

 

But i would go wide if you are shooting digital. Check out the tamron 17-35 2.8-4, i bought one and i love it.

We shoot film, and we typically use 800 in most churches. Rarely we can use 400, since there there is normally not enough light. We do set up strobes when we can for the walk in and out, and then for quick use for the formals. But many times it's just on camera flash for the walking parts, and then strobes for the formals. And yes outdoors is our preference for the formals, but this year way to many brides have insisted on doing the formals indoors :(.

My add on advise is to plan to shoot with your digital camera, and bring enough memory to shoot the wedding without downloading from the cards. But also to bring your EOS3 with you and enough film to shoot the wedding just incase your digital camera decides to break. Personally i would shoot the b&w on the eos3 if you really wanted film b&w, mostly because then both cameras will feel the same, and you won't fumble between them. I love B&W film so that's what i would do, but i also still shoot weddings only on film. I use Fuji 400 and 800 for the color, and Kodak 400cn for the b&w because it is c41 process, which makes life easy.

I use an 80-200 2.8L for between 30-40% of my work on a film camera. But i am also the photographer that gets stuck at the back of the church while my partner shoots the closer stuff. I love it for reception work so i can isolate people from across a table or 2. It also is great for working with just the bride and groom giving them space to relax with out you right up on them for the intimate photos. 2.8 is fast enough for most of our work, but i pull out the 85 1.8 when light drops or i don't like the background.

 

On a digital 1.6x crop i do find the 80-200 pretty long so i use the 28-70 more with my digital camera, or just go with the 85.

I agree with all of the above advice, and have just a little to add.

 

Fuji makes good pro films also, for a wedding i am shooting tomorrow i am shooting Fuji Superia 100 & 400, press 400 & 800, and Kodak BW400CN (black and white).

 

My main recomendation would be to also pick up some black and white, it gives a real timeless feel to weddings, and it's where i almost always find my favorite pictures of the wedding. You might check with some of the other people who are shooting, and if they are all color you can feel safe to run a roll or 2 of B&W.

The wedding photographer that i currently work for as a photographer has the best method for designing albums that i have seen so far. She has an album layout specialist that she sends her couple's to, with the requirement that they choose X amount of proofs before hand. It varies with the size of the album. And then the layout person and the couple go though and layout the story of the wedding, and choose the flow of the album by varying the layouts(mats) and using B&W and color. The designer makes recomendations about what photos work and what don't, but the final decision rests on the bride and groom.

 

I know this works because the reason i work for this photographer now is because she shot my wedding last year and i was blown away by how good the photos looked and how easy the album process was. We got what we wanted and felt like we really had control, but also that we had great advice on how to put together photos to make a great album.