rob_s___san_francisco_bay_

You have to know which color channels to bring up and to bring down. Curve adjustments is also a big part of it. Maybe some selection masks and or layers in some cases, but rarely I bet. A little dodge/burn here/there. There's a chance she might be using some pre-packaged actions, or some form of her own. I doubt she's doing anything too complicated that most people aren't also doing. It's not that difficult once you know the basics.<p>

Everyone here can only guess at someone else's workflow (which probably varies over time or even image to image). If you want the real answer, just send her an email and ask her. I bet she'd be happy to answer your question.

I'm not sure why I'm adding to this thread again, but I have to say...

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First - Jeff, Awesome work brother!

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Second - I think "quality" has a different definition to everyone. For some, it might mean beautifully smooth tones, superb details from the deepest shadows to the brightest highlights, and razor sharp images. For others it might simply be beautiful lighting and composition. For others it might be some unique artistic touch performed in post-processing, cross-processing, or some other film, darkroom, or photoshop technique. For still others, it might be just having a great eye and sense for timing to capture those fleeting, candid, "decisive moments"...

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...I've heard Cartier-Bresson produced terrible exposures out of the camera, but he had a wonderful eye and created powerful and definitive images. I've also heard that Moonrise Hernandez from Ansel was not a particularly well exposed neg (we've all heard the story of how he grabbed that shot right before the sun went down), but his artistic vision, his skill and overall technical ability in the darkroom allowed him to create one his most popular images from that negative...<p>

...If "quality" was defined simply as sharp, detailed, etc... then why are we all not shooting weddings with sheet film? Or using medium format digital backs? Why are people using 20D's instead of 1Ds MkII's? Are all those grainy 35mm black & white negs so inferior to the slick look of medium format chromes?

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... JPG or RAW? Tri-X or Velvia? 35mm or 4x5? What defines "quality"? NOBODY can say that one format or film is better than the other. But I will say (again) that the decision should be left up to the artist who can make that decision based on his/her experience and what works best for them in realizing their artistic vision.

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Quote from Steve Crist ...<i>

How do you advertise that - "Quality optional"?</i>

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Steve... "quality optional"... those are your words not mine.<p>

For those who tell me they can give me a well exposed, nicely color balanced image in

both RAW and JPG form, process them adequately, produce an 8x10 print and tell which is

which, I say let's go ahead and take the Pepsi challenge. <p>

RAW is great, but JPG works for some people for various reasons already stated. RAW will

allow you save poorly exposed images taken in the heat of a wedding that you'd have to

throw away if they were JPG. Who really cares. Do what works. <p>

Susan had the best answer to all this.<p>

To add to my first post, I find it's actually easier to process RAW files, especially with a program like Lightroom. You can process JPGs in much the same way with basically the same type of adjustments and batch processing ability, but RAW files will give you a lot more range in both exposure and color. You just have a lot more data and lattitude to work with. The speed difference comes into play when you, your computer and your hard drives have to deal with 20gigabytes of RAW files coming out of the camera versus 5 gigabytes of JPGs... plus the post-processed files... all multiplied by ten or twenty or fifty weddings per year. I know... "storage is cheap".

I've heard of a number of high-end wedding photographers who shoot jpg. I think Bambi Cantrell also does (or so I've heard).<p>

I believe that if you can nail your exposure and color balance in camera, there is no real benefit to shooting RAW for wedding photos. Most are not going to be printed larger than 5x7 or 8x10.<p>

The color correction is the biggest benefit of RAW for me. There's a lot of times when the lighting sucks and you don't really have time to do a custom white balance which is the best way to go IF shooting JPG. With RAW, you don't have to worry about it.<p>

For the high-end photographers who shoot JPGs for weddings, they are dealing with tons and tons of images, usually have one or two other shooters, and doing a lot more wedding than most of the people on this forum. Shooting RAW would slow down the post production for them, not to mention require huge amounts of hard disk space. If you look at some of Jessica Claire's (or other peoples) photos, her colors are not always accurate... they are beautiful, but not always accurate.<p>

The choice to shoot weddings in RAW or JPG depends on whichever best fits one's workflow, shooting style, and artistic vision. The decision shouldn't be made entirely on image quality.

Well this isn't the typical photo.net thread is it? Don't you want to know what lens we shoot with and how sharp it is :-)<p>

1. Part timer at photography for a while now. I'll shoot almost anything.

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2. Started weddings about a year ago. I love the people, the excitement, the challenge and good vibes. Being able to document real-life events and emotions is a beautiful thing.

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3. The goal is 10 weddings in '07. More would be gravy. I have 4 booked now.

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4. $1500 ~ $2000 range for now.

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cheers!

Thanks for the reply, Sam. I definately don't want an "employee" for tax reasons and other more personal liability issues.<p>

Anyone else? Is this a sensitive topic or something :-)

I was searching for info about contracts/agreements for hiring an assistant and/or second shooter. It

seems there are varying strong opinions about the need for contracts and ownership of images shot by

the second. I don't care about a contract with someone who I might hire strictly as an assistant, but

curious about if there's a need for a contract if I hire a second shooter or an assistant who doubles as

second shooter. <p>

When I've worked as a second shooter myself, it's always been with verbal agreements and I never had a

problem. The photographers I've worked with were great, I gave them the images, they let me use them

however I wanted. <p>

My feeling is that barring some prior agreement, whoever makes the shot owns the image and can do

what they want with it. As I understand it, that's the way U.S. Copyright laws work for all photography and

I think it's the right thing. But it seems reasonable that someone hiring a second shooter for a wedding

should be able to ask for a written agreement that they can also use the images just to make sure that

they've got that detail covered as well as a few other areas.<p>

I've also read things about photographers limiting the use of images by second shooters. Not sure how I

feel about that. I suppose it's to keep the potential competition down. Or maybe to somewhat protect

themselves from liability if the bride & groom say something about their images showing up somewhere

they didn't expect. Would be interested to hear comments on that.

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Thoughts? Experiences? Examples?

That's surprising to hear that a Sony lens costs $2400!!! It actually makes Canon look

cheap.<p>

In any case, dropping that much money on a piece of gear is definately tough but there are

worse things to spend your money on. If you can afford it and you shoot with it, then just

enjoy it.

Based on a post by Marc Williams in a recent thread, I'm going to try shooting without my

bracket. It just gets in the way too much and I've already busted 2 of those Canon off-

camera TTL shoe mounts.

Yes, this technique is definately much better suited to black & white images. Color noise doesn't look good at all.

I've done this occassionally both intentionally and non-intentionally. Getting a little faster shutter speed is definately a plus. <p>

With RAW, one stop of underexposure is easily recouped in post processing with little if any perceptable noise for practical purposes. Also, since the noise will primarily be in the shadows, you can also approach the post-processing just as you would when pushing film... underexpose/overprocess. Just use curve adjustments to bring up the highlights more than the shadows which will help keep the perceptable noise down. That will also give you a little of that pushed film look.<p>

I think it's cool that most of the "tricks" we do with digital are really just more efficient and flexible ways of doing things that were done with film for years.

here it is...<div></div>

I'd suggest working with the camera in Manual mode and experimenting with shallow depth

of field for these kind of portraits. The composition in the first image is too loose. There's a

good idea there, but it needs refinement.... too much leaves, not enough bride, too much

camera tilt. Her expression in the second image is not very flattering. I think I'd edit that one

out. A little post processing would help also since the images look a bit flat like they came

right out of the camera. <p>

Here's a quick edit if you don't mind...

Nice Marc. A bit of fill flash on that shot? Or just available?

* Borrowed a photo with a sloppy border off the web somewhere.

* Enlarge border to fit the image dimensions

* Layer Mary's photo on top of the border layer

* Rotate/Crop

* Little dodging/burning

* Curve adjustments

* Very slight sharpening<div></div>

Thanks you guys!<p>

Linda - I applied about a week ago. I think the application time varies. Being patient is tough, huh? :-) Yeah, I'm up in the city and would love to do some networking... definately! <p>

You might want to advertise that you do custom printed, fine-art enlargements for some low

quantity hand-printed work and charge a bit of a premium for your creativity and your time.

Offer those as matted/framed.<p>

But for most prints, I'd find a good local lab or outsource it through one of a number of great

online labs.

Happy Friday!<p>

I just got an email from the WPJA this morning saying I was accepted!<p>

I knew about the WPJA before, but I'm not sure I would've applied if it wasn't for this forum. There's some

great photographers that post here and I'd like to thank you all.

<p>

Cheers!

I think no matter what "look" you decide to go with, you should stick to it and retain some

consistency. We all continue to develop our style as we continue to shoot. It will evolve

slowly. But if you show a client one "look" and then give them an album with a different

"look" ... it may not go over well. You should show them something representative of what

you will give them.

Nice going Amanda!

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Hey, we're in the same town!

Short runs? Check out www.whcc.com

Given equal prices, I'd choose Sandisk. But there are some who would never use Sandisk. Everything has a chance for failure... memory cards, hard-disks, cameras, etc... <p>

I own several Sandisk, a couple Lexars, and a couple Kingstons ranging from 1GB to 4GB. I've never had a failure or lost image on any of them. Some cards I've had for well over a year and have easily run thousands of images through. Most flash memory devices are spec'd at hundreds-of-thousands of erase/write cycles. <p>

I personally prefer 2GB cards, which hold about 100 or so RAW files from a 5D. 1GB cards would certainly be safer if there was a failure. Most of the time I don't fill up a whole card though. I'll swap when there's a break in the action and the card is getting close to full. I always load a fresh card right before the ceremony.

The way I've done it is that all my packages include processed high-resolution jpgs of every final shot, some number of 4x6's, plus some amount of print credit for additional prints. The client gets professional lab prints every time and they can now also choose to get an album. I give them lots of information about how to print the digital files and the difference between a professional print and costco. I recommend local labs that I personally use myself, which I know some people have gone to because the lab tells me. But some probably still go to costco and that's their choice.

16-200mm f/1.4L IS

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I can dream, right :-)