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View Full Version : Enthusiastic Amateur - my attempt at some candids


Greg_C
26th of March 2006 (Sun), 05:17
Yesterday I attended my sister in-law's wedding. NOT as the professional, just as an enthusiastic family member. I've been lurking here for some time trying to pick up anything I could. I had a brief moment at the brides house to chat to the official photog and check what he was happy with me doing. He's a great guy and pretty much gave me free rein on everything except the setup shots. I wasn't interested in these, well I was but couldn't do any as my primary job for the night was as MC. This meant I had to be at the reception whilst they had these shots taken.

As a result I tended to look more for candid's and get things that the pro wouldn't have (something I read about here). I've already created a very rough Proshow show for the family to see. I plan to refine this as I process the images more. Lighting was the issue as I thought it would be, the church was very dark and so was the reception room. Inside I shot high ISO's on the 30D and from the couple of test prints at 6x4 I'm very impressed. I did process them in Neat Image to cut the noise a bit. I've only looked at a few jpgs so far and haven't touched the RAW. I shot RAW + large fine jpg's. At the moment DPP 2.1 is the only thing to process the RAW's in.

Overall I had fun and can certainly see what people mean when they say these events are difficult to do well. Don't know at this stage if I'd do this professionally, but certainly want to do more to improve my skills. Just watching the pro direct traffic to get the people he wanted, where he wanted, was an eye opener. Personality and presentation was a big part of it.

Any comments welcome. All these shots were taken either before the pro arrived or when he had finished.

With the first two everybody had gotten over me walking around with the camera plus her attention had to be elsewhere.
No 1 Makeup time - Bride getting ready

85.00 mm 1/100 s at F 1.80 with ISO 200

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10302.jpg


No 2 This is a crop, the markup artist was only just in frame and inspecting her work, I removed her. I'm kinda undecided on this one, is it too serious?


85.00 mm 1/125 s at F 2.20 with ISO 200

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10301.jpg


No 3 Candid moment. I was at the pre-reception drinks when they walked out onto this balcony. Part of a small series. Best thing was they just ignored us.

24-105 mm at 105.00 mm 1/40 s at F 4.00 with ISO 1,600

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10300.jpg

clengster_77
26th of March 2006 (Sun), 05:53
nice candids! :)

cleng

Balliolman
26th of March 2006 (Sun), 05:57
Candids at weddings are always delightful glimpses for the couple to enjoy after all the formal shots ...

bpuppy
26th of March 2006 (Sun), 08:30
Pretty good in spirit, but I'd say on the first two, wait there until something happens. The first two would have been much better had you waited until some emotion registered in her eyes ... a joke by someone off camera etc. The 2nd one especially ... great lighting an framing, just wait until some emotion registered in her face and fire away like 3 or 4 shots to make sure you captured it.

It's all about facial emotion.

The 3rd one is great for this reason.

Greg_C
26th of March 2006 (Sun), 16:34
Thanks for the comments.

Yeh the first two do look a little flat expression wise. Brides nerves and me not creating that moment when it wasn't going to happen by itself. The family loved the Proshow DVD show I quickly put together. Got orders now.

Here's some more. Lighting not as good but the emotions on the faces is great.

No 4 Father of the bride & Bride. After a very moving speech they danced to My Little Girl by Steve Kirwan. Hardly a dry eye in the place, me included. Still bringing on tears when everyone saw the slideshow, I cheated though, I used the same music for this sequence.

24-105 mm at 105.00 mm 1/60 s at F 4.00 with ISO 1,600

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10304.jpg


No 5 Father of the bride & Bride.

24-105 mm at 85.00 mm 1/60 s at F 4.00 with ISO 1,600

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10305.jpg


No 6 Bridal Waltz. What do you think about the lights between the faces, I think they need to go.

50.00 mm 1/60 s at F 3.50 with ISO 1,600

http://www.steadyhands.net/photogallery/albums/temp/image10303.jpg

BLINN
27th of March 2006 (Mon), 10:21
Like you already know , they are dark. Nice candids. What does she think of them??

blueminnie
27th of March 2006 (Mon), 10:43
the one of the couple in the balcony is the best in my opinion, I like the angle, the expression--you caught a "moment" :) Keep on shooting--you'll only get better :)

Greg_C
28th of March 2006 (Tue), 04:12
Like you already know , they are dark. Nice candids. What does she think of them??

Thanks for taking the time to comment.

The bride like them a heap. The balcony shot when down especially well, probably the shot of the day. I look back at the EXIF on this one and just shake my head and wonder how this shot turned out how it did with these settings. The complete sequence of 4 shots go very very well together in the slide show. Sometimes you are just lucky!

PIXI_666
28th of March 2006 (Tue), 07:05
I like the B&W one the best, there is a nice array of light all over, and it defines her cheek bones which can't be a bad thing! It's a classique shot and i like it. The coloured ones are a bit dark and looks like they have been photoshopped a bit too much to lighten? (I could be wrong!) But all in all...they are pretty nice candids, maybe make most of them B&W? Once you desaturate them they always seem to look better because you dont have that colour correction. Try it out...you never know!

Del