suggestions for 10-D wedding photography???

[mikasi]

Some people are born wedding photographers, some become wedding photographers and others have wedding photography thrust upon them.

I am of the latter.

So far I have shot four weddings. The guys at the camera shop were right - it sucks. But despite the fact I do not get it right, people continue to ask me to do their wedding. Hence I am yielding to fate.

If I am going to shoot a wedding correctly, what settings should I use on my Canon 10-D? What mode should I shoot in?? Which ones ought I avoid??

I have 4 lenses - a Tameron AF 19-35, 1/3.5-4.5; a Canon 28-80 1/3.5-5.6 USM; a Canon 75-300 1/4.5-5.6 USM; and a Canon 85 1/1.8. My flash unit is the EX 550.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

(Gods, but I want to get back to taking feature and sports shots!!!)

[Rob Beltman]

OK, this may be something you've heard before, but I'm going to say it again...

If you dread wedding photography ...... DON'T DO IT.

I like photography too. Many of my friends compliment landscapes and animal features or travel photography I have done. Logical...they only see the top 1% of my photos. The trouble with wedding photography is that it needs to be perfect at least 95% of the time. You can risk messing up A shot, but not THE shot. Churches with terrible lighting and difficult positioning, throwing the rice, Champagne and cake....all moments you really can't re-do. If you feel you're not up for it and don't enjoy it, then just say no.

If you feel this is something you want to get the hang of, then accept to be the second photographer for a couple of weddings, but encourage the couple to get a pro for their main shoot.

As to tips for wedding photography: you really ought to go over the prefered style with the couple. Do a test-shoot on location about a week before the wedding. Check if they like 'hard' or 'soft' images. How comfortable are they with posing and playing? They can get used to the camera and see if they like your pictures and you can get used to the locations and the light conditions. Be sure to test-shoot around the same time of day as the wedding, so the position of the sun does not surprise you.

[cmM]

I'm not a wedding photographer, but I can give you this piece of advice: Have a lot of memory available, and shoot away!
As for your lenses, the Canon 85mm 1.8 is great for portraits (or candid shots, stuff like that), and if you wanna get artistic, stick on your 19-35 and do some wide angle stuff. It comes out great many times.

Why don't you like wedding photography? Is it because...
the fact I do not get it right ? If that's the case, don't give up. You'll get it right eventually, and... who knows, maybe you'll start liking it. I wish people asked ME to do weddings. I'm probably worse than you, but I have to start somewhere.

Good luck. Bring back some photos.

[steven]

A little off topic but I just want to know :roll:

How do you get people to just ask you to take their weding pictures :?:
Are these people you know or complete strangers :?:
Do you have a bilboard sign around you neck with "Will take weding pictures for food" :wink: :)

steve

[natalka]

From experience:

1) you will rely on two lenses...your widest lens, and a long lens for the ceremony. if at all possible, remain at the back of the church/aisle for the ceremony and shoot avaialble light. shoot AWB and later white balance when converting.

2) for the ceremony and formals, shoot RAW. expose your raw images correctly, and you will have beauiful images.

3) in eight hours, my assistant and I shoot close to 7G, so bring lots of memory. don't format cards at the wedding. try not to delete images at the wedding, unless i's a completely bad image (flash didn't fire, took pic of your shoes). if you take a pic, and delete it, but someone remembers you taking it and wants it, then you can't prove you did take it, or show them the "bad"image.

those are things that work for me.


nata

[WestFalcon]

Get a White lightning or alien bee monolight and put it on a light stand about 10 feet over your head. I shoot groups at F11 with the one light and get great results without shadows. You can zoom in and out with your lenses. Check your histogram when you start and you can shoot all the formals on manual exposure at f11/90th of a second. The lights give you the same output on every shot unlike the erratic 550ex flashes. The group formals are a piece of cake with this method. I do some other more advanced lighting too if I have time but people are very happy with this method. Time exposures during the ceremony are without flash and I think someone already answered about that. I use high quality jpegs and 500 mb cards which give me 189 shots at asa 400. I fill 3 cards at a typical wedding. I have 3 10D's and use them all. If I had one, I'd bring a couple of backup 35 mm along with film. The monolight really makes things easy. I don't use a lightmeter anymore..just the histogram.

[robertwgross]

Probably 25 years ago, I would have been considered an amateur outdoor photographer with a decent film SLR camera. Some friends of mine were getting married on the cheap, and they had enough money to hire a pro photographer for the wedding ceremony, but they asked me to do the reception photograhy. That came off OK, so I did more.

Each time a friend or family member was getting married, I got asked to either do the "backup photography" to the pro, or to do the reception. Basically, the Number 2 shooter. Then one friend and pro wedding photographer needed a steady digital shooter to backup his film photography. So, I guess I just walked into this gig one step at a time.

Some other friends were getting married on a mountain top a few miles from the nearest road. No self-respecting pro photographer could even think about shooting it, due to the logistics involved... except me. I carried in about twenty pounds worth of camera and lighting gear to do it, and let natural sunlight do the rest of the work. Natural sunlight is cheap.

---Bob Gross---

[Harry Settle]

I have been shooting wedding video for the last couple of years, just got my 10D because that's what most of the other photographers in the area are using. Lighting is going to be dependent on the church. For most formals, most everyone is using a two light setup with umbrellas. Some are shooting strictly 550ex on a stroboframe, with an omnibounce or lumiquest pocket bounce. Other than one photog that had his lights cranked up way to high and blew out all of his color and flattened the pictures, I can't see an ounce of difference in any of them. I have shot a few weddings with flash only, with good results. If I had my druthers. . . I'd invest in a couple of lights, 10-13 foot stands, umbrellas to start with. There are many inexpensive two light kits available.

By the way. . . the other day when I was walking around with my sign that says "will shoot your wedding for food", I got asked to shoot a wedding with my 10D, then later on got asked to do some portrait work for a family reunion/50th wedding anniversary/got married a couple of weeks ago and never had any formal picts taken event for next month.

I'm sure this happens quite frequently, but it surprised me.

[WestFalcon]

The reason that I use only one monolight about 10 feet above me is that I can throw the shadows behind people...none on the wall. I don't use umbrellas because they make for a very large light source and thus much more glare on people with glasses and more stuff to have to set up for results which are not perceptable to 99% of the customers. Single light sources with small reflectors are like a point light source and thus cause little tiny specular highlights on glasses. Two lights also can cause side shadows on people in the back rows. Two lights aren't worth the effort in my opinion for group shots. Keep it simple...why break your back and maybe cause more photo problems. Two lights or more are great in a controlled studio but at a wedding, I think they are overkill.

[redbutt]

http://www.redbutt.com/bairdphoto/proofs/atchison

Canon 10D
Canon 70-200 f/2.8 L IS
Canon 28-135 IS
Canon 420EX Speedlite

I'm just a friend of the groom in these shots, but they didn't have a large budget and the photographer they hired was a bit of a moron (he was late getting to the reception!!!!)


Some people are born wedding photographers, some become wedding photographers and others have wedding photography thrust upon them.

I am of the latter.

So far I have shot four weddings. The guys at the camera shop were right - it sucks. But despite the fact I do not get it right, people continue to ask me to do their wedding. Hence I am yielding to fate.

If I am going to shoot a wedding correctly, what settings should I use on my Canon 10-D? What mode should I shoot in?? Which ones ought I avoid??

I have 4 lenses - a Tameron AF 19-35, 1/3.5-4.5; a Canon 28-80 1/3.5-5.6 USM; a Canon 75-300 1/4.5-5.6 USM; and a Canon 85 1/1.8. My flash unit is the EX 550.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

(Gods, but I want to get back to taking feature and sports shots!!!)

[mikasi]

A little off topic but I just want to know :roll:

How do you get people to just ask you to take their weding pictures :?:
Are these people you know or complete strangers :?:
Do you have a bilboard sign around you neck with "Will take weding pictures for food" :wink: :)

steve

Well, if you really want to know, you start by working wiht a woman at a paper who likes your picture work. Then she begs her soon-to-be-husband (a Gypsy, who happens to want to keep all the wedding work "in the family") to let you do photos. Then do a sub-par job for them. Over time they remember the good stuff and forget the bad, thereby recommending you to someone else. Repeat as necessary.

[mikasi]

Get a White lightning or alien bee monolight and put it on a light stand about 10 feet over your head. I shoot groups at F11 with the one light and get great results without shadows. You can zoom in and out with your lenses. Check your histogram when you start and you can shoot all the formals on manual exposure at f11/90th of a second. The lights give you the same output on every shot unlike the erratic 550ex flashes. The group formals are a piece of cake with this method. I do some other more advanced lighting too if I have time but people are very happy with this method. Time exposures during the ceremony are without flash and I think someone already answered about that. I use high quality jpegs and 500 mb cards which give me 189 shots at asa 400. I fill 3 cards at a typical wedding. I have 3 10D's and use them all. If I had one, I'd bring a couple of backup 35 mm along with film. The monolight really makes things easy. I don't use a lightmeter anymore..just the histogram.

First, let me say thanks for all the thoughts here. Next, let me bring up two things -

1) histogram? My previous experience - shooting for a small paper - pretty much didnt' require knowing even what a histogram was. I still don't know. So what is it?

2) I have an old 500 watt lighting set-up along with a couple of light stands in my basement. Will 500 watts be enough?

Again, thank you for all the help!

ps - did I see that you were in Illinois? Where? I am in Winthrop Harbor myself.

[cmM]

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml

all about histograms.

[WestFalcon]

I am in Moline, Illinois.......the light should be adequate but if it has a powerpack, I'd try to get a monolight for ease of movement. The Alien Bee(Paul Buff of Nashville)line of monolights makes a unit for about $225 that could be used for weddings...this unit is light and any 10 foot stand would work.

[redbutt]

That is probably one of the isngle best things about digital photography. You can snap a couple test shots and get your exposure perfect right then and there...AND you can change on the fly as conditions change.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml

all about histograms.