3rd official wedding- would love C&C

Hi All,

This was our first wedding of the year, we were there for 4 hours, so it was mostly ceremony and posed shots. I would really love some C&C since we have another wedding coming up this weekend where I'll be able to immediately apply your suggestions!

Thanks for taking the time to look and comment!
Full Blog post here:Wichita Wedding Blog- Miller Wedding

-Joe
1.

The good...I'd say you composed the shots you posted well. Standard shot, but nothing creative.

The bad...Lighting is not so good and you'll need more 70-200mm 2.8 and 85L in my opinion. White balance may be off in a couple.

Hi Ryan,

Thanks for taking the time to comment. I used the 70-200mm and 85L for these photos

Can you give me some guidance on what you mean by lighting is not good? On all photos except #5, I was adding some type of light to the image.

On a side note, this church was a cavern of darkness! I think I shot 6400, f2.8, 1/125 and had to push it up a bit in post! I think that's why my other wedding post has better overall shots in it.

Sorry for my lens assumption. I said that because of your depth of field, sharpness, and "Current Gear" you have listed (no 70-200 2.8L or 85L).

When I say the lighting is not good, I mean the white balance looks too yellow to me.

Nice shots, WB off in some. However, unfortunately they look like snapshots, not pro photos.

Danny has a point about snapshotty-ness, but I don't think this applies to all of the photos. Photo 1 doesn't look like a snapshot.

Here's my critique:

1-The best of the series, I think. I would have had her tilt her head back a little to open up her eyes more. Because it's probably an important shot and reasonably close up, I would also have done some extra work like reducing the eye wrinkle (possibly made worse by light placement) and absolutely de-yellowing the teeth a little. Her teeth might very well be the first thing she notices when looking at this shot, sad as that may seem.

2-Dude has red splotches on his face--temporary marks that probably shouldn't show up so obviously in the photos of his wedding. I might have framed horizontal to lose his hands and I might have preferred a candid of him looking out of frame, waiting. You probably also have one of these.

4-Seems like a guest photo to me (not to say that there won't be some shots that look like that in a professional's set), I suppose because of the wide fov and your appearing to shoot from a pew. I also swivel to the side obviously, but like to get most of my processional shots straight on with a longer lens while standing in the middle of the aisle.

5.Compare the white balance of the dress in this one with the previous. They're just not consistent enough. I'd get this one closer to white. The framing seems a little loose here. It was probably challenging to do so, but I'd have tried simplifying the frame a little (move so bridesmaid and priests hands were not in the shot).

6.I think that this is just about as good as one can do in these circumstances. It's a small thing, but notice how you clipped the statue on the right leaving a black line at the edge of the frame. I'd crop in.

7.Get your light off-axis, even if this means having a flash+umbrella off to the side ready to go after the ceremony. The bride is slumping. The bouquets are being held too high (take a second to give a tutorial to the bridesmaids + bride regarding bouquet holding). If you really had to shoot this wide and get the pew in the shot, edit it out. I think the arrangement looks good; and you have mostly good engagement going on.

Wow, Christopher. Thanks for your time. I really appreciate it!

I agree and really value all your comments, one that I would love some help on is #7. I am using 2 lights with umbrellas for this shot, one to each side. Should I have them at different power levels to create a gradient? I was going for- even-lit and good exposure, but not much else. What do you do for your formal shots in churches?

Interesting. I didn't even notice the tell-tale signs of two flashes until looking closer just now.

In terms of lighting this shot, I would have (as you probably did), adjusted ambient so that my background looked as I wanted it too; I then would put an umbrella in the 'short light' position and at 45-degrees off-axis (short-lighting the bride in this case would mean camera right). I'd have swiveled the umbrella toward the left-most bridesmaid and checked for evenness of the light across the frame with a test shot from the hip. That might be it. I like a little bit of drama in the lighting, but, yeah, if you find that your shadow side is just too deep, drop another flash on that side, but definitely reduce its power with respect to your main light. Treat one light as a main light and one as a fill (which I rarely use).

Thanks Christopher! That's exactly what I will try for this weekend!

Hey Joe. Good on you for coming here and asking for, and taking well, the c&c. Ill agree with the others that some of the images are "snap shotty". The first and last image are your best, imho. When I see a shot as your first one, I immediatly think of this post. http://neilvn.com/tang​ents/soft-window-light/

I think the light is too harsh in your similiar image. I prefer (and not always, but for a bridal portrait) to have much softer light. Notice that in the posted image, you still have a nice contrast from highlight to shadow but it is much much softer.

Something else that jumps out at me is that most of these look to be out of focus. Perhaps your resized them and didnt sharpen. What settings are you using on the Mark III for focus? Mine rarely misses unless the subjects are in complete darkness.

The last image is nice except for the distracting elements in the frame, like the car. If you wanted to include the entire church, a vertical shot may have been better. As is, Id crop it so you lose the top of the church and the car on the right.

Thanks Shane,

I really value the advice- Can't believe it's offered for free! This is a strange profession - in a good way- where others freely share their knowledge!

Thanks for the comments on the first one, This is actually legit doorway light coming into the church, I should have had her move closer to the doorway for softer light.

I do have issues with resizing for the web. I'm learning about post sharpening now, yes, these images are all tack sharp at full size- I love the 5d3 compared to the 5d2 when the camera would miss on many occasions. I don't even take multiple shots sometimes cause I know it's already going to be sharp!

I definitely hate that car in the last one, I wanted her full dress and didn't notice it until I was at home. I could clone it out of course.

Do you gel your flash? If not you might want to consider gelling them, as it'd help getting the ambient / flash mix a bit better. 1/2 cut CTO will get you there, while still leaving the background somewhat warm enough.

Josh Young wrote in post #16378936
Do you gel your flash? If not you might want to consider gelling them, as it'd help getting the ambient / flash mix a bit better. 1/2 cut CTO will get you there, while still leaving the background somewhat warm enough.

I wanted to mention this too but forgot when typing. I support this advice.