A Few From My Last Wedding

These are photos from my wife and myself of a wedding we did this last weekend..

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Im still working on some skin tones for the finals but these are pretty much complete.

crop the first one. There is too much out of focus writing. lighten up the eye shadows on number 2. And crop the last one to get rid of the shadow at the bottom. Stop at the bottom of her dress.

Quick comments:
#1 - more dof needed. I like the focused area to be at the front of the frame.
#2 cool shot, but the brides face isn't exposed well. Turn the flash off. See next comment.
#2, #3 - expose for the subject, not the background
#3 what's with the space above her head? It adds nothing to the photo.
#4, cool, try B&W or sepia to make it something special. Anything other than a plain photos is good here.
#5 Nice, i'd like to have seen the bride like that

Technical competence is essential, you'll get there with time. Artistic talent and making people comfortable is arguably more important, that can also be learned.

A good start.

#6 is amazing - way to "find the light".

A couple of tips for the others (in addition to Tim's excellent suggestions):

#1 - I'd be fine with the amount of DOF if the couple's name was in focus rather than the top of the invite. (did you make use of my old 35/2 on that one?)

#2 & #4 - Looks like you are bouncing your flash. Excellent technique, but you might want to look into something that pushes a bit of light forward (like an omnibounce or a FlipIt!). Straight ceiling bounce often makes shadow areas of the eye sockets. #2 would have been a perfect capture (I LOVE her expression), except for the racoon eyes. You can lighten the shadow areas of the eyes a bit in PS...

#3 - Looks like you used an off camera flash to side light her (or you caught someone else's flash). Can be a cool effect, but you need a bit more fill on her front. Bump up your FEC a bit. Also, there's a bit much headroom above her, and the candles are giving her a bit of an unintended crown.

#4 - nice pose, but again fill the frame a bit more. There's too much empty spave above their heads. And (and this is one of the tings I'm most guilty of), always watch what's behind them. The cross looks like it's resting on their heads, and the candle appears a bit phallic in it's current position (I might be tempted to PS that out - their look of anticipation only heightens the effect!)

Thank you for the great tips..there was no flash used on any of these actually. They are just available light. Maybe should have used a flash on some to fill in the shadows created.

My wife took like 4 shots of the rings on the invite I think..but I think this one was the best.

agreed 3 has to much headroom it was not a posed shot she was standing there talking to her future husband and smiled and shot that really quickly..Ill crop the head space out as it really doesnt add anything.

Thanks again for the tips. I was overall very pleased with the photos. This was my first real wedding shoot so Im not upset about the way they turned out, all in good time


here's a better crop and a sepia..I like the sepia

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The edit with the lightened eyes looks unnatural - did you use the dodge tool?

Maybe you ought to try using the shadow/highlight tool with a mask everywhere but the eyes...

^^ yeah I didnt look so bad in PS but on screen it was obvious..I changed it out with a little different look now...much better I think...

If you want to keep working on #2 (could be a great shot with a bit of work) I would suggest reducing the dark circles/lines under her eyes. They are especially pronounced after you lightened the shadows in the eye sockets.

In Photoshop, choose the clone tool and a smallish, soft edge brush. Reduce opacity really low, like 20% or so.

Set the mode to "Lighten" at the top.

Choose a target that is quite close to where the dark lines are and then start to gently brush the lines away!

A pretty simple technique, and it can really improve a picture (whether people just didn't get enough sleep the night before...I'll admit I've used it on pictures of myself, or whether the lighting just created the bags!)

Cheers,
Lauren

Like that? ^^^ Thanks for the tip