Q's For First Wedding and Bride's shot list

Hey everyone,

I have been diving into this forum lately to prepare myself for my first solo wedding. I have shot one other wedding as a favor thus far but was the secondary photographer. I am looking for a couple of answers and some words of advice/encouragement before I do the shoot on Saturday. I am also posting the Bride's shot list to see if it seems manageable by one person, and to see if there is anything we should add to the list in particular.

Here are a few wedding details: The ceremony is outdoors at 4pm. The bride and groom do not want to see eachother before the wedding. Payment for the wedding was $450 which I used to buy the 580 ex II (We both won on this... I get a flash and they get better photographs). The reception is accross the street in a reception hall. I will have about an hour tops after the ceremony to do photos. My primary body is the 20d with an 18-200mm tamron, My second body is the 10d with the 70-200 2.8 Canon, I also have a 24mm 2.8 canon and the 50mm 1.8 canon and 3gb memory. And someone else is shooting the Bride and bridemaids getting ready.

Ok, here are a few of my questions.

1. What are a few of your most standard b/g shots that work well? (feel free to post examples on any of these)

2. What are a couple of winner shots of the b/g that are a little less traditional that I may want to try or elaborate upon.

3. What can I do to really prepare myself to use my new flash for portraits and during the wedding... any particular settings that work well?

4. Is my current equipment going to be enough? Do you ever use a polarizer during a wedding if outdoors? How about reflectors to bounce flash or sun?

5. I have always shot jpeg... do I have enough time to figure out raw before the wedding? Should I bother? (please do not debate the particulars of raw v. jpeg here)

6. Is a step ladder going to be handy or a burden?

7. How am I going to best combat sunlight during the ceremony?

8. Any tips on workflow for doing the shots below and also doing processing in the aftermath.

Here is the Bride's shot list:

Before ceremony:
groom alone
groom and guys getting ready
groom and parents
groom and grandparents
groom and groomsmen
ushers
any others that he may want

me and my parents
me and grandparents
me and bridesmaids

During ceremony:
general ones of the guests seated
groom and officiant waiting at altar
bridesmaids and groomsmen walking down aisle
me walking down (front and back)
all of us once up at altar
during vows
during kiss
during rings
walking down aisle after
greeting guests during receiving line

After ceremony:
Me and groom (a few different locations, poses)
whole wedding party
me and groom with his family
me and groom with my family
our hands with rings

during Reception:
me and groom first walking into the room
head table
cake before cutting
cutting cake
toasts
family table
our first dance
dances with our parents
garter throw
bouquet throw
random ones during dollar dance
candid ones of people dancing, talking, eating, etc.

Thanks for all of your help. I will be sure to post some of my best images when all is said and done. I feel confident but definitely could use all the help I can get. Thanks again!

Hi, There are a lot of questions probably left to the more experienced members but seeing that it has been 7 hours since you posted I'll try to answer a couple of things.
Shoot RAW... Just change the setting in your cameras Menu to raw+small jpeg. That is all you need to do. There is nothing to 'get used to'. Look in the manual for your 20d. You will need some more memory - at least another 4gb - the more the better.
Get a buddy( or two) to go outside to the park or whatever ( get then to wear a white shirt/dress and take along a black jacket) and practice with that flash. Take the instruction manual for both your camera and the flash. Try things out with different lenses. Keep cheching the results in the viewfinder especially the histogram. Call the venue and ask if you can get in there to have a look around - take your camera and flash, try it out , check the results.
I would use the 20d with the 50mm and 70-200. I think you will use them more. Sorry I couldn't be of more help but I am on a lunch break and have to go. I wish you the very best of luck,

I think you asked too many questions... take them a few at a time and you'll likely get more of a response. If you post many questions people will look, realise it'll take ages to read and answer, and don't reply to any. Basically you've asked "how do I shoot a wedding". My answer: "carefully".

viewing-the-invisible wrote in post #3960948
1. What are a few of your most standard b/g shots that work well? (feel free to post examples on any of these)

2. What are a couple of winner shots of the b/g that are a little less traditional that I may want to try or elaborate upon.

3. What can I do to really prepare myself to use my new flash for portraits and during the wedding... any particular settings that work well?

4. Is my current equipment going to be enough? Do you ever use a polarizer during a wedding if outdoors? How about reflectors to bounce flash or sun?

5. I have always shot jpeg... do I have enough time to figure out raw before the wedding? Should I bother? (please do not debate the particulars of raw v. jpeg here)

6. Is a step ladder going to be handy or a burden?

7. How am I going to best combat sunlight during the ceremony?

8. Any tips on workflow for doing the shots below and also doing processing in the aftermath.

Before answering all of your questions, here's a few thoughts:

- You got a new flash. Use it as much as possible before the wedding. You have to know how to use it properly before the event. There is no time for learning how to use new equipment on a wedding day. Also, it would be a nice idea to have a backup flash in the future (i.e. asap).

- Remember: Flash photography is two exposures in one photo: the light coming from the flash unit and the ambient light. The light from the flash unit reaching your sensor isn't affected by the shutter speed, but is affected by the aperture. Ambient light is affected by both shutter speed and aperture.

- To summarize: use M mode indoors when using your flash unit. Bounce the flash around. Settings like (f/2.8, 1/60 and ISO 400-800) with a bounced flash (set at +2/3 FEC) work well for most places, but you may want to tweak this to let more ambient light in.

- Use Aperture priority mode for outdoor shooting. Use your flash even if you are in bright sunlight. Reduce your ISO to 100 and close your aperture as necessary. If I remember correctly, your shutter speed will be limited to 1/200 for the 20D (I'm not familiar with the 10D, never used it but it is very different from the 20D, especially on the way it handles flash photography). Meter the shot for the dark area in the eyes and use the flash to fill it. I'd use direct flash, no diffuser, no stofen, etc.

Now, to answer your questions:

1. Look at other photographer's websites for inspiration. Browse older posts on this forum. Find the shots that work well and that you like. I don't like to work with lists, except for formal pictures with family and friends. Make sure that you are always on your toes and talk to the bride and groom to see if there is any special event that they want you to capture.

2. See #1, above.

3. See my thoughts, above. Read the manual. Practice, practice, practice BEFORE the wedding. Learn how to bounce your flash.

4. Polarizers are too much trouble for me at the moment. I have one, but only use it when I'm on vacation. Every time you turn around, you have to readjust it. Bring your reflector if you have one. You may want to use it to fill in the shadows in the faces. But again, it's advisable to know how to use it properly before the wedding.

5. If you want to shoot RAW, it's not going to be any different than JPEG during the actual shooting, with the only exception that they really fill up your memory cards fast! It may help you out during post-processing of the images, especially if you screwed up with the exposure. It's easier to recuperate moderately overexposed or underexposed areas of a photo when all the information is present vs. JPEG, where this information may be lost in the compression. I always shoot RAW, even if I don't necessarily need it.

6. I always bring a step ladder with me and I often use it. Remember: if you don't have it, you'll need it.

7. Expose for the highlights and try to use your flash to fill in the shadows. But this is hard during the ceremony, especially if you have spotty lighting (mix of shade and sun). But that's probably the best you can do.

8. When shooting formals, start with larger groups and finish with the bride and groom. Make sure that you still have quite a bit of time for the bride and groom alone. They are very important shots. For post-processing workflow,this has been discussed many times before, so make a search here, see Tim's signature and you'll be able to find what most people do for a processing workflow. Remember one thing: synchronize your cameras before the wedding (i.e. make sure that they are at the same year, month, day, hour, minute, AND second). This will greatly help you out after the wedding, when you want to re-order files from two cameras in a chronological order. You'd have to do it manually otherwise, which will probably take you a few hours.

Have fun, encourage the bride and groom to have fun and express their feelings and best of luck!

Thank you very much for your sound advice. I will definitely be practicing with this flash all week long. I like the buddy idea a lot because that will give me some real practice before the shoot. And Sebastien had some great advice.

I'd be glad to have a few more viewpoints but I understand that this post was quite long.

I don't feel 3 GB will be enough, especially you are shooting RAW.
1 GB only fit ~ 50 RAW images.

Judging by the timing, I don't think you would have time to download your pic (especially you don't have an assistant).

Just my personal advice. Buy more memory card

You'll need to shoot RAW, and to buy at least 10GB more memory.

Sounds like i am shooting raw and spending some $$ on memory. I am also going to get my bro and fiance to pose for me to practice with my flash.