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[OM] Re: Wedding help!!

Subject: [OM] Re: Wedding help!!
From: AG Schnozz <agschnozz@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 17 Jul 2005 15:10:31 -0700 (PDT)
Walter T. wrote:
> Shot my first wedding yesterday (as an amateur in the crowd,
> not a pro).  I tried to follow the pro as much as possible and
> not get in the way at the same time, but didn't like his
> choice of lenses and equipment.  He used 35mm SLR all day,
> never changed to medium format, and what looked to be rather
> plebian lenses.  

What matters most in an event photography lens is a good zooming
range (35-70 is minimal, 28-100ish is better), low distortion
and excellent performance at F5.6.  A wedding photographer could
live an entire lifetime without using anything but F4-F8.

> I wanted some nice bokeh, so used fast lenses most of the day,
> but the wedding was in the mid morning in a hotel courtyard,
> which was in deep shadow, while the face of the building
> behind the shoot was already in morning light; so difficult
> light. The subject was in deep shadow all the time with a
> highlighted background.  

Always expose for the subject!  Regardless of what the
background is, your always need to make sure the subject is
taken care of.  You can do so with fill-flash to reduce the
lighting ratio--but this might require some serious horsepower. 
In a Sunny-16 environment, it takes a pretty hefty
flash--especially when distance is involved.

Bokeh is one of those strange things.  What works well for
portraiture isn't the best for event photography.  Blurry
background photos are nice for a few select pictures, but just
like vignets, a few go a long way.  I may shoot only a dozen
photos where bokeh is a concern.  You only need it for a couple
photos which *MIGHT* result in an 11x14 or 20x24.  Otherwise,
people buy reprints based on the content of the photo, not the
style of the photo.

> 1.  I think I should have switched to point metering under
> these conditions, but I stayed in evaluative (over-all
> averaged metering) since I had a flash unit on.  Mistake?

Depends on the entire camera system.  The IS-3/G-40 combo does a
fantastic job in auto mode.  The OM-2S/4 with OTF flash works
very well in auto mode (with the ambient exposure showing about
1/30-1/15 of a second).  To many factors to give absolute
answers.

> My question: when using flash in the day, do you folks
> normally shoot in aperture priority? or manual?  This is for
> moving subjects where you can't freeze the action.  

Totally depends on the camera and flash system.  Assuming that
you're not using a dedicated system, you setup the flash with
the desired ISO, put it in auto and identify the F-stop it
recommends.  Set the lens aperture to that and the shutter speed
to your sync speed (1/60).  A flash like the Vivitar 285HV has
four different auto settings to choose from so you can vary your
aperture to compensate for ambient light.

You can tell who the old-timers are.  Even with the
latest/greatest advancements in auto flash, they still pretty
much use manual modes.

> Also, I found quickly that if I set the flash exposure
> compensation for correct amount of flash when the subjects
> were far away, up the aisle, then by the time they got closer
> to me, the flash exposure was way too high and they were
> highlighted too much.  Argh!!

Auto flash usually takes care of this.

Some photographers use manual flash, manual camera exposure. 
They go by known distances.  At 15 feet they use F5.6, at 8 feet
they use F8...  Shoot 50 weddings per year, every year for 20
years and they can pretty well guarantee success.

AG


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