Category Archives: Wedding

Prayer

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I guess this shot is more about architecture than people, though I hope I can be forgiven for this: The First United Methodist Church in Watertown, SD, is a beautiful structure. I know that Gothic cathedrals, like the Notre Dame de Paris, were intended to lift the celebrants’ eyes to heaven, while at the same time giving them a sense of smallness and humility. Maybe that’s what the architects of this church intended.

I like the symmetry of this shot, though if I were staging it, I would have the bridesmaids move about two feet to my right so I could get all three in the frame. Oh, well. . .

Finally, you might be wondering about the black and white treatment, given the amazing color present in this shot. I think color sometimes distracts. Also, getting good color at ISO 1600 in a big room with generally dim, mixed light sources can be problematic. But, if you want to see color, click here.

Canon 5DII 1/50s f/2.8 ISO1600 85mm

We Do

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Moments after the exchange of vows, Eric and Abby seem oblivious to the appreciative audience sharing their special moment.

Those who have been using a DSLR for more than 6 years might have some sense of why shooting with an ISO set to 2000 and getting fairly clean result is worth commenting on. I rarely shoot at higher than 400, but in this particular church, that isn’t an option for available light photography. And you will note that even at ISO 2000 and with an aperture of 2.8, I am still using a shutter speed that risks blur.

When I am shooting with a slow shutter speed, I look for moments when the action slows down. In this case, the only blurred object that I can see is Abby’s earring.

Canon 5DII 1/50s f/2.8 ISO2000 200mm

Color Version (click)

A Bit of Color

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I generally don’t like selective coloring, which is what this photo illustrates. It’s done in Photoshop. Compositionally, this is very simple photo but the software processing wasn’t – I ultimately had 6 different layers in this photo. A goal was to emphasis the flower, which would have been the focal point even if I had done nothing to the photo.

But I also wanted to soften the skin texture in Katie’s hands, blur parts of the photo but keep the detail in the bodice of the dress.

The Princess Bride, Part II

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This is another example of serendipity in a photo shoot. In the days before my photo session with Brian and Katie, I had imagined some of the photos I would like to take. Unfortunately, few of those worked the way I had planned.

But I did manage to take a photo or two that were totally impromptu. One has already appeared here. And now here’s another. I was getting my camera ready for something and one of our many assistants held out Katie’s veil to straiten it and this is what I saw. I said, “Hold it!” and Katie stuck a pose.

I rarely use on-camera flash but this photo needed it, since strong sunlight was coming from behind the subject.