I will be off to do the worst thing possible

[srobb]

this weekend. I will be doing my nephew's wedding. I know it's family, but that means I will be even more hard on myself quality wise. Just got finished reserving a Novatron 61-V600-3C lighting kit at my local camera store. I have only done one other wedding and that was like 20 years ago. Hopefully, things will go well. I know I am going to be run to death Saturday.

[another view]

And I'm guessing Sunday will be a day for relaxing...

Good luck on the shoot!

[srobb]

Thanks, and Sunday will definitely be for relaxing. I will try to post some of the better pics here when I have them done. I am hoping to use this to move into doing wedding photography for extra income.

[dmm96452]

Good luck!

[Photo-John]

Make sure you spend the next couple of days doing as much testing as possible. You want to know all your equipment inside and out and have every shot as tightly planned as possible. The less improvisation and experimentation on the wedding day, the better. Leave nothing to chance! That way, when the surprises happen - and they will - most of the technical stuff will already be figured out, leaving time and mental energy for the new problems. If you possibly can, take those lights and a model over to the wedding location and shoot a bunch of tests.

[Speed]

I'd wish you good luck, but, I believe we make our own luck.

That and I think you'll do fine.

When I shoot a wedding, I use a checklist to go by, listing every photo I intend to take of the bridal party. I have pre-wedding shots, wedding shots, and reception shots. Not to say that I don't take shots not listed, because I do. Rather, it is a list of those "got to have" shots. The father giving away the bride, the ring exchange, the kiss, etc.

Hope all goes well. And please share some of those shots with us!

Oh, all right,

GOOD LUCK!!!

[Old Timer]

Good luck. I know you will do a great job. Just don't stress, go in and trust your skills and knowledge and everything will go great.

[Lionheart]

this weekend. I will be doing my nephew's wedding. I know it's family, but that means I will be even more hard on myself quality wise. Just got finished reserving a Novatron 61-V600-3C lighting kit at my local camera store. I have only done one other wedding and that was like 20 years ago. Hopefully, things will go well. I know I am going to be run to death Saturday.

Checklist, checklist, checklist. Have one with you to keep yourself focused, stay calm, you'll be just great. Shooting weddings for family probably takes the most courage in my book.

[srobb]

Thanks to all.

OT, coming from you, I take that as a high compliment. Looks like I may be traveling the same road you did with the wedding stuff.

Lionheart and Speed, I had not thought of it as an actual written checklist, but I had been at least going over in my head the shots I wanted to get. Thanks for the tip.

PJ, the tests were done about two weeks ago, although sans lighting. I have gone over the pics with my mentor and will go with his suggestions on how to set up the lighting. Right now my biggest thing is trying to figure out how much film to get. I know I will be using Kodak Portra 160NC for those "portrait" shots I will do in between the ceremony and the reception. They also want pics done at their respective locations where they will be getting ready, during the ceremony and at the reception. So do I plan on using the 160NC for everything?

[JamesV]

So how did everything go this weekend? I hope that you were able to pull it off without any problems and still be able to enjoy yourself. Post so pictures if you can.

[srobb]

Well, I have survived the weekend. It was a very good experience for me at least. ;) The jury will still be out on my nephew.

Have most of the pics back, but in my haste this morning, I forgot to bring the CD's with me to work. I will say that for the most part I am happy with the results. I really think that for the "portrait" shots I would have been better off without all the lighting. Some of them turned out well, but others you can tell had way too much light to them. Some of them were simply horrid. Pretty much all the shots I did before, during and after the ceremony at the reception looked pretty good. (This is the reason I feel the p[ortrait shots could have been better using just my camera and flash.)

Hope to have some good critique this evening, or tomorrow, depending on when I can get some posted here.

[another view]

I really think that for the "portrait" shots I would have been better off without all the lighting. Some of them turned out well, but others you can tell had way too much light to them.

Good that you tried a few different techniques - I found that with weddings life is a lot easier to not use much equipment. I used a flash with the camera mounted on a Stroboframe, and sometimes an additional flash (on-camera type) mounted on a light stand and connected with a cord. That's it. Also, I used mainly Portra 400NC exposed at ISO250 - that extra stop or two, depending on how you exposed the 160, can be a huge help with getting some exposure in the background that's not lit by the flash.

Glad to hear you survived!