Marisa wrote:

Randall Ainsworth wrote in message . ..


In article , Marisa
wrote:



I'm going to take wedding pictures in a few months and I've only done
two other really small weddings. I'm lookin for any advice as to how
to best use my equipment, what type of film, filters, etc..and any
techniques/advice you can give me for taking wedding pictures- indoor
and outdoor. I will be using a Nikon N80 SLR camera and have a Nikon
lens 28-80mm as well as a Quantaray lens 100-300mm. I also have a
promaster FTD 7000M flash, which I'm not too familiar with. Any
suggestions for the best results would be greatly appreciated...


You're asking questions that you shouldn't be asking for this type of
job.



So anyone else have any suggestions that are helpful?


Hi Marisa,

The two previous responses a gently saying that weddings are so
important to the participants that botched pictures are not an
acceptable risk. Weddings really need someone who does not have to ask
these questions, someone who has worked previously as an assistant to a
professional wedding photographer.

If you are not familiar with lighting, then you probably should not be
shooting the wedding. Lighting is one of the most important issues. A
wedding deserves off-camera lighting attended by an assistant. Given
the need to move around, wireless communication between the camera and
lights would be preferable. Go to a photo supply store, rent some
lighting, and go to the church a couple weeks in advance and take some
pictures to learn what you need to do at the wedding.

Really good lighting allows you to use slower film, get greater depth of
field (as you can stop down the aperture) and higher quality images.
Never underestimate the importance of the lighting. Example:
Photographer A shoots a scene with powerful off the camera lights. The
background is lit, there is no red eye and the subjects are not
overly-contrasty. Photographer B shoots the same scene with an
on-camera light only. The background is black or just a grissly brown,
there is red eye everywhere, and the faces of the subjects are glaringly
lacking in color. Your Proflash will not do the job.

I have repeatedly declared in this newsgroup that I do not consider 35
mm the format of choice for weddings. Weddings photographers I know all
prefer 6x6 medium format - and the Mamiya C30 in particular. You get 3x
the surface area on the film, and that can make up for a lot of errors
itself.

Whatever the format, you need at least two camera bodies, so that your
assistant can be taking out exposed film and loading fresh film while
you continue to shoot. All this while the assistant is adjusting the
lighting., Note, your assistant should expect to work hard that day.

Whatever the camera, don't use a program to determine the aperture and
shutter speed. Your brain has to decide if the depth of field is going
to be narrow or wide, whether elimination of movement is more important
than depth of field. If you leave it to the computer you will probably
have fast shutter speeds and narrow depths of field.

Optics are critical. I doubt either of your lenses open up wide enough
to accommodate a dark church. What do they open up to? f/3.5? Prime
lenses are better than zoom lenses at accommodating weak lighting
conditions. For instance, f/2.0 or f/1.4. The Nikon will have good
optics, but the Quantaray? The Japanese were the first to use the term
"bokeh" - it means the quality of the out of focus image. This
determines the acceptability of an image. If the out of focus part goes
into a doubte or blurred image, that is bad. If it gently softens that
is good. You need to study the images you have made with the Quantaray
to see if it is useable for this critical situation.

Then there is the choice of film. .......

Read a book of wedding photography.


Francis A. Miniter