Wedding Woes
So I shot my first (outdoor) wedding yesterday ... 7 grueling hours in the heat! OK, not *all* 7 hours were outdoors 
All in all I thought the day went well. I shot 1200 photos between 2 cameras and came out with what I feel (and hope the bride and groom will feel) are a lot of great photos, and a few that are just wonderful.
With that said, I had two persistent problems throughout the day. One which I think I may have figured out, the other that I am clueless on. I am going to post just the first one here for now.
On many pictures, I got what I would call "ghosting" and "smearing". Here is a perfect example:
After looking at the EXIF on the file, I noticed that the shutter was 1/60 sec. Since the kids were moving, and I was moving backwards to stay ahead of them, I suspected this was a simple case of too slow a shutter speed to capture the action. Since the flash went off, I was guessing that was how I got the strange smearing and ghosting.
This was the first thing that came to my mind, but then I recalled just how fast a burst of light from my flash is, and all the sudden this didn't seem like a viable explanation for what happened.
Does anyone have any clue what I did here (and at least 15-20 other times throughout the day?)
Brian
All in all I thought the day went well. I shot 1200 photos between 2 cameras and came out with what I feel (and hope the bride and groom will feel) are a lot of great photos, and a few that are just wonderful.
With that said, I had two persistent problems throughout the day. One which I think I may have figured out, the other that I am clueless on. I am going to post just the first one here for now.
On many pictures, I got what I would call "ghosting" and "smearing". Here is a perfect example:
After looking at the EXIF on the file, I noticed that the shutter was 1/60 sec. Since the kids were moving, and I was moving backwards to stay ahead of them, I suspected this was a simple case of too slow a shutter speed to capture the action. Since the flash went off, I was guessing that was how I got the strange smearing and ghosting.
This was the first thing that came to my mind, but then I recalled just how fast a burst of light from my flash is, and all the sudden this didn't seem like a viable explanation for what happened.
Does anyone have any clue what I did here (and at least 15-20 other times throughout the day?)
Brian
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Comments
The flash only fires for a portion of the capture time, which is enough to freeze the details in the girl and some of the other people. However, the sunlight is contributing the rest of the light which causes the rest of the 1/60s to get blurred for the duration of that time.
In general, freezing motion where the flash isn't the only light source requires (in my experience) at least 1/125s shutter speeds or faster.
Hope that makes sense.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunny_16_rule
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Also I have found that if I just pick a spot down the aisle and allow the motion to come to me and not move I get much better photos....because if they are moving towards you and you are backing up there are varied types of motion happening and that is what causes the ghosting (blurred movement) in you wonderful photos.........and also you could easily trip due to a hole in the ground (outdoors) or a wrinkle in the carpet or those dang rolls of white paper that is laid forthe wedding party to walk on (indoors or sometimes outalso).....I hate thsoe they never lay perfect.....
Hope this is of some help
Ah, yes that makes perfect sense. And I am glad this is what the problem is (operator error), as I can correct this the next time. Thanks for the help!
Brian
I am getting to the point where I shoot probably 50% or more in manual mode, using the sunny 16 (outdoors) or with a flash and dragging the shutter (indoors). In this case, things were happening so fast that I didn't adjust things quick enough. In fact, the path that the wedding party was taking as they approached the front went from full shade to full sun to partial sun to back in full shade. What I should have done was set the camera to shutter priority, or stood still and let them come to me.
Lesson learned!
Brian
Howdy, Art!
Yeah, I think you are right-on, especially since the lighting changed between shade and sun and partial shade as they approached me. It would have been near impossible for me to manually change my shutter and aperture for each person coming down the aisle like that.
The only reason I went out to meet them was because I knew it would give me time to fire off a few shots and check the results before firing off the next group. I never thought about tripping as I walked backwards - now *that* would have been a classic move!
I think I know what to do in the future - shutter priority!
Brian
Let tell you about tripping........I was shooting a CDB concert (Charlie Daniels Band) and as I was snapping away Charlie came to the front of the stage and told me to come up on stage and shoot him crossing the stage as he did a fiddle solo on Devil Went Down to Georgia....said it was going to be a tad longer than normal as he wanted pics of himself shuffling across the stage......I have a bit of stage fright any way........so I try to get by ...by shooting from the stage legs (curtains that hide the awful working sidelines of the stage)....he said nope....had to be directly in front of him walking backwards...sort of reverse following.....ok been shooting for what seemed an eternity (was actually less than 3 minutes) as he shuffled towards the front of the stage I missed my mark (a set of low speakers that were stage level...a perfect step)......I missed my step by about 2 feet and did a perfect flat landing on the concrete floor (stage was actually only 2 feet off the floor, it seemed 10 tho)....I hit and front the farthest and highest cheap seat you could hear 1 voice yelling...."WAY TO GO ART!!!!!!"......The hall was filled to capacity...Charlie had one hard time no laughing as I lay there snapping pics....nothing hurt but my pride......but was a little embarrassed..........got some good pics at least.....he was happy and so was his wife (Hazel)......
Of course I haven't been quite rite in the head since...........
Which is why you fit right in here!
Great story!
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Thanx..............I kinda figgered it helpped me here
Yeah, I have heard that 'bout you
I have to admit that I have never seen any wedding photographer do what I did (walking backwards in front of the wedding party), and so I wonder what the people who attended the wedding thought about it!
All I can say is that I am glad I had two camera bodies, one with flash and one without (specifically, one without a flash where the shutter was much faster than 1/60), else I wouldn't have gotten *any* pictures of the party coming down the aisle.
Brian