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05/12/2009 04:38:20 PM · #1 |
Ok.. so I did my first wedding and to me the pics arent where they could have been - the couple was very pleased though so that's the important part right? I just get frustrated sometimes when I see the "big dogs" around my area's wedding shots and how they capture the drama / emotion... and I cant seem to figure it out. Is it in my post processing? How I originally capture the image??
Also, my scores on the challenges here are just mediocre... I know I havent been at this long - and it will come with time and experience I'm sure.. but how do I fix it when I don't know what I'm doing wrong?? That's my question I guess..
I just uploaded some of the wedding pics to my portfolio on here.. I have some portrait shots too... If you could check them out and see where I'm missing it it would be GREATLY appreciated. Be honest... it wont hurt lol... |
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05/12/2009 04:45:39 PM · #2 |
Hi Clay, just had a quick look at the photos you put in your portfolio, they are clear, clean and sharp. However, I wondered why you haven't posted any of the couple during the ceremony, except just one. Most were of preparations etc??
I don't think you can judge yourself by your scores here, this is a virtual world where people can be very harsh with your photos, they don't have to tell you face to face what they find right or wrong. They can hide behind the screen and just let go!
Message edited by author 2009-05-12 16:46:12. |
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05/12/2009 04:58:18 PM · #3 |
Steve - I just threw up a handful. I have more lol... Those were just some that I was finished editing... I've been playing with Kubota actions some too.. I'm sure you can tell which ones those are too... They seem to make some difference but I'm still not capturing "it"... maybe im just a lot harder on myself than the customers will be??
Message edited by author 2009-05-12 17:00:30. |
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05/12/2009 05:13:07 PM · #4 |
I've scanned your portfolio, and here's my unfiltered reaction, for what it's worth:
You're at that stage of your career where it's essentially a victory to show up and have everything *work*; that is, you are at that point where you worry about your technicals, you worry about your setups, you worry about everything, basically. And so the work itself shows competence, but it lacks any sort of identifiable transcendence, if you catch my drift? Now, where you *want* to be at is at that point where you've transcended craft, you trust the technicals to take care of themselves, and you're living in a world of *vision*, where you start to see possibilities and they, more or less miraculously, happen for you.
Getting from here to there, that's the hard part. But, in general, the more you work and the more you analyze your work, the more you derive lessons from it, the more you incorporate those lessons into your pretty-much-unconscious approach tot he job, then the more (and the sooner) you transcend the level of mere competence and begin to translate vision into reality.
And since a wedding, in the end (for the couple being married), is all *about* vision, about promises and possibilities and dreams and endless hope, that's most definitely where you want to go. And some people can't do that; some people are better, say, at product photography than they ever could be at wedding photography, not for technical reasons per se, but for emotional/visioning reasons. The bottom line is, to get where I *think* you're bemoaning that you're not at, you need to transcend the craft and buy into the eternal vision of human hopes and dreams.
Reality is gonna set in soon enough for these people; your job is to capture what's possibly the one instant in their lives when everything is transformed by the luminosity of dreams.
There. that's my reaction. And that's why I don't do weddings: I'm too much of a cynic :-)
R. |
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05/12/2009 06:41:54 PM · #5 |
Here's my unvarnished opinion. Hopefully you wanted honest...
Ok, you're choosing good moments, but you need to watch your camera angle and your cropping. Two of the photos can be significantly improved by cropping. In this photo,  , half the picture is of the man on the right's back. Crop it down. You'll have to leave part of him in so the people have room to look out of the frame, but you don't need that much of him. Photo  is a great moment between the two men, but the man on the right is at a really awkward angle. If you took one step to the left, you'd get both faces and it would have been stronger. A step to the right it would have focused more on the one man and would have been stronger. The angle of the man on the right is unfortunate, we can see a little, but not enough.  would have worked better landscape. It doesn't look cropped, it just looked like you ran out of room and had to cut off the sides.  is wonderful, but the out of focus pews and flowers (etc, background and foreground) really don't add much to the picture. Crop it in significantly. It's a wonderful picture of the groom.  is a great moment, and normally I have no problem cropping off the top of someone's head, but there's an extra amount of space at the bottom that holds no interest, so it just looks like you didn't aim high enough. Crop it up higher and in from the right and it would be much stronger.  is interesting artistically, but the family would like it a lot more with both of the people in the shot. The interaction between two people on the day of a wedding is what people most want to capture and cherish.
 is wonderful, and I would love that one if I were the bride.
Realize that you're picking the good moments--play with the composition a little more and don't be afraid to move around.
It's difficult to get anything completely new and different, and there's no reason to. Study the photos that you like from other photographers, and figure out why you like it and duplicate it. You're not stealing their idea, you're taking the idea and making it your own.
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05/12/2009 07:11:50 PM · #6 |
Wendy and everyone..
Thanks so much. Looks like Cropping is my biggest issue... Some people commented on the actual photos themselves and had cropping comments as well. I'll start working on that.
Thank you again for all the great suggestions. If anyone else has any please post them too.
- Clay |
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