I reveal my secret on how to create a great wedding photo.
Not only wedding portrait. It can be applied to all kind of portraits.
Very interesting post for those who want some free tips on how to improve your photography skills or wish to discover how a West Midlands wedding photographer works during a wedding day. I will reveal my a little secret, how to create an outstanding wedding portrait. To be honest, all kind of portraits, not only wedding ones. Unfortunately, it will be very difficult or even impossible to achieve it without proper equipment and I’m not thinking about cameras and lenses. OK, everybody tried to take a photo against a large source of light. I mean sun, for example during the sunset. A romantic, colourful and beautiful moment and everybody wants a photo like that. And what was the result? Not as good as you expected? The same as on the photo below? Possibly the answer will be YES. Why does it happen like that? Photo cameras and even our eyes are not perfect. Let’s make a little test. Have a look at a person who has the sun behind. Our eyes will see the dark shape of the person without details on the face. Am I right? A camera’s sensor will see the scene even worse because our eye is a better tool if I can describe it like that.
So, if you are going to take a photo against the sun, you will receive a similar effect like on the photo below.
I reveal my secret how to make great wedding photos
How to get a better result. The result will make the WOW effect?
Have a look at a photo below. That’s the same couple, the same place, the same photographer 🙂 but an effect is slightly different. Slightly better. Isn’t it? What happened on this occasion? The sun is a very strong source of light and as I explained before how our eyes or camera’s sensor see that king of the scene (darker without details), we have to find an extra source of light to balance the lighting conditions. It’s easy 🙂 I have mentioned it before, a small LED at the back of your smartphone won’t be enough strong to balance the ambient light. If you will take a photo, the final result might be the same as at the photo above… A pop-up flash on modern cameras might be too weak as well. Especially, if a photographer is in a bigger distance from the object. At this occasion from my lovely wedding couple.
I reveal my secret on how to create a great wedding photo
Step by step – know how?
In this bit, I’ll go dipper into more technical things. I’ve already explained a general rule on how to achieve such as creative wedding portrait photo which says that we have to balance ambient light by using an additional source of light. Mobile’s LED or pop up flash on a camera body won’t be enough at this specific photo too because a photographer was too far away from the wedding couple. I used one from my Nikon’s cameras. D750 od D4s, I don’t remember but it is not important. Every single one would be good. A lens, possibly 24-70mm F2.8 from Nikon – but it wasn’t important too. The camera during the wedding photo session with my lovely couple was set on manual mode, so I had a control on every single detail. On the photo, you can see the third person on the left side of the image. This gentleman holds something in his hands. That’s an additional source of light. That’s the key to create a photo like this. That’s the light to balance the ambient light. It was Godox AD400 pro. 400Ws of pure power every single time when I will press the shutter button on my camera. The lamp is strong enough to produce a lot of light. Enough to help create a photo like the one above. Now your know-how. So, let’s practice a little bit. I’ll do this at the next wedding, a very, very soon. Leave e comment or ask a question regarding wedding photography. I’ll try to answer in the nearest future. You can spot MK Wedding Photography – a wedding photographer based in Coventry on Facebook and Instagram.