D80 Shoots a wedding (C&C welcome) lots o'pics

Hi All,

I am not a wedding pro, by any stretch of my rather limited imagination. However, I was asked to fill in for a pro who could only be at the wedding for part of the day. Here are a few shots. This was a great learning experience and it brought so many questions to mind, some of which I now have answers for. I guess the clearest thing I learned was that a good multi flash set up would be priceless. Unfortunately in this case no flash was allowed during the ceremony.





























Well there are many more of course - thats just a few. Thanks for looking.

Cheers,
Peter

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Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear

You have some great pictures. White balance seems to be off on most of them. Cropping tighter on the subjects may be better as well.
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http://www.pbase.com/all86

The participants should be very pleased; you did an excellent job.

You did great! the fact that thier "pro" could only do part of it.. and that part was NOT the ceremony baffles me. Ive actually just been put in your position, as ill be shooting a friends wedding in sept.

Im no expert, but what i see is this. yes the WB seems a touch off. did you shoot RAW? if so, maybe play with that.

the group of the guys.. maybe stick the short guy in the middle. I know he wasnt the groom, but it just doesnt seem to flow. or if you want to keep that order, maybe do a super low-angle so the height isnt so obvious.

the ceremony shots.. use those 10 mp's and do some cropping maybe? also, it seems like youre 4 ft tall in some of those. unless of course, you are! then im a moron! lol. just saying it seems like an odd height.

if youre put in this situation again.. the outside-the-church shot, have non participants back out of frame and and get a better composition. i like that pic alot, i just think that it would have been a show winner if it didnt feel as "spur of the moment". when i think of formal, i dont see crowd in them. but that would give a nice atmosphere for the "running of the B&G".
those outside ones are great!

so, in no way am i trying to be a jerk, and im NOT an expert on the subject, but thats what i see.

GREAT JOB! i hope they paid you.

It seems to me that color balance is just about impossible with the D80 - I shot raw files and balanced them in C1 and then again in PP. However, I am just not happy with the results. In any event, this is the best I was able to do on this monitor, and it seems passable to me, although it sure could be better. Do you know of any technique books or sites that really get deeper into CB? I know all about the standard tools but the results don't ever seem to be just right. I had better results from my D70 in this regard.

-Peter
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Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear

Thanks!!!
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Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear

Thanks again for the positive comments.

Actually I was supposed to shoot the second half and just shot the whole thing - so most of the shots here are just doubles of what will have been shot by the pro. Thats reason for my low shooting angle. I was seated. It was my brother's wedding so I don't know about getting paid much. We shall see.

-Peter

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Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear

when youre balancing in PP, are you doing it by temperature? or preset? id try by temp if youre not already. are you doing a custom WB on the camera?

wupeide said:

Thanks again for the positive comments.
Actually I was supposed to shoot the second half and just shot the
whole thing - so most of the shots here are just doubles of what will
have been shot by the pro. Thats reason for my low shooting angle.
I was seated. It was my brother's wedding so I don't know about
getting paid much. We shall see.

-Peter

--
Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear

Click to expand...

oh i see. so good, youre not 4 feet tall. i thought maybe you lost a fight to a jack russel. i guess i would charge my bro either.. just make him pay for prints and maybe a little PP time.

I start w/ temperatue in C1 and then use color balance in photo shop. I also tried using temperature in ACR - but the results were about the same. In this case I was only able to use pre-set WB in a few shots becuase I had to use a flash. Notice that some of the up close shots should have different color in the forground and background - I tried to balance this by processing multiple exposures. Anyhow, its not easy. The problem is that color is relative - so my mind plays tricks on me at times. The way i balance one photo is impacted by the lighting in my room, the angle of my monitor and the color of the photo i balanced before it. I really need to find a better method, but it illudes me.
-Peter
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Currenlty shooting w/Nikon gear