Autograph Wedding Photography Made Easy

Esigning wedding photography quotation

that's what can you lead her across the street holding hands and I'm gonna stand in the street here alright welcome back to another video where you guys are on top of my camera behind the scenes out of wedding I'm the photographer Josiah blizzard I'm really excited you can join me for this behind-the-scenes welcome back to another behind the scenes episode at a wedding today we're at Jim and Lissa's wedding I'm shooting on the sony a7 3 with a 24 to 70 2.8 from Canon at the moment I'm in a small room with our bride allysa our videographer and her mom and I'm photographing the dress I don't necessarily love photographing dresses when they're backlit like this but it was a nice moment with Alyssa taking down and putting up the dress and the hanger that made for a really great candid image hey can we see if well it'll look nicer the back will look nicer when it's on you so let's uh let's have you hang it back up yeah I never say no to the bride unless I think it's gonna be a huge waste of time or the light is really awful I never wanted to shoot the back of her dress hanging and Alyssa if you're watching this you figured it out yourself that it wasn't gonna look that great so it's okay shooting the back of the dress always looks better on the bride and this was no exception I really only wanted those images of Alyssa taking down and hanging up the dress as a nice candid moment we're also taking a few getting ready images of her getting her makeup touched up her makeup was finished before we got there but it was nice to be able to get a few images of her touching up the makeup you'll never know that this wasn't her actual like her actually putting on the makeup so it just helps tell the entire story normally this is a room that I would really dread photographing in but because she's near the window and the LED light to my right is daylight balanced it actually made for some great images the color is totally fine nothing to worry about here typically though if there was no window light or that LED light there I'd have to bring in a flash because there's room would just be to tungsten it'd be too orange I just really wouldn't like the way this this looks without those lights there plus I'm making everything black and white and black and white looks really really classy for these types of images anyway alright so now you're on Steph's camera and she's shooting some details she always starts out with the details when we first get there and I photographed the dress hanging what she's doing now is reviewing the images and she noticed that that lamp was on and we're getting two different color casts and so she turned off the orange color cast from that tungsten bulb and now it's just daylight balanced images making for much cleaner looking photos so she shoots everything top down and then from the side she starts wide and works her way in and it just takes practice on learning how to set these things up and then she'll photograph the shoes separately and the perfume separately again takes practice to learn how to do this how to set these things up and get a really pretty aesthetic for these detail photos if you need to fake moments that's totally okay this is Alyssa's mom pretending to put something in her hair with our hairstylist on standby to actually do it makes for a nice moment between mother and daughter remember to ask your videographer if there's something they want to capture before completely dismissing the moment remember you are on a team today this was a really tough room to shoot in it was small only had two windows for the light and there was not one but two mirrors on the wall we were shooting towards so we needed to be careful about reflections but the neutral colors is why I chose to shoot here they emphasize the light and airiness of the room making for beautiful clean images ELISA asked to bring her sisters in and I'm redirecting her requests without being negative or saying no I knew there were still shots I wanted to get and if all the sisters piled into the room then I would never get those shots before we bring sisters in can't have ELISA turn around and face this when we get some shots yeah and you can still pretend to zip so you call that good take one step right to your left perfect and you can smile you're going down you're going back that's me attempting to learn the names of one of her four sisters that all looks super similar we try and learn every bridesmaids name during the wedding day sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't Dale Carnegie once said remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language we always try and learn the names of the bridesmaids because they're gonna be our future Brides someday or at least we hope connecting with them on a personal level by just learning their name is super important and really helpful and makes them feel valued and connected to us and so we want to really work hard to make sure we remember their names because they might book us in the future or they might refer us to their friends can you you were playing with your dress looking down towards your shoulder I'm redirecting her line of sight by telling her to point her chin towards her shoulder to give her a more flattering profile than just shooting the top of her head I was more quiet and laid-back than normal typically I give a lot more directions but because I knew Dave the videographer was already doing a lot of that and getting good real smiles out of them I decided to let him do the work so we weren't all talking over one another and giving mixed or confusing directions it's okay to take a back seat sometimes as long as you know that the person giving the directions is doing so in a good way and you're getting real authentic images Yeah right there's great no no you're never never in the way family I never say no unless it's to emphasize a positive like them never being in the way keep the smile going yeah can you move over time you can you can see just how small and how tight this room is I had Dave move over and Steph isn't how actually on the bed all just trying to let the window light behind Dave into the room so we can get some really great images we're talking with them the entire time communicating with them not being silent we know that this is a moment between them but where there were part of their day and we feel like we're guests or friends that get the honor to to work with them and be a part of this moment so interacting with them is important but not stepping on each other's toes and not butting in too much is also important there's a there's a level of talking too much and not talking enough just look how tight that is you can see Dave directly to my left and Steph to my right look out the window past his through his body give good directions on where to look tell them what to do tell them how to smile tell them to not smile if you want those images that the full wide I was on the fifty millimeter one point four and Steph had the 24 to 70 so I'm even thinking of shots for my second photographer who happens to be my wife to capture be careful not to step on toes if your second isn't your wife but it always is okay to suggest a shot you're leading for a reason and you know the shots you need if you need a wide of the bride putting her shoes on ask for it if you don't have the right lens all right so we were at the ceremony now they had a Catholic Mass so it was about an hour long ceremony and I am at the front I'm actually right underneath that videographers tripod and I'm just waiting for the bride to come down all the parents all the bridesmaids flower girls ring bearers to come down the aisle and I'm capturing that Steph is actually normally to my right but you can actually see her on the balcony up there let's speed this up real quick all the bridesmaids flower girls and here comes the ring bearer in a little wagon so like I said Steph is up on the balcony getting the wides of the of the people coming down the aisle specifically the bride when she gets here I'm getting all of the other stuff so I'm getting them walking down and then there's gonna be a time where I actually shift and focus on Jim our groom and get his reaction to some things make sure that you are shooting quickly and anticipating moments to get everything you need to make the bride and groom happy with their images this was actually a really great looking church this there was a lot of light pouring through those windows there and now that nothing's happening I'm looking for a little moment so here's mom's smiling if Jim there's dad there's the best man I'm just looking for these little moments of people smiling reacting and I'm waiting for Jim to he's smiling real big right now so he's anticipating his bride coming through there's a little delay for some reason let's speed this up again and there she is so there's the wide you can see stuff on the top of the balcony again getting her coming in Jim's huge smile both horizontal and vertical I want to make sure that I get both just so I have just so I have some versatility when it comes to blogging cool so she's coming down the aisle now and I'm just getting as many images as I can again vertically and horizontally phones came out I hate phones at weddings people put your phones away and there's Jim's big ol goofy smile love it and now I'm actually gonna scoot behind her and make sure I get this moment real quick of father handing her off to Jim and Jim giving him a hug you can see I went behind her and said to the left because the videographer was to my left I didn't want to get in his way and I wanted to make sure I could get those images you're not hearing my shutter click anymore because these a 7-3 actually has a silent shutter mode because it is a mirrorless camera so I turned that off you're not going to hear any of my shutter going throughout throughout this ceremony just looking for candidates looking for these little moments there's not much to do during an hour-long Catholic ceremony except for look for moments and it's totally okay if you want to chill out and not shoot for a couple minutes it does get very very repetitive and most of the time they are sitting in chairs with their backs to you so not taking more than you need is totally okay to do you're gonna see that I I am moving around a ton all right I'm starting in the center aisle moving to the left and now everybody is standing up and I love when everybody stands up during Catholic ceremonies because it means I have more freedom to move without being the center of attention look for interesting compositions like that love that image and I'm actually going to move up in a second I'm going to move up to the very front because I want to make sure that I can get a little bit closer they were very far away I'm on the 24 to 72 point eight once more again because everybody is standing I can crouch and not be the center of attention I'd never want to draw focus away from the bride and groom so that's why I move my move the most is during people standing or transition moments like that again I met to the front I'm getting them from the side and now I know that I actually need to get oh there's the kiss awesome and get it both vertically and horizontally awesome Steph is also in the 70 to 200 she's to my right and she's getting that image as well just a little bit tighter a little closer up there's times where I'll say I'm gonna shoot horizontally and she'll shoot vertically or vice versa if you're shooting a Catholic ceremony for the first time be aware there's a lot of moving pieces there's a moment like this where the bride and groom come down and give a hug and kiss to the both their parents and greet their bridal party so I didn't record them walking out but get them walking out and then immediately follow them to wherever they go because they're gonna give a lot of hugs kisses and celebrate with their family for a moment before their guests are released I was just following them it's great moment for candids to be captured and then afterwards immediately scoot them out of the way get them away from their guests because if you lose them to their guests it's gonna take a really long time to get them away from their guests especially if you're doing family formals immediately following the ceremony you want to make sure you can get them back and all the family together for these portraits so I'm using the 24 to 70 there is a magmod softbox to my left I did another video on that that is linked here you can watch it in the cards all right you saw me point at the camera because I added a kid and there's a lot more people and the videographer was to my left I wanted to make sure that they were looking right at my camera all right hey everybody you're gonna look right at me the whole time okay right here big smiles ready one two three awesome I might even go way back hey Dave guy have you slide to your right a bit Thanks awesome right here again ready one two three awesome juvenile listen look at each other everybody looking at Jim and Alyssa okay you can smile at them if you want to make fun of them you're welcome to do that as well just laugh at them if you want to that's really all I'm asking for you all right we're at bridal party portraits now and for the full bridal party I keep it pretty simple you saw me do the very basic hey everybody look right at me I do a horizontal and vertical and then I come in I have them look at each other interact with each other and I start and I go to the right and I get I focus on Alyssa and her bridesmaids first and then I actually scoot around to the other side and get Jim and his groomsmen and I shoot these horizontally and vertically as well I just want a lot of variety and I just tell them to look at each other smile laugh you want to make fun of the couple go for it all good Jim give her a big kiss don't forget to be a team player ask your videographer if they have anything that they want to get David view whatever you want to do David go for it go for it come right here perfect right there it's good you guys gonna hold hands okay hold hands you can put the dress like right behind them if you want to yeah perfect yeah we're gonna do a little bit of walking that's what's gonna happen a little bit of walking all right you guys are partners tonight agreeing you guys just right here right next to them okay you can interlock arms that's good yep another pair another pair another pair right here okay another pair it's okay you're gonna do a guy-girl guy-girl so we're gonna flip you guys cool right there's good you guys still link arms okay Jimmy Alyssa I want you guys to take a giant step forward for me hey these guys are gonna lead the way you're all gonna walk to me slowly look at each other look at your partner while you walk okay do not do not walk faster than Jimin Alyssa don't walk faster than them you're gonna look at each other don't look at me at all okay go ahead walk towards me look at each other this is one of my favorite bridal party poses it takes a while to set up but it's so worth it every single time they are forgetting that you're even shooting there focus on walking smiling with one another and it creates some images that have some really great depth and color in the background hey are we actually able to bring this behind her no it's okay I think it just looks cleaner when it's when it's behind yeah you know you guys seriously are amazing it's all right ladies looking right at me okay all right ready one two three everybody look at Alyssa I again I do the same thing here with the bridesmaids I start wide get them all looking at me and then I tell them to look at each other smile with each other laugh with each other if they want to make fun of the bride they can totally do that and just get some real laughter I let them do their thing and I let their personalities really come out there they're the best friends and they know how to make each other laugh and smile with one another so I go to the right here in a moment Steph is obviously on the left and then I actually scoot over to her side too and get some some shots that I want to get I actually when I shoot I don't rely on her at all I know she's there and she's getting some great images but I shoot as if I was the only shooter for the day I want you guys now to link arms with each other okay if that's possible come on ' your best they're your best link all right you guys gonna walk towards me you're gonna bump hips together while you walk okay don't fall over yes embrace it okay I promise you you'll laugh or you'll feel really weird just slowly walk ready bump pips with each other while you walk okay ready set go ahead walk towards me look at each other guys this is one of my favorite bridesmaids poses because again just like the walking for the bridal party they totally forget I'm taking images they're just smiling laughing with each other and having them bump hips while walking just makes them crack up let's do individuals of each of them with you okay so we can go right back to the spot down there you guys are doing great all right looking right at me ready one two three yeah one two three look at each other perfect fun one do a fun one now let me tell you if you are not doing individuals of each bridesmaid with the bride you need to start these are images that they're gonna share on each bridesmaids birthday on the bride's birthday they're gonna consistently pop up in social media news feeds and Instagram feeds you definitely need to be doing individuals we also send each bridesmaid over to Steph and Steph takes a headshot sort of image of each bridesmaid and they can then use that for whatever they want sometimes they'll even make it their profile picture the more often you can get your images out there from a bunch of different people onto social media platforms the better the more people are seeing your images and the more likely you are going to be booked Kristin you can go over to Steph here all right next up all right gentlemen right here ready one two three back up just a bit hey Alyssa can I have you slide to your left just a little bit thank you all right guys ready one two three awesome hey everybody looking at gym for me Jim look over at Joe now is your chance to make fun of Jim if you want to say anything to Jim you are more than welcome to the biggest thing to keep in mind is to stay efficient be efficient with the bridal party especially the groomsmen they don't really love having their photo taken to begin with you can see I'm using the same formula I used before start in the back at the wide everybody looking at me go to the right go to the left get those images from the sides but stay efficient I only do two maybe three hoses up the groomsmen and so now I have them I just lined up and then I put them in this Flying V formation I always mentioned has anyone seen the Mighty Ducks and they get excited to do the Flying V alright stay in this formation you're gonna walk very slowly towards me very GQ like okay alright so you've seen my routine I've done this with both bridal party and bridesmaids and I'm doing it with groomsmen ending with a walking shot they're focused on each other laughing with each other not focused on me or my camera we also do individuals with the groomsmen just as we did with the bridesmaids they're more likely not going to share these images on Facebook or Instagram but who knows just because they're dudes I don't think they're really wedding sentimental as the women are but it's still good to have these images of their best friends together Jim knows all of these guys in different stages of life whether they be brothers-in-law coworkers or just friends from life in general guys hey you're gonna slowly walk it's all gonna come back to you so it's just gonna be a lot easier cuz you're not gonna be on sand yeah perfect look at each other for me guys beautiful just keep the smiles up for me that's good I'm not gonna narrate through my posing for them I think it's more beneficial for you guys to hear what I'm saying how I'm interacting with them just know that I do a lot of variety a lot of nose touching foreheads together Hey look at me look at each other that sort of thing walking is really great for really natural-looking images and it kind of warms them up for their portraits there is a rhythm that you need to get into so keep that in mind and I just move them around a lot we stayed in this one little area for about 25 minutes and we got a lot of variety and then we walked back to the hotel and got some more inside and I will catch back up with you when I'm inside the hotel love it guys can you bring noses together and walk for me keep walking keep walking keep walking you've had too many Heineken Jim then it's awesome guys you're good let me have you guys turn around hold hands and walk back that way now okay yeah you know let's take that let's take the marina you be triggered after all right looking at each other again guys all right that's pretty guys guys you look amazing we got amazing light right now - this is beautiful love it guys you do any area when he's a cyclops like that beautiful yeah Steph gonna say beautiful guys stay right where you are okay guys are so easy no don't just don't get it I just don't yeah you guys bring those noses together for me noses together awesome hey Alyssa look at me now okay you can turn your head Jim I want you in does Lin okay bring your nose oh and if you can now Jim I want you to whisper in her ear I want you to whisper in French you can make it up that's not what spring just keep the nose closer hear that keep the nose you've kind of face I think Jim is now as giggly as this guy's looking ready to be here good guys that is so pretty killing it so pretty awesome guys hey wants you from behind you this time now all right is it okay Dave all right guys hey noses together again all right I know you guys probably are sick of rubbing and wet noses you know was Hannah again yet awesome stay right in that a little closer cool yes Alyssa look right back at me like you were just doing yep nuzzle in there you go he's got it down you never remember how it works it's not a rookie anymore Alyssa eyes right here perfect Jim whisper in French this whisper you kiss her right where your nose is Jim Alyssa looked down yeah look down at his shoulder now it's time there we go perfect right there hey whisper one reason you married her today in her hear me sir is there can I bring you right behind him okay you're gonna come great right here okay yep yeah give the flowers to those let me bring this this way a bit your left arms gonna come right up on his bicep you can flex if you want to all right guys right here Jim can you bring the flower down just a tad bit yep there you go well it's all good it's all good ready 1 2 3 again 1 2 3 you see a little look at what I'm doing I don't even know what cross my cross my legs my weird is right Jim will go right Alyssa yeah there you go perfect Alyssa look at me Jim Oh Grammy it is this the cheese I know and love awesome guys can you take him a little bit he's not taking this is easy sticklers I like you my kid there you go Jim you're gonna stand right here chest the chest okay all right and one two three all right big kiss this time big kiss hold it hold it hold it hold it ready one two three toss it let's double check that yeah I think we got it - you're gonna take one step you're gonna be one step in front for the whole time leading her down diagonal diagonally this way okay pretty much walk towards right here okay slowly very slowly you're gonna look at him the whole time be one big step take one giant step in front of her right now yeah right there that's the distance you're always gonna be apart all right ready walk down the stairs slowly very very slowly if you can look back at her if you can first a quick step it's bagging her yawl that is magic no joke magic it's totally okay you know after this pose let's do an individual view an individual view because we don't have that and then we're good for a bit Jim can I have you bring the left leg up onto the step there is that possible yeah and then if the other one can go flat on the step below it there we go like that yeah like that yeah there we go you know what Jim can you flip the legs like just swap yeah there you go let's say looking at each other bring those noses close again it's magic no you're good we're reading minds now hey can you look down towards his knee there perfect can you know the line for me Jim just nuzzling or maybe attack her with kisses or something on the cheek or something like that maybe whisper something in her ear on guys that's cute look it's like I can't whisper I mean you're a big kiss right there yo my gosh so good so good I don't say it often I don't say it often you know it's good leave it on you can grab her by her weight pull it into you okay I want to get I want to get close with these flowers here before anything else we just got past me them let's just pashmina it's just on the back of the car no one will hashtag it because it's just so difficult thank you there you go Jim this is what we're gonna do I borrow you you're gonna choke around not really yeah and you can come in like there here we can actually we can even bring it this is a really kind of a tricky pose yeah Jim you're gonna cross and then you're gonna come in this way a bit yes right there yeah there you go yep can you bring your hand that's on his hand towards his wrist towards wrist there you go right there right here guys yeah in tight hang tight hang tight hang tight pink tape is a guy behind you right here ready one two three Jim over here so as the whistle hey can you get in her ear again nuzzle in a bit actually you know what attack your kisses on that cheek right there just attack her the whole bunch of kisses as many as you can there you go Alyssa right here for me beautiful perfect guys that's it and if you can while you walk look at each other beautiful guys love it that's well can you lead her across the street holding hands and I'm gonna stand in the street here look back at her for me big big step in front of her Jim Alyssa look over me love that guy's awesome cool alright so we are back in the hotel to Pont down in Wilmington Delaware and you can see just how dark it is inside of this stairwell here this is the stairwell that everybody takes photos in and so we decided to kinda follow the trend and take some photos in this nice dark stairwell we are not typically flash shooters we do not do a lot of portraits with flash the only time we really use flash is during the reception however we wanted to make sure that we got some of these shots and we wanted to push our our skills and our boundaries to the next level a little bit and put them to the test so we're using the magma mag box it's a softbox just to my left only one flash for this I believe my shutter was open to 1 over 125 or 1 over 160 f-stop a 2.8 and then my ISO was probably somewhere around I believe it was 800 ISO and then the soft box has one flash one speed light in there and that is set to 1 over 32 power so we did some portraits of just Alyssa now we added Jim to the mix it's a little bit more difficult once you add two people in because now you have to worry about where the light is falling on both of their faces the mag box is a 24 inch mac box I believe it's pretty soft I really love the light that comes out of this softbox and it beats using just bare bulb flash or an umbrella or anything like that I can control the light a little bit more so Steph is running just the softbox and I'm the only one shooting I'm making sure that I'm staying very limited with my shot choices here I only want to keep them in one place I'm only doing horizontals and verticals mainly verticals because of the way the staircase goes up with the leading lines in the staircase and I can get her full dress have her look at me look at each other look down at her shoulder and now we're in the ballroom and we to do some spinning shots and I love the way this image turned out my shutter is actually at one over 60 to get a little bit of motion blur with her dress just to show some movement hey you guys are free 555 you got about 35 minutes till cocktail hour starts we are all right and now we have moved into the reception intros guys these are the best reception intros I've ever seen by any bridal party ever so yeah normally they're a little rough but these guys were super awesome a lot of dancing I believe all the sisters all Alyssa's sisters are dancers so they did a really awesome job and Lindsay had some really cool light-up shoes here so yeah we are in the reception the entrance let me talk to you real quick about where our flashes are because it's really important we have our softbox to my right to my left a few feet behind me is a tall light stand with another flash with a mag sphere on it to spread the light out and in the back right of this room you can see it flashing here and there is another flash that's giving them a little bit of a hair light so we are doing three-point lighting and I actually told them where to stand before they came into the room it was very important because if they stood in the middle our entire lighting situation will be messed up and we wouldn't have as much room to shoot so I told him to stand on a little box on the floor I actually took a picture and showed them where to stand so if you need them to be in a certain location straight up tell them where to go it's okay they're not going to be mad at you for telling them what to do if anything they're gonna be a little bit relieved because it'll be something more to follow more instructions to follow and they'll be put at ease because they know exactly where to go so the videographer had a light on them you can see on his camera there's a little light on the top we're very thankful that that was there because this room is really dark so that light that he has actually gives us a little bit of extra contrast on them too to capture the auto focus to make sure that we're focused on them once I get the main shots I kind of move around the room I shoot through the bridesmaids behind them I get some wides from the stage and then I move to the right and get some some other shots I'm on an 85 millimeter 1.8 by the way Steph is on 24 to 70 so we get those shots now the issue that we had here at the toast was that you can see that Alyssa's father's back was to our flash to our key light and our fill light so what happened was our our hair light became our key light and that is such an issue because it was not powerful enough we had two flashes facing one way and one flash facing the other so what I had to do was ramped up the power on the two flashes that were facing his back that were behind him and just really overexposed a lot of the image to make sure that we were getting enough light to wrap around his face and that we were getting enough light to fall unto Jim and Alyssa at the table and it is totally okay for you to do that you just got to be ready for anything so that's what I did I just I just really ramped up the power I think to one over sixteen on both of the flashes that were by the stage and you know we were just dealt with what we were dealt so also be aware at the end of each toast there's always hugs that happen so be aware of those hugs make sure you get those candid moments moving on to the parent dances here we are doing the same this same setup now we're back to normal Mac box on the right big flash to the left behind me and then a hair light in the back right of the room you just saw it flash there a few times three-point lighting is really great just make sure that you don't get it too many starbursts from shooting directly into the flash sometimes it makes for really great photos sometimes it kind of is distracting so just get a variety of shots you can always put the hair light flash behind the couple like directly behind them and it'll give them a little rim light and that looks really really cool to do so I just move around a whole lot and and just be ready for anything moving on to Jim and his mom's dance again we already knew our light was good so we were just kind of just capturing the moment the nice thing about having off-camera flash is you can move anywhere in the room and the light is still hitting them guys thank you so much for joining me and watching this entire video I hope it was extremely helpful I know that this would have been really helpful for me when I was first starting out to be able to watch somebody behind the scenes out of wedding guys I want to hear your feedback let me know what I can do better how I can record these better what you guys are struggling with that your wet and what you guys need to learn and need to know going forward if you like this video please subscribe hit the like button and maybe share with a friend who might find this content valuable and I will catch you guys in the next video