Psyche! I totally took a better photo than yesterday’s post. I think this is it.
It probably would have been cooler if I had managed to slap a polarizing filter on the lens though – really darken the sky and bring out the cool cloud detail.
Still – I got this one printed up nice and big for Raissa & Adam. I Hope they hung it up somewhere nice.
Shooting Raissa & Adam’s wedding last year taught me a few very valuable lessons about wedding photography. One of them is to take a lot of shots – there were probably a dozen of this grouping – and this is the best. You’ll notice it’s far from perfect. Realistically I should have taken, maybe, double that… triple – whatever, memory is cheap.
The other issue I experienced from this setup was the family shooters – I’m not a prick so I’m not going to tell the father of the bride he can’t take a photo. But eventually the guests have to give it a break and let the “pro” do their job, otherwise the attention of the subjects is always going to be misplaced and looking at whoever is pointing the click-box at them.
What I’m unsure of, is if I should go before, or AFTER they take their shots.
I’m super excited to be booking some weddings this year. It’s a marvellous privilege to be allowed to document and photograph what is, for many, the single most important day of their lives.
What’s especially nice is they sometimes come here and see that I post photos of doors and benches and stuff – so really – it shows some faith in my ability (or just simple viewing my portfolio).
If you are, or know someone who is, planning a wedding or in need of photographic services; send them my way, I might be their “guy.” ESPECIALLY if they want a shot of some frosty benches… I got that shit covered.
I’m not really “going” for anything here – this image should not represent my artistic intent or style. It’s just a grab-shot I took, liked, ran through Lightroom and Nik’s Colorefexpro and pooped out this image. And I like it.
I took this shot on Sommerset st. here in Ottawa, walking home after dropping Quinn off at the babysitters and about to spend my first full day with little Alex whom I desperately need to take more newborn photographs of, y’know, since I’m a photographer.
edit: some feedback suggested that I remove the distortion of the image created by the G11’s lens and straighten some lines. I don’t disagree, but I wanted to see if anyone has their own preference. You can view the “correct” version here.
Sorry for the hiatus around here – been a bit busy; this guy decided to come out on Wednesday.
Mel’s water broke at about 2am, which sucked because we were both sleeping. We called her mom to come to watch Quinn as we took a cab to the Ottawa Civic Hospital (did you know cabs are cheaper than ambulances?). Then we waited… wait wait wait. At least that’s what I did; from what I could tell Mel was contracting every five minutes and in quite a bit of pain.
Around 6am she started the pushing thing (Technical term – I’m a doctor – a doctor of love!), Alex came out at 6:17am and we haven’t slept since. No really – not since Wednesday- I’m frikkin tired.
I tried my best to show a better sense of scale with Alex than I had with Quinn. Quinn was my first son and I just stuck my camera as close to his face as the minimum focusing distance would allow. Got some great portraits out of it, but at 3lbs 4oz’s you never got a sense of how small he was.
Most of my shots of Alex were taken a bit further back, including more of his environment, though in quite a few cases I got sloppy and didn’t frame right. This shot is a good example – his right hand’s cut off – you’ll have to trust me when I say all fingers are accounted for.
I went into the delivery room simple: Canon 1DMKII SLR with the 50mm f/1.4 attached. Shot mostly wide open or down to, maybe f/2.5 or something. Shooting wide lets a lot more light come in which gets me shutter speeds I’d need to get crisp images at an ISO I can bare (on the 1D I don’t like going over ISO 800). Of course the drawback is that f/1.4 is pretty shallow when it comes to depth of field, and the chances of getting the tip of the nose in focus with no joy on the eyes is pretty high. There is, however, a simple solution to this: Take lots and lots of pictures.
If you’re interested in seeing some more of Alex’s newborn photos follow this link.