My Nightmare....

[Demonic]

I buy a XTi, two weeks later a co-worker / firend has a wedding. "Hey you should bring you new fancy pants cam to take a few pics" he says jokingly. "i'll do that, good learning experience for me i guess."

Now the story i got was his new father-in-law, was a camera freak and had been taking pix for a while and i would be basically backing him up. So i show up whip my camera out when i arrive at the wedding, the only one pouting about the overcast day for the outside wedding. (hey i was not wearing a black tux, schmucks) I wanted some good pix and i wanted it to be easy with good light. Well "father-in-law" shows up with a older Kodak with a 32mb mem stick . I swear this thing was the slowest camera ever, and at some point while everyone was getting ready for the wedding i was told "Ok, your the only one with free roam, go where ever and whenever u want during the wedding just get some good pix." OMFG what?! i just.. wha.. snap shot... /cry ... ANYWAY i did just that, my legs are so sore from going up and down on my knee... that **** was hard work in the heat, and it was not even that hot! I have a new found respect for Photography!

Anyway RESULTS... Any tips?!

[Clint_Smith]

hehehe...the dreaded "I bought a Digi Rebel and I shot a wedding," thread...LOL! Good call on not being upset about the overcast day.

Yeah it can be hard work, but very rewarding work also.

The best tips I can give you are:

• find a photographer that you would like to emulate. Study their images, and try to "reverse engineer" then to figure out the lighting and technique. Then try to duplicated it.
• Shoot RAW
• Learn off camera lighting
• get the best gear you can afford - but don't skimp on quality - you can get good lenses for less than the Canon L series.
• buy a book on posing for weddings - our Books A Million has a ton of them.
• If you decide to try to make money doing weddings, charge something. Please don't do them for free "because you are a rookie" That just makes it harder for you to beomce a pro. Your images may be great but once someone knows you do weddings cheap you will always be known as the cheap wedding photographer. Not to mention you are peeing in the pool we are all swimming in when you do them for free.

[bodynmotion]

I think Clint hit the nail on the head about charging something!!! Good words of wisdom.

[akimartymar]

Originally Posted by Demonic

the only one pouting about the overcast day for the outside wedding.

When shooting a wedding, or any outdoor portraits, it is a good thing to be overcast instead of bright and sunny. It's much easier to produce good photos in the softened light.

[Demonic]

Originally Posted by Clint_Smith

you will always be known as the cheap wedding photographer.

OMG i feel so slutty!

Originally Posted by Clint_Smith

Shoot RAW

I did until my 4gb CF was full need another 8gb to go with it.

lol Thanks for the advice Clint, I never wanted to do it in the first place hah so much pressure, and there still is seeing as they have not seen the photo's yet. Weddings are not something i want to make a habit out of doing, you guys can keep em!

Now of course i feel about the same now as i did back in the day when i started getting into computers, everything is new, don't understand a lot of it, but i can't leave it alone. Now i make a living working on computers...

[Wes]

Originally Posted by Demonic

I did until my 4gb CF was full need another 8gb to go with it.

I wouldn't buy an 8Gb card. Imagine shooting most of a wedding only to have your 8Gb card go south on you. It's not a matter of IF a card will fail on you; it's when. Get several small cards so that you're not putting all of your eggs in one basket.

[Clint_Smith]

slutty....HA!

[LPFyreDawg]

Originally Posted by Wes

I wouldn't buy an 8Gb card. Imagine shooting most of a wedding only to have your 8Gb card go south on you. It's not a matter of IF a card will fail on you; it's when. Get several small cards so that you're not putting all of your eggs in one basket.

Sooooooo correct on the going south. I shot a HS Baseball playy off game and when I got home the CF decided it didn't want to work anymore. Needless to say I wasn't a happy camper. So now I use mostly my 2Gb cards. Or if I can I just shoot them to my laptop with my new WT-3A its assume.

[ngoduyviet]

Also, prepare to go broke for the rest of your life when you start getting into cameras...I found that out the hard way heheh.

[akimartymar]

Originally Posted by Wes

I wouldn't buy an 8Gb card. Imagine shooting most of a wedding only to have your 8Gb card go south on you. It's not a matter of IF a card will fail on you; it's when. Get several small cards so that you're not putting all of your eggs in one basket.

What most people don't seem to realize is, just because you HAVE an 8GB card, doesn't mean you HAVE to use all 8GB worth of space. It's nice just knowing that it's there just in case you get caught up in something and don't have time to swap cards. It would kinda suck if you were getting ready to let's say do the cake cutting photos and OOPS!!!....out of space on my 4GB card. If you had an 8GB card you wouldn't miss a thing and could swap out afterwards. Besides, on a 5D or 1Ds Mark II(for anyone lucky enough to have one), a 2GB card can fill up rather quick shooting in RAW. A 5D won't even except anything less than a 2GB.