8 places, 8 celebrations, 8 months

At 8pm Friday 20th April, we finished our last of 8 weddings shoots for the 2011-12 season. Charlotte coincidentally was also going to be 8 months old that weekend. We thank Jillian & Sam for the opportunity to photograph their special day at the Adelaide Oval. Despite the demolitions going on, spirits were still high and we hope the images reflect your love of cricket! We are also deeply appreciate the stress endured and the love shown for Charlotte by our respective parents as they managed to look after her during these 8 days of photographing , followed by the week of editing afterwards. Starting with Jillian and Sam’s wedding, these are some favourites of ours from the past season.

Panoramic view of the grandstand of Adelaide Oval

Sam showing fine form with the bat

Rings & a well worn bat!

Sheffield Shield room

Entering the arena!

Presenting the rings

How was that!

Bat & Ball , go together like Bride & Groom

In with the crowd

Modern stairwells amidst old architecture

Jillian & Sam's scoreboard

Adelaide Oval by night - a vibrant burst of colour!

We wish Jillian & Sam all the best for the future. We certainly had a great time during our shorter than usual coverage of the day!

Now for a step back in time looking at our previous weddings for the season :

March 24 : Celia & Andrew at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens

March 17 : Kirsty & Drew at Port Elliot

March 11: Yen & Malcolm at North Terrace

December 17 : Amy & Dylan at St Marks College

December 10 : Jane & Mike at Bird in Hand winery

October 29: Carina & Paul at Al Ru Farm

October 8: Alice & Matt at Bungaree Station

We look forward to what the new season begins this spring! With our growing commitment (literally) to Charlotte , we have decided to cap our availability at two weddings a month. So far, it looks like we will be returning to some familiar venues which always helps us be at ease and hopefully bring that sense to the bridal party and all involved. Thanks once again to all the brides and grooms who allowed us into their special day and we hope you enjoyed our services And now, some final packing before holidays!!!

-D&M

Celia & Andrew’s day catalogued : 24032012D

Our last of three consecutive weddings finished with Celia and Andrew’s special day. It was the shortest coverage of the three weddings and after the previous two weeks of constant editing during the week to keep up with the work, we were glad to arrive at Celia and Andrew’s house at Grange without a backlog of images to process!

With today’s post , I thought I’d give a little insight regarding how Marianne and I manage the files we take during each wedding. Photographing a wedding with one photographer makes it relatively easy to sort images.  Once the wedding is done and the files are catalogued, one could process them and name them in sequential order. During our first few weddings, we found the post production organisation of files difficult as we were swapping cameras at times and often using similar focal lengths with different lenses (eg 70mm with a  24-70 lens on a crop sensor vs 100mm with 70-200 lens on a full frame sensor). Unless we immediately tagged our files when we came home, we’d often forget who took which image. Moreover, sorting the image according to time didn’t always work because the cameras’ time was sometimes disynchronised.  Our wedding packages usually give the clients an opportunity to name ‘x’ number of images from a series of proofs. From these, they select the high-resolution files to enable larger printing. Finding the file names initially required a very labour intensive correlation of spreadsheet, file name viewing and lightroom selections simultaneously. We also used to process the proofs differently to the final images which meant another round of post processing once the clients had chosen their high-resolution images.

Here’s some of our approaches to resolve this issue:

1. On the night before the wedding, we synchronise the times of our cameras to the second (interestingly we found that the 5dmk2′s clock ran slightly faster than the 7D hence we have to do this before every wedding!)

2. We try to stick to the same camera for the whole day. If we end up swapping cameras, we end up swapping CF cards as well to make the import and tagging process easier.

3. When cataloguing in lightroom, I tag my images with ‘Dee’ and Marianne’s with her name so that we can filter the catalogue for own images.

4. For each wedding, we set up a few different presets for white balance, exposure and vignetting for each scene to keep some consistency between our images.

5. When exporting the files, we name them according to the wedding , hour, minute, second with D or M. For instance for this wedding, a shot taken by me at 10:34 am and 20 seconds would read ‘CAwedding103420D’.

6. We now have a set of actions to enable 1 touch processing (which is then refined) adjusting colours, brightness, skin tone adjustment with imagenomic software, web resizing and proof resizing.

7. Once the proofs are done we found a command which generates a text list of all the filenames in a folder. This is then exported to an excel spreadsheet from which the clients choose their high-resolution files.

8. The editing is all done for each file , so once the final files are chosen, there are no re-edits to do!

And with that, here are some images from their wedding !

7:40am Charlotte was dropped of a happy girl with Marianne's parents for the day

10:04am at their beautiful home

10:25am leaving the house

10:42am arrival at the church

11:01 rings are presented

11:35 leaving as husband and wife!

12:55pm arrival at the botanic gardens

13:01 inside palm house

13:20 shhh, the bride is always right!

13:26 taking a break from procedings

13:43 one of many moments of happiness

14:28 Andrew get's told how it is ! (again)

If anyone has further suggestions, we’d be more than happy to hear about them

Until the next wedding which is at the Adelaide Oval on April 20!

-D

Wishing you happiness for the future!

Kirsty and Drew : The long and short of March 17

On March 17, Marianne and I had the privilege of photographing Kirsty and Drew’s wedding. The weather forecast was all doom and gloom earlier in the week but we were  happy to see the heavy rains fall a few days early. This meant that  Saturday was a beautiful day for celebrations. Blue sky days aren’t ideal for wedding photography due to harsh lighting but that certainly did not put a dampener on what was a fabulous day. Once again, we were overhwhelmed with the friendliness and geniality shown to us; something which always helps us photograph the day. The ceremony was held at Horseshoe Bay in Port Elliot while the reception shifted to the Blues Restaurant just outside of Middleton.

With this post, I thought I’d show some of the advantages and luxuries of having two photographers on the day. First of all, during bride and groom preparation, there is no rush for us to head to each venue sequentially. Rather, we have enough gear to split up the shoot between us simultaneously. To date, I have carried the 7D with 10-20mm sigma , 16-35mm F2.8 and the 70-200 F2.8 lens. This gives me the capability to go ultra wide, or ultra long if I need to for detail shots. I end up using the 16-35mm on the crop sensor for most of the shoot. Marianne has photographed the bride with the 5dmkII and 24-70mm F2.8 lens. She rarely deviates from this but has the 135mm F2 lens in her bag if required.

Preparation details photographed independently

Once we are at the ceremony, I usually focus on details with the 7D + 70-200mm lens while Marianne stays wide to capture the whole scene and traditional portraits with the same setup as for the bridal preparation. Usually, I arrive at the scene with the groomsmen which gives me some time to try a panorama. To date, I have not found it possible to do a panorama including the bride and groom as there are inevitably people standing in the way beyond our control.

Soldier's Memorial Gardens : Port Elliot

Sand ceremony in context and detail

Rings in context and in detail

After the ceremony was over, we took a short drive to the clifftops around Horseshoe Bay where there were great opportunities for both short (wide) and long lens images. These gave different perspectives of the same scene.

Long lens shot atop the cliffs

Wide angle from atop the jetty

Long lens image taken from 100m back of the same scene above

Wide angle image of the tracks

Long lens image of the same tracks

We always appreciate quality time for location shoots and we felt that we had plenty of time for Kirsty and Drew compared to many other weddings we have photographed. Once the location shoot was over, we headed to the Blues restaurant in Middleton whose food we had the pleasure of tasting thanks to our hosts

Wide angle shot of the beachouse accommodation

Long lens shot of the same scene above

Wide angle coverage of the bridal waltz

Longer lens coverage of the same scene

Shortly after the bridal waltz, Marianne and I headed back home to Adelaide where once again, Charlotte had proven to be very ‘baby-sittable’. We had a great time photographing the day and are preparing for our next wedding before a four week break, another wedding, then off to New Zealand!! Congratulations again Kirsty and Drew and thanks for your hospitality throughout the day

That was the long.......

....and the short of March 17

Until next time! (ps. some 5dmkIII shots from the next wedding too

-D

Yen & Malcolm got married !

Last weekend was our first effort at capturing a two day wedding. It was a tiring but rewarding experience and the first of four weddings in the next month (and hopefully no funerals!) Yen & Malcolm were a fabulous couple to photograph. The day was made so much better for us with very accommodating relatives and friends. We’ll let the pictures do the talking for the days(s). The first day began with traditional attire for the tea ceremonies.

We can't resist photographing cute kids - especially when dressed up for the day!

Tradition called for certain proceedings

Firecrackers to ward off the evil spirits? (that's my theory)

At the end of the first day’s shoot, I headed home to immediately start the cataloguing process while Marianne went to pick up Charlotte from her parents’ . She had behaved exceptionally well to our relief. We were very grateful to be provided lunch at the end of the shoot as our stomachs were definitely starting to growl. The second day was what you might call a more ‘standard’ western type of ceremony at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens. The reception was later held at John Difede reception centre.

Details of the day's procedings

Preparing Yen

Arriving at the Botanic Gardens

Down the aisle

Exchange of vows

Releasing the doves

The day was filmed from many angles as well our photographs

After the ceremony and a few formal family portraits, we set off with the bridal party for an hour around the Botanic Gardens.

Palm house, cyclad gardens and the pond

A stroll down Murdoch Avenue

Finally ending up on North Terrace

When we arrived at the reception centre, Marianne shot details of the hall while I took pictures of each of the 158 groups of guests! Note a supplement to the meal provided by Kong Brothers

An interesting 'entree' !

Many speeches were given with gusto

A captive audience at the end of a long day!

The bridal waltz was a spectacular highlight!

…and with that , our coverage of the day was concluded. We thank Yen & Malcolm for letting us in on their special 2 days and for the hospitality shown to us by everyone involved with the wedding We hope you enjoyed our services and the final result too. Our next wedding date is at Port Elliot !

-D&M

A Weekend Escapade

Our last weekend away taught us a few more things about travelling and photography with a young child. We drove down to Robe and the beautiful Limestone Coast of South Australia. 3.5 hours in the car with an infant is a gamble and at some stage, they will NOT like the journey! Despite trying to remain outwardly calm, their crying will eventually affect you. Stopping the tears can sometimes only be managed by aborting any efforts to take photographs. If you persist and have your mind on two things at once, you may end up paying a price, such as breaking camera equipment like our 82mm circular polarising filter!

Above: an exposure blended image. Below: the result of a smashed polariser

The point of view of a baby is somewhat different to an adult photographer. We love sunsets and sunrises, they love to sleep during those times. We look at the grand scene, they love to focus on one detail such as the texture of a sand on a beach. Charlotte was engrossed with the water movement underneath the jetty where most of us would not have paid it a passing thought! Not to mention some very cute shadow dancing she was doing.

The little things are a wonderful source of joy!

She also loves the sound of wave motion as I found out from her coo-ing sounds while taking this panorama.

Standing in the water with Charlotte

Babies can be infatuated with one thing one day, and then treat it as his/her worst enemy the next! Charlotte seemed to love playing with sand while in Kangaroo Island but we couldn’t put her within 10 cm of the sand at Long Beach! (it was cool sand too!)

"Get me away from the sand!!"

Charlotte loves to pull on daddy’s hair. Even when there isn’t much of it left after a #3 shave! This shot was one of a series taken with Charlotte on my back pulling away as though I was a horse.

Obelisk and grass

The look of concentration is an odd one when taking the arm’s length self portrait – so I tried smiling this time!

Don't concentrate so hard!

Mornings are her best time of the day. After coming home from a dawn shoot, she seems to love the appearance of daddy through the door! Meanwhile, I was ruing the smashed polariser as these shots of the reef could have done with one to reduce water and rock glare.

More post processing was required in the absence of a CPL

Charlotte loves being in the backpack – but only while moving. Every time I so much as thought about setting up for a shot, there would be complaints from behind. Set up tripod, walk 5 steps. Put camera on tripod, walk 5 steps, Compose, walk 5 steps. Take picture, walk 5 steps. Rinse and repeat! At least I managed this panorama with this routine!

I recommend usually staying still for shooting panoramas, but not always possible with baby on back.

Mummy gets much more adventurous without having to worry about Charlotte. Here she is showing the very Chinese combination of squatting + [insert activity here] ; in this case, photography. She also got quite adventurous in finding some locals in search of crayfish and abalone at Beachport.

The squat & wait game!

There are conditions which bar Charlotte coming along. Getting to these locations required scrambling down sharp rocks and any slip could have resulted in injury. My own injury I can deal with – but no point taking unnecessary risks with the baby!

Climbing down those rocks was not a 'baby friendly' activity

Unfortunately landscape shooting will be coming to a halt for the month of March while we photograph weddings on 3 consecutive weekends. We will however be taking Charlotte on a three week journey through New Zealand in Late April. A trip we are very much looking forward to Until next time!

-D