I was about 5 feet away from the subjects, and not a lot of room. I was shooting with the Canon Mark 2 and the lens was the 70-200 f 2.8. My lighting was the two Spiderlite TD5s and Spiderlite TD 3 which is a portable lighting unit. I had one light as a Main set at f 5.6, and another as a fill set at f4.0 and very close to the subjects as you can see in Image no 2.
As you can see the lighting is simple, I am using two Spiderlites from Westcott. I am keeping the lights on the same side, so that I am layering light. I want my fill just to open up my shadow side and not compromise the main light. The fill is one stop less than the main light. To get this reading, I have my meter in the available light reading, the icon on your meter looks like a sun. Place the meter under the chin and point it to the lens. It is so important that you read not only the highlight side, but you need to know what the shadow side is too. I also made sure I custom white balanced even though I wanted these images in black and white. If you get in a habit of doing this process, your images will always be ready to upload to the lab every time.
Image No. 2
By metering under the chin and to the lens it gave me my exposure of f 5.6 to 1/30 and my ISO is 800. I custom white balanced and I was ready to go.
Keeping the model close to the wall minimized the shadow. The pose was simple, but be sure to open up the shoulders and slightly lean her back, now have the subject turn her head to the main light.
The Art of Romance
Not only did I prove we don’t need a studio, in fact we don’t even need electricity, all we need is a bride and groom and a couple of Spiderlites and good metering. I’m using the TD3’s because they have a rechargeable battery that makes them portable and reliable.
I spent many years learning from the best, like Monte Zucker, Don Blair and Joseph and Louise Simone. We need to know our craft inside and out. These are some of my standard money shots that I would do regardless of where I may be.
The Pose
First bring his hand around and softly place her head on his hand, you want to see the ring. Next, placement and making sure the fingers are nicely spread out on his hand. I only want to use some of his face in the image, I purposely cut into the head so that she is my focal point. I always try to make more out of one image so I told her to close her eyes. I call it a two-for-one pose.
Here is the set up for Image no 8
Notice the wall is only about 4 feet across. I couldn’t even move the fan next to the model’s head. The beauty lens is the Canon 70-200 f2.8. I can crop in the camera exactly where I want the first time. Here are some of the images taken.
We are story tellers; don’t just shoot one image and move on to another pose. Create a complete album page, think ahead and plan ahead. If you don’t have it you won’t sell it.
Image No. 1