Lightroom 3.0 Beta is now available for download. Go give it a try and see what you think? More thoughts coming later, but right now, it’s time to play. Let me just say the new import tool rocks! And check out that noise reduction, it’s like magic! Fancy stuff, good times ahead for all of us Lightroom users.

Go Get Lightroom 3.0

..mike

About 6 months ago I had the awesome opportunity to photograph several SWAT teams during training exercises. I had an all access pass to follow them as breached a building, saved the hostages, and got the bad guys. The opportunity to document such activities is something I’ll always remember. This afternoon I had to urge to take a photo that I really liked and reprocess it using a different technique. The original effect was a simple but harsh b&w conversion. I think I like this better. It’s definitely gritty and sharpened, but I feel that it adds something to the character. The atmosphere and situation these guys work in seems to demand such an effect. I’d like to hear your thoughts.

Well hello there again! I see you’ve decided to come back for more thoughts from a first time wedding photographer. This is the big post, in fact, it’s so big that I’m splitting it up into 2 parts. You’ve done your reconnaissance. You have your shot list. You have your group photo ordering optimized and ready to go. It’s less than 24 hours to the wedding. What should you be doing now?

• Clean all of your gear. Make sure your sensors are free of dust spots. Make sure there are no fingerprints or smudges on anything. Double and then triple check everything!
• Make sure the clocks on all of your camera bodies (remember you have more than one camera) are synchronized and set to the correct time. When post processing, if you have photos from the reception mixed up with getting ready photos, you’ll want to pull your hair out. Of course you can go shift the capture time using a tool like Lightroom, but why bother? Get it right the first time!
• Make sure all of your cameras have the same settings. Make sure white balance, metering mode, shooting mode, ISO, etc are all set to some sane default values. You don’t want to accidentally have one camera on spot metering and another on matrix.
• You’re going to need more memory cards than you think! With my 5D Mark II, CR2 RAW files are 20 – 25 MB. At the wedding I shot, I took 3965 photos. That equates to almost 97 GB of images. Do you have enough storage? Get more! Flash cards are cheap enough running out of space shouldn’t be a concern.
• Format all of your flash memory cards using your camera. Don’t format the cards on a computer, as the camera puts special files on cards when it formats them.
• Make it a rule that you will NEVER format a card on the wedding day. The risk of accidentally losing images is too high.
• You’re going to have a bunch of flash cards all freshly formatted and ready to go. This poses one subtle problem on the wedding day, how do you know what cards are used and what cards are clean? I didn’t use a fancy wallet to keep track of this, I used a idiot proof system. I put a piece of paper around each CF card before putting it into its’ little plastic case. When I pulled out a new card, I put the strip of paper in my pocket. Any plastic case containing a CF card without paper was used, and any CF card with paper wrapped around it, was clean. Easy, right?
• Get extra batteries for your cameras. BorrowLenses.com rents batteries for all major camera brands. Pickup an extra battery or three.
• Give all of your batteries a full & fresh charge the night before the wedding.
• You’ll want extra batteries for your flashes too! Costco sells a 48 pack of AA batteries for like 12 bucks. What have you got to loose? Your flashes and your TV remote control will thank you.
• If you don’t own a battery grip, head on over to BorrowLenses.com and rent one. I couldn’t imagine shooting a wedding without a battery grip. Does it make the camera heavier? Yes, but having the extra shutter button, and being able to take vertical shots without straining your wrist is a small price to pay. As an added bonus, if your camera batteries die, you can put AA batteries into the grip as a last resort!
• You need to make sure you have backups for all your important gear. For most of the reception I had a 24-105mm f/4L on my 5D Mark II and a 17-55mm f/2.8 on my 40D. If one camera died, I wouldn’t loose coverage of a critical focal length.
• I used 4 main lenses on the wedding day: 24-105mm f/4L, 17-55mm f/2.8, 70-200mm f/4L IS, and a 85mm f/1.2L.  I wish I had a 50mm f/1.2L or a 24mm f/1.4L for my 5D Mark II too.

Well that’s it for this post.  The second half of this should hopefully come next week.  Thanks for reading.  I hope you find this useful!

For the past two weeks I’ve been wanting to take a new photo of myself that I could use on my Facebook and Twitter profiles.  Unfortunately I’ve been starved for ideas and I haven’t gotten around to it yet.  Tonight, for inspirational purposes, I started looking through my Lightroom catalog.  While doing so I had the idea of making a simple collage containing photos I found interesting.  I used Lightroom’s Print Module to save the spread as a JPEG and I’m sharing it with you here.  All of these photos are from 2009.  Let’s call this a Year to Date Collage.  Why don’t you make one, and share it with everyone as well?  It’s a quick and easy exercise to see what you’ve accomplished in the past 8 months!  I look forward to seeing your’s!

N.B. The next update to my wedding photography observations is not abandoned, I’m just pushing it back until Tuesday morning.  Stay tuned!

So this summer was phenomenal.  In the span of less than two months we had Zack Arias, renowned Atlanta based music photographer, and Joe McNally, who needs no introduction, come by Google and teach us.  Why?  I dunno. These two photographers took time out of their extremely busy schedules to come and talk to a group of engineers about lighting and photography.  I’m humbled and thankful that they’d want to come by our offices and share knowledge they’ve spent a lifetime learning.

I’ve thanked them both numerous times, and yet, it never seems to convey the true gratitude I have for their willingness to share their time and insights with us.  Then it hit me, “We can sit around and attend all the talks we want, but unless we put what was shared with us to practice, we didn’t learn anything!”  I’ve kept in touch with the models who worked with us at both workshops and  I’ve started organizing weekly photo shoots in the area surrounding our offices.  A group of us wanders around and tries to put what we learned into practice.  (One thing we’ve learned is that it’s much harder when Zack or Joe isn’t standing 15 feet away ready to offer advice, but skin or swim, right?)

Today we had our second photo shoot/walk.  Brittany, who volunteered her time as a model for Joe’s workshop, came over and we started wandering around Shoreline Park in Mountain View.  There were 6 of us, and we took turns assisting each other, offering advice and opinions.  Did we come up with award winning photos? Probably not, but for a bunch of newbies running around a park at sunset, we didn’t do too bad.

Some in our group had never used off camera flash before, so I gave a very quick spiel about aperture controlling flash exposure, shutter speed controlling ambient light, and ISO just shifting everything in some direction.  I could hear myself repeating what I heard Zack and Joe say.  I’m not 1/1000th the photographer either of those two men are, but when I started explaining the absolute basics, it felt good.  Perhaps that’s what it’s all about, not hording experiences, but sharing them with others.

So that brings us to tonight.  All three photos of Brittany were taken with an Apollo 28″ softbox.  I had two speedlites inside the Apollo, as even on full power one just wasn’t able to put out enough light.  It was quite bright outside and I was stopping down my lens to try and darken the overall scene.  You can see a complete set of my photos from tonight over on my Flickr page.  Let me know what you think, I love getting constructive comments!

Hopefully I’ll be able to keep this going.  Looking at the shots I got last week and comparing them with those from this week, there is a noticeable improvement. Perhaps one day, this will all start to make sense, but until then, I’m learning and doing.

Okay, back again with some more wedding photography observations.  Last time we covered things I did (or wish I did) 2-3 months before the wedding.  Now that some time has passed, the big day is fast approaching.  What was I thinking 2-3 weeks before the wedding?  Well, wait no more!  Here are some more thoughts from a first time wedding photographer.

• I went online and found a bunch of shot lists and compiled them into 1 giant list.  I asked the couple to go through it and rate each shot with a check plus meaning “I must get this shot”, a check meaning “it’d be nice if I got this shot”, or check minus meaning “I shouldn’t waste my time.”  Make sure you have VIP people on the list by name/role.  Great grandparents? BFFs? Second cousins twice removed?
• Get a chart of what the reception area will look like.  Where will tables be? Dance floor? Bars? DJ?  Knowing all this will help you figure out where you need to be for different events.  If you are setting up any off camera lighting, you can use the chart to help figure out where you’ll be putting light stands.
• I also asked the couple to give me a list of all posed and group shots they wanted me to get.  Then I suggested things they might not have thought of.  ”Do you want a photo of the groomsmen lined up in a special way?”  ”Are there any creative/fun photos you’d like such as the bridesmaids wooing the groom?”
• Get a schedule of events with approximate times.  Most people underestimate how long group shots will take.  It’s true the wedding is not about the photographer, but if they want 37 group shots, well, you’re going to need more than 20 minutes. Be forceful here.  Either trim that list or set aside more time.  The wedding I just shot had about 30 requested group shots, with only 30 minutes allotted for them.  That’s only 60 seconds to get everyone together, posed, and shot.  You need more than 60 seconds for this if you want to keep your sanity.
• One short tip that is a good follow up to the previous one, “Do everything you can to keep your sanity.”
• If the bride and groom aren’t organized, don’t go along with it quietly.  Without a sense of timing, you will miss something.  If you have to sit down with them in person and come up with a schedule, do it.  The only thing you’re going to be judged on is whether or not you get the pictures they wanted.  ”You didn’t give me a schedule,” is not a valid excuse.
• Optimize the order in which you take your group shots.  Basically no one wants to stand in front of a camera when other people are enjoying appetizers and an open bar.  To try and keep as many people happy as possible, organize your group shot list so people don’t stand around any longer than they have to.  For example, get a photo of the bride and her mother .  Then the bride with her mother and father.  Then toss in the groom. Then toss in the groom’s parents. Then pull out the bride’s parents.  At this point her parents may be dismissed to go enjoy themselves.  (Assuming no more shots with them are required).  See what happens here?  Between any two shots, we only put one person/group in and/or pull one person/group out.  The idea is that as soon as we are done with someone, they’re free to go.  Organizing your group shots like this lets your assistant (or volunteer helper) get everyone needed for the next shot up on deck and ready to go.  Does it take some time to organize your shot list in this manner? Yes.  Is it worth doing? Absolutely, 150% yes! (Doing this saved my butt, seriously, it’s worth every second you spend in preparation.)
• This is obvious, but make sure you know every how to use every control on your camera without hesitation.  Changing ISO, adding an EV, switching your shutter speed should all be second nature and instinctive.  Make sure you know how your speedlights work.  Make sure you know how to use your flash auto focus assist option without firing the flash itself.

So that sums up my list of things I suggest doing 2-3 weeks before the wedding.  Next week we’ll start with things to do a few days before the wedding.

Now that I’m home I’m dumping photos off of my CF cards. I saw this composition, and I started processing it. I wish the sunset brought more color, but the dark blue sky works here for me.

I saw some photos of a rock formation on the northeast part of Lake Tahoe called “Bonsai Rock“. This is a pretty cool area.  In the right light I think it would be amazing.  I was there today, and the light would just not cooperate. :(  But that’s besides the point.  Finding it is a real pain in the butt.  There are some general directions online, i.e. “south of Sand Harbor, near a hill, off of a turnout.”  Well great, Magellan, that’s not all that helpful.  Also, Panoramio and Flickr have some photos of Bonsai Rock, but none with accurate GPS info.  So today, almost by sheer luck, as the best info I had would have put me almost a mile off track, I found Bonsai Rock by stopping at the right turnout by accident.  I pulled out my iPhone, launched the absolutely amazing MotionX-GPS app (which if you do any outdoor stuff you should own) and grabbed the actual GPS coordinates of the turnout, the trail head, and Bonsai Rock itself.  (The coordinates are approximate as there was a 200 foot accuracy issue with my satellite reception.  Never fear though, because the coordinates for Bonsai Rock itself are spot on.)

• Turnout where you want to park if you’re going to Bonsai Rock:  39.183690° N , 119.927088° W  (this may be about 250 feet off target)
• Trail head 39.184747° N , 119.927268° W (fairly accurate)
• Bonsai Rock itself 39.184844° N, 119.927727° W (spot on — if you are here you are staring at the rock)

So some notes for you.  The trail head isn’t so much a trail head, as it is a gap in the bushes.  You can see Bonsai Rock from this location if you look between the bushes & trees.  The trail is all sand covered rock and it’s unmarked.  The sand is very loose and it’s very steep.  If you’re going, pack light, wear good shoes with a lot of traction, and I’d highly advise a walking stick to provide support.  Of course teenagers were running up and down carrying beer during the day, but I’m not going to risk a fall with a few thousand dollars of equipment attached to torso.  Going down is much more difficult in terms of maintaing your balance than going back up.  However going back up is quite a workout.

To make sure everyone who wants to find this place can, I’ve made a custom Google Map that will show you where to park, where the trail begins, and where the rock itself is located.  Bonsai Rock Mapped!

N.B. Some people probably like to keep photo spots secret.  Well, sorry.  It’s what you do with a camera that makes you a great photographer, not what secret places you know about.  Share what you know, and people may share with you.  Keeping things secret does everyone a disservice.

UPDATE: Photo uploaded!

A few weeks ago I put together a small but very useful python library to interact with ZenFolio. I don’t normally open source code I write, not because I don’t want to, but because I’m usually lazy, haha. However in this case, I didn’t see anything out there that did what I needed, so I figured someone might find this useful. The code is available at Google Project Hosting (http://code.google.com/p/lib-pyzenfolio/) under an MIT License. Let me know if you find this useful!

Having shot my first wedding a few weeks ago, I’m basically finished with all the post processing. I still have to assemble an album, but the client saw the photos, the images were retouched, and all the actual photography is complete.

So then, considering I’ve only shot 1 wedding, what kind of observations could I possibly have to make? Well, I’ll tell you what, I read every book on wedding photography I could find. I’ve read all of David Ziser’s blog posts on wedding photography, and despite all that, I encountered numerous unexpected challenges. So, to try and share some of my experiences, I’ve decided to do a series of blog posts on observations I’ve made.  Even if you’ve only shot one wedding, all of these suggestions probably seem like common sense.  (I still hope you’ll find something useful here though!)  But if you’re about to shoot your first wedding, this is the type of info I wish I had available to me about 2-3 months prior to the big day.  I’m not going to focus on business and marketing, this is a list of survival tips.  I’ll let the pros tell you how to run a business.  I’m just going to share what I think will make your life a little easier.

To start this off, let’s start in the beginning.  You’ve been approached by a couple who would like you to be their wedding photographer.  You’ve told them you don’t want the responsibility, you’ve told them you may seriously injure people, you’ve told them you’ve suddenly come down with the plague, and despite all this, they still insist you photograph their wedding.  So, what do you do?  Sit down with them a few months before the wedding and talk.  My first post contains a list of things you need to square away up front.  Remember, I’m not dealing with any business stuff!

• You just aren’t taking photos for the couple, you’re working with them.  The bride’s father called me “the second bride” based on how much I was running around and trying to do.  It’s true, you’re going to work your butt off.  Make sure you’re comfortable with the couple and vice versa.  If they view you as just another vendor, you’re not going to get relaxed personable expressions from them.
• Offer to shoot engagement portraits for the couple.  This is a great way for them to feel comfortable with you taking their photos.  It also gives you an idea of how they’ll react to being photographed on the big day.  Engagement photos are nice because it’s low pressure, relaxed, and fun.
• What style are they looking for?  Do they want traditional photos?  Do they want photo journalist style photos? Do they want a mixture of both? Have you shot like that before?  Expectations should be set to a reasonable level.  Show them samples of your work, not just your best stuff either.  If you only show them your top photos, they might be expecting everything to look like that.
• Give them homework!  Tell them to look online at other people’s wedding photos online or in person.  Ask them to find examples of stuff they like, and stuff they don’t like.  Have them send you these samples if possible.
• So apart from shooting style, does the couple have any feelings as to the ‘look’ of the photos they’d like you to get?  Do they want light and airy feeling photos?  Sharp and realistic?  Soft and dreamy?  Should portraits and staged photos be dramatic?  High contrast?  Low contrast?
• You are interviewing the bride and groom as much as they are interviewing you.  If you don’t click, don’t take the job.  You’re making pictures that capture memories, not selling socks!
• Where will the wedding ceremony take place?  What time of day is it scheduled for?  Can you scout it out in advance?  If so, go do so!  Where is the reception being held?  Is it indoors or outdoors? What time of day?  Can you scout out that location in advance as well?  What’s the name of someone at the reception facility who you can talk to should you need access prior to the wedding day?

My next post will contain things you should probably do 2-3 weeks before the wedding.  It’s looking like it will be a long one, so I might split it up into two parts.  Stay tuned! Please share this with your friends if you find it useful!

..mike