What kind of gear do you use? What if something breaks?
For you tech-concerned folk out there, I’m happy to discuss the kind of gear I use and what measures I take to be prepared for any situation. If none of this means anything to you don’t worry about it! Just rest assured I am well equipped to create high quality, artistic images even in challenging conditions and I take every precaution to keep up with the day and ensure the well being of your precious photos even when the unexpected strikes. Here are some basic points of interest:
My main camera body is a Canon R5, a top of the line mirrorless camera with a resolution of 45MP, which is particularly rewarding for wide shots where you want lots of detail and helps keep images high quality when cropping. Its focus capabilities are also top notch, even with moving subjects. As such I use my Canon F/2 24-70mm lens on this body, and its the one I generally reach for. This camera is equipped with double memory card slots, so even if one memory card corrupts (it happens to the best of us), there’s automatically a backup copy of every image file straight from the camera.
My secondary camera body is a Canon 5D Mark IV, which is considered the work-horse of Canon’s DSLR line. It has a high resolution of 30MP, and I’ve found has particularly lovely capture of color. This body pairs extremely well with my Sigma F/2 70-200mm lens, focusing on close ups and shots at a distance. When called upon it still takes wonderful shots at a wider view as well. This body also records to dual memory cards.
As a backup, just in case fate has a cruel sense of humor towards my equipment, I bring along a Canon 6D Mark II camera body. After having served as my main camera for the first year of my wedding photography career, this one might not be my first choice anymore, but it still creates images that just sing, and does more than well enough should a technical difficulty call it into the game.
Like camera bodies, lenses are fragile things and can sometimes break too. (Though mine have managed to survive some heart stopping events, including a groom’s shoe chucked right at it and a harness snapping during the Horah). Whether it’s an interior mechanism that putters out, or rogue footwear, I always have atleast two additional lenses on hand. These might require adjustment to my positioning strategies, but are no less capable of creating beautiful images.
When working in digital I shoot only in RAW format in the highest resolution available for each camera. The nature of RAW files is that all of the data collected by that camera is unrefined and uncompressed, as a camera produced JPEG file would be. Meaning the data is left entirely intact and without any adjustments already applied to it. This is great if you’re a photographer, have the necessary, specialized software like Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop that can read those files, and posses the know how to go in and make those adjustments yourself in order to get the best results out of those image files, particularly when it comes to lighting and color adjustments. These files, however, don’t always look like much right out of the camera; the colors appear dull, the lighting might look low contrast and dim, and especially if taken in low lighting scenarios, particularly noisy (sometimes it actually looks really bad). While it takes a lot of work, these files when processed professionally, will far outshine a JPEG image or a cell phone photo, even with edits applied to it.
What can I think about now that will help make my photos the best they can be?
Photography is the art of light, quite literally. I personally love working with natural light, but given the nature of weddings, with things scheduled a year or more in advance and the unpredictability of weather, an event spanning from morning till the dark of night, and often in spaces where the lighting leaves something to be desired, sometimes it’s necessary to supplement. So let’s talk about flash.
Sometimes it’s just a fun vibe and brings the party to life.
Detail 3
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