Wedding Photography Seminar with Stewart Randell

Today I attended a talk with Wedding Photographer Stewart Randell near Gatwick Airport in Surrey as one of The Societies seminars they hold.

I am a strong believer that as a photographer I am always learning new ideas and tips. I tend to go to these sorts of seminars and watch videos online to see how other photographers operate and to see if I can pick up any useful tips and information which I can put in to practice with my own photography and the way I run my business.

Stewert’s seminar gave me a greater understanding of wedding photography as a whole and it is definitely one I would I would recommend.

Part of the seminar was a practical element allowing us to put what we had been talking about into practice. I have attached some of the images from the day for you to see.

Shooting Portraits with Coloured Backgrounds

Recently I have got bored of shooting against White or Black and even Grey Backgrounds to some extent. It seems like everyone has done this so I thought that I would do something different in my next photo shoot by creating some bright coloured portraits.

I had a photo shoot yesterday with Angel Knight who came in to have some photographs taken for her portfolio. Before the shoot I had bought some coloured card Immense Yellow and a Bright Blue. I bought 3 A1 Sheets of it which I stuck together to form a long strip of each colour.

For the lighting I used a large softbox aimed slightly off from the middle of the background and Angel. Then to fill in any shadows I placed my large 7ft x 6ft Lastolite Hi-Lite running along the side so it was facing inwards towards the subject. The softbox was set at F11 and the Hi-Lite was set at F16.5. My camera was set at 125 Sec @ F11-F8.

The results were great as we used various different coloured outfits against the yellow and blue which looked great. I am now thinking about buying some different coloured card to do more shots like this. I didn’t have to do too much photoshopping although occasionally I did have to add bit of the background in as the card wasn’t always wide enough. I also had to edit out the joins where the sheets of card joined but this was done easily using the correct tools in photoshop.

I thought I would share some of the shots that we took with you so you can see how they look.

Photographing with Coloured Backgrounds

I have previously used coloured gel filters by attaching them to my lights before to create a different and fun look to my portraits. The problem I have found with coloured gels is that the colour isn’t a constant colour as it is weak in appearance. It also means playing around with settings on your lights and cameras to often slower shutter speeds so it can take in the colour. This isn’t very good if your photographing fast moving subjects as all you will end up with is camera blur.

I have been thinking about doing if for sometime but decided that I would pop down to my local art shop and buy some coloured card. I decided to buy what they call Extreme Yellow as I have a photo shoot tomorrow and just wanted to break away from the normal white and black backgrounds so I thought a nice bright colour would work great. The Art shop down the road only sells them A1 size so I decided to buy 3 sheets which I would then mask together horizontally so I can stand my subject in front of them.

I will need to experiment with the lighting to light it evenly otherwise the colour will not look consistant throughout and nasty shadows could occur.

Check out tomorrow to see how we got on with a live subject in front of the yellow.

Charlotte & Matthew’s Wedding Photos Online !!!

Just finished editing Charlotte & Matthew’s Wedding photographs taken at Mannings Heath Golf Course on the 11th Feb 2012.

If you were a guest at this wedding and would like to see the photographs taken please contact me directly at gdpics@me.com for the password needed to view this gallery.

http://www.gdpicsphotography.co.uk/gallery/110212-Charlotte-Matthew-Wilkinson/G0000y7F1E4rhKFY

 

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Tibby and Perfect Mask 5

Thought I would share a quick photo taken of Tibby during her maternity shoot. Using OnOnes Software Perfect Mask 5 again I was able to take out the background and transport her into her very own magical forest. I hope you all like this and what I have done with the original image to create something different.

Tibby @ 20 Weeks

Tibby who is currently 20 Weeks pregnant popped into the studio this morning for some maternity shots of her and her bump.

We wanted to use a range of different lighting and backgrounds to create different moods to the photographs. As Tibby is local to us she has agreed to pop in to see us a number of times before the baby is born to have photographs at different stages.

Make sure you check out our blog to see the bump getting bigger to even photographs of the baby when it is born later in the year.

Winter Wedding at Mannings Heath Golf Club

I had the pleasure of photographing Matthew & Charlotte Wilkinson’s Wedding at Mannings Heath Golf Club near Horsham in West Sussex.

It was a lovely small wedding, which made it easier for me to get all of the photographs I needed to get with everything being all together in the same location. The recent snow which had fallen during the last week helped turn the venue into a winter wonderland perfect for taking photographs.

OnOne Software Perfect Mask 5 with Fizz Reynolds

Yesterday I had one of the best shoots I’ve had in sometime photographing Fizz Reynolds.

I recently got a copy of OnOne Software Complete Collection and thought that this should would be perfect for playing around with their Perfect Mask 5 Software that comes with it.

Here are a few more I created using Perfect Mask 5 from OnOne.