So I’ve been waiting 6 years to shoot this wedding!

Ever since I met Lisa at Gerri & John’s Savannah Wedding in 2006, I’ve been looking forward to the day she tied the knot. Lisa used to work in Atlanta for Bold American Catering, which is how we met, and has since moved up to New York. We’ve kept in touch over the years, and last time I was in New York to shoot a wedding, we met for drinks to catch up and maybe even plan a little as we waited for Craig to pop the question. I was super excited when she called to tell me about the [actual] wedding plans in the Hampton’s, New York where they own a home.

Enter Craig.

Tying a bow isn’t his strongest talent. Lest you think I’m throwing him under the bus already, I have to say that Lisa could not have picked a greater guy! He’s truly one of the most gracious and generous guys we’ve ever met (and by “we”, I mean me and Huy Cat, my trusty second shooter who flew up to the Hampton’s with me to cover the wedding).

Okay, back to pretty and blingy wedding-y things…

Craig clearly has a little soft spot for Lisa in his heart.

Now is probably a good time to point out the weather.

We arrived before the Friday afternoon rehearsal to absolutely stunning weather. The breeze, the sun, the temperature… everything was picture perfect. Fast forward to Saturday morning, and while everything was still beautiful, mother nature was threatening to toss a few curve balls our way. We flirted with rain off and on all day long but the wind was just tremendous. It presented a few challenges, but as you can see below, everything went off as planned and the sun made an appearance right as Lisa walked down the isle. Just amazing!

And in case, you’re wondering about the order of images below, Lisa & Craig had their first look followed by photos around the Hampton’s before the ceremony.

I think I’ll let the images do the rest of the talking! (mostly)

I want a big huge canvas of this one!

This was taken about 30 seconds after the image above, but how this one looks is actually pretty close to how dark it was at the time. I could have lit it up and made it look all colorful, but I love the feel of this image. It takes me back there so much I can feel the wind if I close my eyes.

Congratulations Lisa & Craig!

Class. Class. Class. Those are the three words I think of when I think of Sarah and Alan.

But before we get started, I have to mention again how much I love coordinators. Their super fabulous coordinator, Amy DiLoreti with A Flawless Event, did a fantastic job keeping everything running and smooth. I’m always amazed at how much smoother everything runs with a great coordinator on board. Get one.

So let’s take a stroll through some of my favorites images of their wedding day…

The image on the left… I’ve walked that hallway at the Atlanta History Center many times. When I took this image I was seeing a black and white photo in my head. I was seeing a backlit wash of overpowering light streaming in and enveloping Sarah. But when I got back to my workstation, this is what came out. Do you like the colors, the kids cubby holes, the light?

It’s always a struggle to capture new and beautiful imagery in a setting you’ve been in many times before. I love these images…

Darryl Wiseman Flowers did a fantastic job with her bouquet (above) and reception decor! The decor was elegant and stunning like Sarah.

Sarah’s dad busted out the MOVES as the reception heated up. And, I mean, BUST-ED!

Kim, the sister of the bride taking in the moves…

Congratulations Sarah & Alan!

There are some couples whose smiles are so infectious not only does it lift the spirits of everyone they’re around but it makes for fabulous images! Katie and Bob were that couple. I had the super fabulous Shawna Herring shooting at my side and we had a great time documenting their wedding day at the Cathedral of Christ the King and the Country Club of Roswell.

Take a look at some of my favorite images from their day…

Bob is barely holding it together…

This is one of my favorites images of the day. I love the dark, mysterious, yet romantic feel of it.

Okay so today’s installment for photographers is all about seeing the shot in your head and knowing your gear.

Often when I’m at weddings I like to show the bride or groom or guest an image or two off the back of my camera. Sometimes I’m so excited I just have to show someone. [ASIDE: I'm not the gushing emotional type, so what is uber excitement to me, might come off strikingly similar to a simple smile to you.] At other times I do it to boost the confidence of the person I’m shooting. I want them to see how great they look in the hands of someone that knows how to make them look their best. IOW, I want to build trust.

That said, I show images off my camera against my better judgement. The reason is actually pretty simple: I feel like it fosters the idea that we photographers take all these photos at your wedding and then we go home, download the images from the cards, then upload them to facebook or twitter or whatever proofing system we use. I mean, it can’t be THAT hard to press the upload button, can it?

See It In Your Head
If you’ve read my previous posts about how I process images behind the scenes, you know that couldn’t possibly be farther from the truth. A lot of the time when I’m shooting and deciding how I want to frame a photo or what exposure I want, I’m not thinking about what the image will look like when I click the shutter. No, I’m thinking about what type of photo is going to make it the easiest for me to get to the image I see in my head once I take the image home, process it in Lightroom (and maybe Photoshop) and output it. In other words, I see the final result in my head and work backwards.

If you saw one of my previous posts, you saw the image of Nikki standing in front of a large set of french doors…

So here we have Nikki standing in front of those same doors. But here’s the problem: the blazing sun outside is AT LEAST 5 or 6 stops brighter than she is standing inside this comparatively dark room. I knew I didn’t want to create a “properly” exposed image. If I wanted to do that, I would have set the camera so the outside looks correct and then light Nikki up with a death ray flash pop that would probably send my flash in for service when I got done.

Not very compelling is it? No, I wanted to create Nikki engulfed in that light.

Know Your Gear
One way to do that is simply to overexpose the image so much that Nikki begins to look “normal” while the rest of the image blows out to pure white. One problem with that approach is that once the detail is gone, it’s gone. In this case, I’m dealing with a white dress and a fairly dark-skinned bride so that approach makes it nearly impossible to preserve the dress detail and brighten Nikki enough at the same time. The other problem with that approach is simply dealing with lens flare issues and the loss of contrast that come with it.

So I decided to split the difference. IOW, I didn’t care about the details in the trees outside, but I DID care about her dress and I know the Nikon D3 well enough to know that it preserves an amazing amount of detail in the shadows. More importantly, I know how to get all those details back using Adobe Lightroom. So this is what is going through my head when I’m telling a bride to “turn around and face me but try to twist at the hips.” And here’s the image I was seeing in my head, the same image as above but processed in Lightroom…

Everything you see above is straight Lightroom. Zero Photoshop. In addition to pushing and pulling the exposure of the image, I rotated it ever so slightly so the railing is level and I added two masks: one to increase the contrast in her face that was lost to flare and another to add color saturation to her flowers. Oh, and I toned the image slightly in the split toning panel.

Bottom Line
Know your gear! Every system (be it a camera/lens, strobes, printers, whatever) has strengths and weaknesses. I know what the Nikon D3 can give me and I know where it fails. Once you get there, you can take artistic advantage of it’s strengths and in some cases, even the weaknesses. Go out and shoot!

For the technical among you, here are all the relevant adjustments in Lightroom:

One thing that’s nice about this blog, my portfolio and the world of communications we live in, is that when I meet a couple for their engagement session or their wedding day they have a pretty high level of confidence that I’m going to make them look their best. They’ve seen the imagery we create wedding after wedding and session after session here on the blog. But what DOES always surprise me is when a couple has the same confidence in themselves. Most people aren’t used to having photos taken of themselves and have enough stress built up that they have to climb that wall and get over that mental hurdle at least enough to relax and enjoy the time they have with the love of their life.

Not so with Shelly and Sam! They were relaxed and confident the moment we arrived at Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park last month. The main lawn of the park was closed for an event that day but we had a great time and there are plenty of places all around the park and next door at the World of Coke.

I can’t wait for their wedding next July with Lindsay Pitt from Toast Signature Celebrations coordinating everything.

Don’t they look like they’re having so much fun just hanging out together?!!