Registration of Marriage

I was looking around the web to find a music piece for the ROM shots.
I was in a mood for Jazz music, so I have chosen this piece from Fausto Papetti - Emmanuelle

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Freeze the moment (motion)

After the Justice of Peace announced to the couple: 'I now pronounce you husband and wife', the couple faced each other and kissed!

I was expecting the kiss and was actually standing by my finger on the shutter button, ready to snap the moment of love. But... It happened too fast! Before I knew it, it was over!

Checking back on the photo, I did manage to capture the kissing part, but with all the motion blur around the couple, they were kissing way too fast!


My flash suppose to help freeze the motion in case things happened too fast. But since the room was not dark , and they were faster than what I would have expected, the motion blur showed up pretty clearly in the photo. Hmm... If the room was really dark, I think the motion blur would not be so obvious.

Showing my unsatisfactory, I requested them to kiss again. Unfortunately, they were too shy and I was only given the below chance: Kiss on the cheek. Sigh...


Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Kampung (Village) feel

The couple walked too fast! They kept leaving me behind... Shooting behind the back seldom get good photos...

We walked into this hut and it gave me some old 'kampung' feel. Hmm... with the couple holding hands and walking happily, I took a shot and kept it for post processing later on.

Looking at the photo, since it gave me some old 'kampung' feel initially, I decided to give it a vintage look. I adjusted the colors and gave a little pinkish look to it. And of course, I added in the effect that I always like - vignetting.


Wish the couple hold on to each other till old age, happily!

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Turn around and smile

I was walking behind the couple and we passed this walkway. There was a rack (squarish wooden rack/windows or whatever it is called) and it seemed nice. I quickly asked the couple to turn around and took a shot.


The light was coming from behind the couple and when they turned around, it gave shadows to the faces. But it was not too dark, so I did not need a flash to fill their faces. The couple was brightened up just enough to be captured in the photo.

I like this photo a lot (the rack and the colors)! I seldom took photos with lotsa greenery in the background. The green always turned out to be dark... This photo, somehow I managed to get the nice color out of the leaves! It just feels peace to the eyes! =D

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Try again, without flash

After the under-exposed shot covered in the previous post 'Fill flash', I stubbornly wanted to try to take a shot without flash on. Yah, stubborn (or trying my luck)... haha...

I got the couple stood on both sides of the cannon. I then tried to move around to check which angle the light was coming from. I positioned myself to make sure there was enough light on the faces.

Alright, found the right location, right pose, and right smile. Say 'Cheese'... Snap!


Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Fill flash

I was invited to take Registration of Marriage (ROM) photos for my childhood friends. We know each other since primary school. And yah, after many many years, they finally got together! Hehehe...

That was my first outdoor shooting. I think it should be considered as outdoor since we spent most of the morning walking around Fort Canning park to take photos before the appointment.

As usual, the sky was full of clouds (this is Singapore), but there was enough lighting to take photos. Or so I think...


First shot with the cannon, it appeared to be under-exposed! I could hardly see the faces! Hmm... the available light coming from behind the couple was too strong (where was the sun???)!

No choice, I've got to fix up my flash and took another shot. The flash used here was for the purpose as fill light. With the flash, the couple got lightened up on the faces. Hey bride, look here...


Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/ROMShots18Dec2009

Turn the flash off

Recently I went to shoot 2 wedding dinners and I repeated a mistake twice!! ARghh!! During march in, a lot of time there will be spot light (not all the ball room have this though) pointing towards the couple. I did not pay much attention to the spot light and continue shooting the couples with flash on. As a result, I got the faces over-exposed! And those photos were totally beyond repair~

Hmm... I don't have the habit to check every shots I took on the camera LCD and ended up, i did not correct my mistake on the spot.


Looking back to the wedding dinner photos I took last year, I am writing this post to remind myself, to turn off the flash when there is spot light shinning at the couple. The photo above was shot without flash (luckily I did not have an external flash that time...)

I do not want to repeat the mistake again... Next time, I must turn off the flash, and maybe try stopping down the EV and see if it gave a proper exposed photo.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots21Feb2009

Built in flash

I am always reluctant to use the built in flash on the camera. The reason I hate using that flash is because it always gives a very harsh image. The objects just got lightened up unevenly. And one thing I cannot understand, since the camera manufacturers are making DSLR to have pop up flash, why can't they just make it pointing upward, instead of pointing directly to the objects...

Anyway, this photo was taken with the built in flash. Wedding dinner will always have low lighting and I have no choice to use the flash. At that time, I did not have an external flash and I was using kit lens to shoot. I boosted the ISO to 1600, f stop to 3.5 (biggest aperture that kit lens is capable of), and managed to get 1/50 sec shutter speed. To make the photo less harsh (or so I think), I stepped backward and tried to keep as far away as I could from the objects.


The harsh effect on this photo was not that bad (I guess keeping a certain distance from the object does help). I have to use 18mm focal length to achieve f3.5 (kit lens). Therefore, the photo I took actually covered much bigger space than this photo. I cropped the photo to remove the unwanted space.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots21Feb2009

Hug

Coming to the end of the morning session, the couple was hugging each other tightly while I was preparing to keep my camera. One of the sisters 'scolded' me, 'This is the best moment and why are you keeping your camera!'. Actually I already taken the shot, haha... Hmm, no harm taking again upon request from pretty girl, haha...

I carried on the shooting, and the sister standing next to me was whispering and mimicking what the couple said to each other while hugging, 'I love you, I will take care of you...' and stuff like that.

'Wah! How do you know what they were saying to each other?' I could not even hear what they said. I was stunt with the lovely words from the sister, and just speechless, haha... She sure has lots of just married friends I suppose, hmm...

I gave a vintage look to the photo. Does it have that feeling like couple grows old together, and looking back to their lovely moment on wedding day?

'One Love One Life! One Life One Love!'

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots10July2010

Love Shape Hand Gesture

Time for a group photo with all the 'sisters'. After some standard group photos shooting, I told them it's time for a funny shot. Someone suggested to do a love shape hand gesture and there you go, everyone made a love shape with big smile on the face! Lovely!


Looking at this photo again, it was interesting to note that everyone made the same gesture (with index fingers on top, and thums at the bottom), except the guy. Hmm... I wonder if all these girls think alike when it comes to love~

Well I am not into studying behaviour or reading gesture... I just know that the guy is a LUCKY B*ST*RD, who get to take photos with a bunch of pretty girls, haha!!

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots10July2010

Light from the window

It was a fine day with a lot of sunlight shining through the windows. The groom was removing the veil while the bride was sitting anxiously on the bed (posing for camera), haha...

The light from the right of the couples projected shadow on the wall. The directional light worked pretty well on the couple and brought out the figure of the face. The shadow was not too obvious, probably due to the fact that I had my on-camera flash turned on as well. To make the shadow to be seen clearer, I decided to convert the photo into black and white.

Hopefully, the black and white contrast, as well as the gradient (color trasition from black to gray to white and vice versa) could give a better feel of the photo.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots10July2010

Isolation

When the groom reached the bride's house, I could not remember what the 'sisters' said to the 'brothers', ended up everyone of them stepped backward, isolating the groom.

"Bro, you are on your own man!"

I thought it would be a nice composition just to focus on the groom, so I fired up my flash and push the shutter.


Aperture: f/4.5
Shutter: 1/50 sec
ISO: 1600
Focal length: 18mm

I checked on the photo later on and realized that I did not manage to capture what I visualized... First, the aperture I selected was not wide enough (should have used f2.8). This may help to create a stand out groom since f2.8 will help to blur everything behind the groom.

Second, I noticed that the groom are little bit too 'bright', especially the white coat that he was wearing reflected the flash. I figured that the focal length I used was 18mm, which meant I was standing too near to the groom. I should have stepped back further and use perhaps 30mm or 50mm to take the shot.

Hmm... Wonder how it would turn out with f2.8 and 50mm setting...

I still like the way the groom was being isolated. So I tried using photoshop to blur out the background (change the colors, filter it, blur it etc), just to make the groom stands out.


Well, it is just one of the many ways to isolate the object.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots10July2010

I take care (of) you, you take care (of) me

'I take care you, you take care me'... That was what the groom said through the gap of the bride's room door, before entering the room to meet the girl of his life.

I was up early to shoot the morning session of the wedding. To my surprise, I saw Edmund Tham, the famous photographer in the house too!

I had this feeling that I was 'showing a fish how to swim'. With all the high end, expensive equipment he and his team brought along, shooting in front of an expert was a lot of stress! Hmm well, I just had to carry on the task and shoot the normal way I shoot, haha... Luckily his assignment of the day was videography, so there was not a crash between amateur and expert, phew...

I have selected some shots and put into slide show for this couple. After going through my music database, I decided to use this 'Wedding Bell' by Depapepe as the background music. Hope the couple likes it.

By the way, the video taken by the expert was shown during the dinner, really impressive! I have a long way to learn...

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots10July2010

Mutual toasting

One of the highlight during a chinese wedding ceremony in Malaysia/Singapore is the mutual toasting (or more known as cross-arm drinking) by bridegroom and bride. This usually follows by toasting together with all the guests.

I guess a good position to shoot this toasting part of the couple is standing right in front of the stage. If I shoot from either left or right of the stage, I can only get the back view of one of them. And the other one, the face would be blocked by the toasting glass.

I was thinking if I could stand on the stage during the mutual toasting, I would try holding my camera high up and shooting from top down. I wonder how the photo would turn out to be...

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots7Dec2008

White Balance

In a wedding, most of the time the lighting of hotel ballrooms, restaurants are very warm in colour. It makes the photos very yellowish. The yellowish effect sometimes gives a very nice effect on the photos, but sadly to say, not all the time. The following 2 shots were taken in a restaurant.




The lighting there was totally warm. I was a 'strong believer' in taking photos without flash (I did not have an external flash). I thought the photos would be nicer without flash (Well, I admit that I did not know anything about flash at that moment). I refused to use the internal flash on camera because I really do not like the harsh effect on the objects.

I quite like the yellowish effect of these 2 photos. But I thought of giving it a try to adjust the colour of them. I used the 'Level Adjustment' tool in photoshop (Image -> Adjustments -> Levels) to play with the colours. I adjusted the Red/Green/Blue (RGB) channel separately (by selecting the colour in the Channel drop down menu).

In RGB mode, R channel is to adjust red and cyan; G channel is to adjust green and magneta; B channel is to adjust blue and yellow. So, to get a proper white balance image, I adjusted the blue channel of the images above to reduce the yellowish effect. I did some slight adjustments on the other channels too. Below are the end results after adjusting the colours.




Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots7Dec2008

Slide show

I wanted to make a slide show which was able to convey the romance, the happiness for this wedding. Of course, I want to do the same for other weddings as well!

Well, that was my first attempt, so I took my time to select the musics, the songs from the internet. I tried animation soundtracks, movie soundtracks, pop songs, wedding songs etc, and I finally settled down with these 3:
- Yuuki Cross, by Haketa Takefumi
- This Ring, by Tony Carter
- Si Bheag, Si Mhor (an Irish folk melody), by Carolan

Hope the couple likes my selection!

Post processing

The photo on the right is a photo that I should have turned on the flash when pressing down the shutter. I like this photo a lot but it was under exposed, noisy and it has lens flare.

So I decided to do some post processing on the photo.

First step was to remove the blue dots caused by the lens flare. I used the clone stamp tool in photoshop and cloned the area around the blue dots. The work done is rough and I shall improve on the skill.

After clearing all the flare effect around the black suit and groom's face, I thought it might show up better with a vintage feel. I followed Veerle's blog to get an idea on how to create vintage feel. You may google on how to create vintage feel in photoshop. You will get many tutorials from the web. Just select whichever that best suits your work.

I adjusted the brightness, contrast, colors, saturation, etc on the photo based on my preference. And the final touch was to add in the vignette effect. Yah, I did this step last...

Photo on the left is after post processing.

This 2nd march in, the couple walked very fast...

Lovely and cheerful couple!

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots30Oct2009

Waiting for make-up session

Personally, I like a photo with the person at the extreme right or left of the photo.

In this photo, there was no place for me to stand on the bride's left. And in front of her, she was only like 2 feet away from the window (no space to stand too!). I left with only one choice - to take her right face.

So I positioned her on the right of the frame, trying to bring out the mood of 'a young lady waiting patiently to get married'.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots30Oct2009

Group photo with bride

ISO: 800
Shutter: 1/30 sec
Aperture: 3.5
Focal Length: 20mm
Flash: 480EXII

This is one of the group photos that I like. The people behind the bride seem blur due to my wrong setting on the aperture. I should have set to higher f stop value (maybe f/5.6) in order to get a clearer image for the whole group.

I like the way they stood. It was like in a beauty pageant contest. And of course, the winner was the bride.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots30Oct2009

Marching in

This shot was taken during the first march in of the wedding banquet.

ISO: 1600
Shutter: 1/160 sec
Aperture: 1.8
Focal length: 50mm
Flash: N/A

Since there was enough light shinning on the couple, and I was standing quite a distance away, I chose not to use flash. I wanted to get a fast shutter speed as the couple was walking forward. I would think there will be some noticeable motion blur around the couple if I were to use flash (the ambient light was not dark enough to make the motion blur invisible).

With aperture at f/1.8 and ISO at 1600, I was able to capture the image without flash. But of course, the down side is to end up with a high noise image.

Album: http://picasaweb.google.com/kcshashin/WeddingShots30Oct2009