Transcript:
Hi, guys! Welcome back to my channel. Today’s video is all about how I photograph a bride during the getting ready part of the day so her and her bridesmaids reading a letter from her groom, sometimes a little bit of those details like stationery and rings, but also the dress getting into the dress, putting on the Garter and all those moments in between. We even have a couple of family pictures here at the house in some tricky lighting conditions. So I’m gonna be sharing all of this with you today. If you’re excited, give me a thumbs up and be sure to subscribe. I have more behind the scenes videos. Just like this coming to you guys next week as well. So I’m starting here with the detail photos. I like to start the day with the details so that I can get all. The details gathered, photographed and given back to the bride so that she can have her rings and her shoes and all the things that she’s gonna need to get ready. So let me back up here and show you what the room actually looked like, so you can see what we were dealing with and where the light was and why I have a reflector here just to fill those shadows. Now, one thing I like to do is start with all the stationary, so I’m doing a vertical stationary setup here, and I’m using live view on my camera so that I can really see how it’s going to look inside the frame and make sure that everything is, you know, an equal distance and it looks really flat and level the other thing that I like to do here is zoom in on these little vignettes, So I don’t change anything about the scene. I just love the way that these rings and the ring box were set up, and I wanted to make sure that I got those details, so you’ll see that I get cheap shots at the perfume and the stamps, her earrings, all that kind of stuff and one really important thing to think about while you’re shooting. These details is making sure that you get vertical and horizontal. Because when you’re making an album, you never know when it’s gonna lend itself better to have a horizontal of something versus a vertical or vice-versa, so get both. It’s also great if you’re trying to get published and featured in magazines or online because publishers love having those options next up. I’m doing the Rings, so I’m using my 60 millimeter macro lens here. I love is a much more affordable option to the 120 millimeter macro, which is really gorgeous, amazing lens, but it’s very expensive and it’s very popular and at the time. I couldn’t actually afford this lens, so I ended up getting the 16 millimeter just to get me through, and I found that it gives me everything that I need for details, so I’m just gonna stick with this lens for as long as I’m shooting weddings. Honestly, and I think that it’s a fantastic lens for shooting close-ups and getting those really gorgeous macro shots next. I’m gonna put her dress somewhere that I can get natural light and get some shots of her in front of the dress, and I felt like this mirror in her dining room was a really great option, so I put it here. I got details of the dress close-up and further away. I’m making sure that I get her dress and her shoes in the frame as well and here is one of the shots of how it really came out so next. I wanted to get her sitting on this little couch in her like dining room, living room area and just some really cute shots of her drinking her future Mrs. Cord coffee mug. Because I loved that she had all these custom details for her wedding, so I took a few minutes here. Got a couple of really gorgeous. Bridal portraits before she actually got dressed which I just think adds a really nice touch to the day and to the album. Next, she’s going to be reading a letter from her groom, so I just had her stay exactly where she was at because I want all these pictures to have the same even lighting and have the same. Look so that when we put them in an album, they’re really cohesive right now. I am just photographing the day as it unfolds. I’m not posing her. I’m not directing her. I just really want her to be in the moment and reading this letter and feeling these emotions, and that’s exactly what happened. She started crying. It was a beautiful moment, and I didn’t have to do any directing or talking to her in order to make that happen and draw that out of her Next. We are going to be photographing. The bridal party. So here are her and her bridesmaids. They’re all in their matching robes. I wanted to make sure that I got a great picture of them. A couple of them looking at me. A couple of them looking at the bride before. I go ahead and let them know that the bridesmaids can go get ready. So this is always the last shot that I take before the bridesmaids. Go get ready And while the bridesmaids are getting dressed. I take a moment and get like five minutes with the bride in front of her gown. This is also when I would get you know those shots of her holding her coffee, just those bridal portraits where she’s not dressed yet, but it’s a great time to get a little bit of extra portraiture. During the day. I told the bride to take her dress down off of the mirror, just because she’s gonna have to get that down either way, and it creates some really beautiful action shots and some photojournalism throughout her album Next. She’s actually gonna get into her dress so now. Her mom is fully dressed. Her sister is fully dressed and they’re going to be buttoning her into this dress. I went ahead and I told my bride just then if you saw me, I said, look over your left hand shoulder that way. I can see a little bit of her profile in her face, and I don’t completely lose those details and only see her hair, So I’m gonna have some where I just see the back of her head, but I also want to get somewhere. I can actually see her smiling her sister, her mom, that kind of thing, so I am directing the bride at this point since we have a couple minutes before the limo is going to arrive. I decided lets. Get some portraits with Mom and Dad and make sure that we just get a couple of extra. Just in case we’re not able to get everything that we want at the church, so I get a full-length portrait here as well as some close-ups of them looking at each other and just having a good time, these are also when the bride and the mom are often laughing, they might want to do a toast or a Cheer’s picture or just a hugging picture, and these are always some of my absolute favorites here. We have the bride getting her finishing touches. She’s just going to get her shoes on and her veil on and just a couple. More things like a garter. If there’s a something old, something blue, that kind of thing, we also had the dad come in for some portraits, so I got some of the three of them, and we’re gonna do more of these at the church, but this is just great to get a casual option as well. So if you liked this video, be sure to hit subscribe next week. I’m going to be sharing the ceremony portrait of this wedding day. I had to shoot the entire ceremony itself without flash, and I’m gonna share with you some details and tips and tricks for how to get that done, especially if you’re in a lowlight Church. I’ll see you guys next week. Bye.