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rickryan.com

DJ Extraordinaire
ODJT Supporter
Dec 9, 2009
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Hendersonville, TN
www.rickryan.com
This was the wedding we did, weekend before last. The clients were Hannah and Daniel. Fairly small group of about 100-ish. They used an old, historic chapel for the ceremony and a club-house for their reception. My wife and I team shot the photography and I hired one of our DJs to run music and MC. We ended up shooting just shy of 2,400 images and delivered around 500 edited images. What made this job a particular treat is that I DJed her older sister's wedding just 2 years ago. When MOB called, she was going to just book DJ. I asked her if she had a photographer, she said "No" and she was kind enough to give us a shot at it. I'm going to do one more pass over these tomorrow, then pass the link to the client. Any constructive comments welcomed.

2016-05-07 (Hannah & Daniel) King's Chapel, Arrington TN
 
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i can point out what's right..but if you did it right you already know it's right and how to do it, right? Unless it was by accident...

It's the things you got wrong that need pointed out - it's seems obvious if you got it wrong it was because to you it wasn't wrong - you don't know, didn't see, had other things in the forefront of your mind (usually my issue), etc.

I almost always see something later that could have been, should have been, done better. BUT I often also see things I got right this time that in the past have eluded me.

I've been seeing a lot of sports pics (team and individual stuff) this time of year online and it's what I've been doing - shooting 1300 kids in the past few weeks with 300 more this saturday and 225 more between 5/25 and 6/13 plus first communion kids - i'm seeing (IMO...of course! LOL) that i"m better than soem that have been at it a long time.

More personal satisfaction than profit - customers rarely know/can tell the difference.

And unless you were there you've no idea what the, um, conditions were. Shot a soccer team sunday - in the snow. Yes, snow. Cold kids are not nearly as cooperative as warm ones. The communion kids were scheduled 5 every 15 minutes...and as they come they stay with their parents..so 1/2 hour in there's 10 kids and 20 parents in the church...2 hours in there's 40 kids and 250 parents and a priest eyeballing me to see if i'll be done on time. More noise, confusion, a huge audience (aka peanut gallery), etc.

the wedding I shot on saturday it was lower 40s and raining for the outside pictures. the DJ was fun to hang with - with only 38 guests TOTAL at the wedding and a dance floor of about 10x10 feet it was a challenging day for all concerned!
 
i can point out what's right..but if you did it right you already know it's right and how to do it, right? Unless it was by accident...

All I can tell you is that I walk humbly in this arena. There is SO very much that I don't know, and often time don't even recognize it until later on. As for the set, I felt this was a step forward for us. No bobbles to speak of, DJ was handled well. I think wifey is really getting her edit chops to working. What should have probably been a so-so event turned out strong, IMHO. I just hope the bride (and her mom) feel the same way. I'll be turning it over to them later today.
 
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BTW, is this link working for you guys? There should be 3 galleries showing. I'm at a training facility today and with limited internet access and it shows nothing. Kinda wondering if wifey found something and took them all back down to re-generate the set.
 
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BTW, is this link working for you guys? There should be 3 galleries showing. I'm at a training facility today and with limited internet access and it shows nothing. Kinda wondering if wifey found something and took them all back down to re-generate the set.
Link works!
 
The pictures are great "technically", but overall have a "busy" look to them. IMHO, here's a few things that would help.

More Photoshop to get stuff out of the picture. I.E. the paper towel dispenser in the shots of the groom getting ready.

Tighter crops to eliminate backgrounds and/or blurred backgrounds by increasing the distance between subjects and background, or using a wider aperture - the shots outdoors would look better if the trees were a blur in the background.

Hey, I know it's not easy when you're moving at 200 mph trying to pose a large group of people!
 
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The pictures are great "technically", but overall have a "busy" look to them. IMHO, here's a few things that would help.

More Photoshop to get stuff out of the picture. I.E. the paper towel dispenser in the shots of the groom getting ready.

Tighter crops to eliminate backgrounds and/or blurred backgrounds by increasing the distance between subjects and background, or using a wider aperture - the shots outdoors would look better if the trees were a blur in the background.

Hey, I know it's not easy when you're moving at 200 mph trying to pose a large group of people!

Thanks for the input. Those are some good observations and I'll make note on future events. Not sure if you've done wedding photography, but it's really a "run and gun" type of event. High stress and high speed. I will add though, it's not entirely reasonable to try and do extensive photoshop "get stuff out of the picture". Yes, we do some, but keep in mind that we took 2,400 photos. We chose just under 500 to edit and deliver and spent 20 hours in editing. Add extensive photoshopping and you're looking at 50+ hours per event, which is not feasible both in a "get it done in a week" and for the package price.
 
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I used to do videography with DLSRs so I will put in my 2 cents. (Here is a same-day-edit I did 5 years ago:)
View: https://vimeo.com/25002604


I think a lot of your photos are great and definitely capture the day perfectly. If you want to get them to be a little more "artsy" or "creative" I have a few suggestions.

You need to narrow your depth-of-field in all of your photos. When everything is in focus it doesn't look "professional" to me. Only the subject should be in focus, the foreground and background should be out of focus. This is easily accomplished with fast lenses. When I was shooting every single one of my lenses was a 2.8 or better.

I'm not sure what you are shooting with but try some faster lenses or open up your aperture as wide as it will go with the lenses you have. Use the autofocus feature by centering the subject in the frame, half-press the shutter to focus and while holding the half-press reframe and then take the photo. You can take photos very quickly this way while still maintaining a narrow depth-of-field.

Here's a good example of depth-of-field being used for a photograph of the ceremony program:

rustic-diy-california-wedding-diy-programs.jpg


In this photo your eye wants to go right to the top of the program because of the selective focus. If it were all in focus your eye wouldn't know where to go.

Another thing to work on is the rule of thirds. Here is a good article about that:

Rule of Thirds in Photography

Using depth-of-field and the rule of thirds will make your photos look that much better and allow you to possibly raise you rates without having to buy a lot of gear.

I hope this helps and didn't come off as anything but constructive criticism.
 
This was the wedding we did, weekend before last. The clients were Hannah and Daniel. Fairly small group of about 100-ish. They used an old, historic chapel for the ceremony and a club-house for their reception. My wife and I team shot the photography and I hired one of our DJs to run music and MC. We ended up shooting just shy of 2,400 images and delivered around 500 edited images. What made this job a particular treat is that I DJed her older sister's wedding just 2 years ago. When MOB called, she was going to just book DJ. I asked her if she had a photographer, she said "No" and she was kind enough to give us a shot at it. I'm going to do one more pass over these tomorrow, then pass the link to the client. Any constructive comments welcomed.

2016-05-07 (Hannah & Daniel) King's Chapel, Arrington TN

You took a lot of great shots! The only look I saw that I'd maybe tinker with a bit is the sparkler send-off photos. Being a very novice photography person, I don't know what needs to change to get this effect. But it looks like maybe the flash was too bright to to really have the sparklers show up. So, you can see them, but they're almost washed out lighting wise, versus something like this: http://www.societybride.com/assets/music-wedding-15.jpg where you're getting more glow from the sparklers.

All in all, I bet they were thrilled that you captured their day!