During last night’s wedding reception it was a typical lighting situation and what I expect to see when I take a photo at a wedding reception. I look for properly exposed subjects in the center with the ambient lighting being shown in the background. In the photo below, this is exactly what I look for. This beautiful woman is looking great under lighting bounced up to the low ceiling. Settings are 1/40s at F/4 @ ISO200 flash at -2/3 exposure on TTL exposure (due to the low ceiling).

How did I choose -2/3 flash exposure? By looking for blown highlights on my display. Most DSLR will have a display setting that displays a view of blown highlights, once I determine it I usually keep the settings all night long. With this low ceiling, the Quantum 2×2 was hardly using any power and kept 4 full bars all night long.

See another expample of good flash exposure below.

Now with natural lighting, white balance is key, I hope your DSLR is as good as mine, it’s so hassle free with minimal image editing required.

There is an example of light bouncing incorrectly. This girl was walking back to her table carrying a drink or two or six and I just had to snap a photo. She was standing underneath a florescent light chrome reflector thing and you can see the reflector on the ceiling caused hotspots on her. Not everything can be perfect but it’s still a funny moment.

Jeff and Stephine are a great couple, I had a hoot shooting their wedding. Starting off was really quite something Steph had 2 black eyes, she looked like a football player! No Jeff didn’t do it to her (I asked the wittinesses), apparently 2 nights before she went face first at full stride into a glass door. It took quite a lot of work and a lot of stress but she was able to hide it great!

Here is Steph with her girls having a good laugh.

The ceremony started off alright and the photos turned out quite well. I did adjust the temperture -4 on the warm color slide because a lot of the photos were a bit too yellow but the minor adjustment in Lightroom did it’s job just fine.

Formals went well though the light was dying quick! The guys were having a good time as always not wanting to have formals taken.

Here is Jeff and Stephanie with a sunset kiss. It turned out great!

The reception was at The Benchmark in Covington, KY. I have shot there 3 times before so I was pretty familiar with the place and the DJ was pretty good.

Here’s the couple with their first dance and first kiss on the dance floor.

Steph getting a bit teary eyed when Jeff was saying a lot of really nice things about her.

So all in all, it was a great night!

I had the pleasure of having Lauren with me, she took this picture below, right on Lauren!

Jeff will be leaving for Iraq soon for 15 months, good luck buddy thanks for serving!

Here are some more photos

http://www.i2istudios.com/blog/index.php?topic=59.0

Photography Outdoors:
A Field Guide for Travel & Adventure Photographers

By: Art Wolfe and Mark Gardner

Now this wasn’t the first exposure I had to photography as I already had a very nice Nikon N90s but during my travels in ~1995 with Kettering Summer Field Studies in high school I did not have the SLR, only a Samsung P&S zoom with 6 rolls of film. I picked up this book at a visitor center at one of the many national parks I visited and read, read, and re-read cover to cover until I understood the principles and relationships between ISO, Shutter speed, and Aperture opening. Just reading and knowing wasn’t enough, the understanding what was going on and how each of them worked to capture light. This is my recomendation for a book for anyone that would like to get a better understanding of photography. This barely talks about digital photography, but you don’t need it to understand the principles of light and light manipulation. This is a very short book and can be read on a short plane ride. Amazon has this book and can be bought for hardly nothing, check it out at the link below.

Amazon

Well I have done it, well pre-ordered 2 of them anyways.

Initially I thought that I wouldn’t order it, my D200s do a great job but as with the advancement of technology electronics get better with time.

The features that interest me most.

• Lower noise at higher ISO
• New focusing sensor

I shoot at higher ISO a lot during the wedding ceremony because of no flash allowed and the low light( receptions are no problem). All of my lenses are f/2.8 covering zoom ranges from 17mm-200mm so I’m shooting at as wide open as I can for the most part.

I have been extremely happy with the D200 and that is why I am confident that the D300 will absolutely ROCK. Though my first D200 I preordered and did have the banding issue but I’m sure Nikon tested the hell out of these for that problem so they won’t happen again.

The Nikon D200 focusing sensor works just fine but knowing that I could get the best focusing sensor that Nikon makes would really be excellent.

I’d love to get the Nikon D3, I really would, but at this point in my career, it’s not practical or economical.

I’ll certainly keep you all updated when the first batch arrives in November.

Well as you can see above, I melted an SB-800. Above are 2 of my SB-800s, a normal one of the left and the melted one on the right. During the reception last night the wedding party was having a hell of a good time and I was taking a lot of photos and a very short time period. Now I have a Quantum 2×2 powerpack hooked up to both flashes at the same time and as you can see, the excessive heat caused it to bubble up. Without the powerpack, a flash cannot do this, there is enough recharge time that you cannot over heat the flash head but when using the high-voltage cord, this can happen as you can see here. I have only heard of discoloration due to excessive heat but mine looks to be pretty clear still. This shouldn’t effect any shots as I bounce almost everything. I don’t know how much it will cost to replace but you can see that the was not damaged in vain.

Well I finally took my first vacation of the year with two of my friends Ben and Alex. Although you’re not going to see any pictures of our camping just yet, we roughed it backpacking 5 of the 7 days. Our trip planning had us seeing the Tetons for 2 nights, Yellowstone for 4 nights, and the last night in Jackson Hole.

I’ll try to limit my talking for now of the trip for later but focus on the photographs first. Ok, first the gear.

1. Nikon D200
2. 2 Batteries
3. 18-200VR
4. Velbon Tripod
5. Nikon Polarizer
6. SanDisk Extreme III 8 and 4 GB

This is a shot of the start of our climb to our 6500 ft camp site half way up towards that tall mountain you see beyond the trees.

Grand Teton - D200 18-200mm @ 22mm ISO 100 1/125 sec / f 5.6 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

And our hike out the next morning onward to Paintbrush Divide and one on our way out of the Tetons the following morning.

The photo below is the morning that we camped on Ice Lake. This is the sight that I woke up to around 6:00am. We had been hearing Elk talk to each other all night long and I couldn’t lay in bed any longer, I got up, saw the fog, grabbed the camera and this was the first photo I took of it.

Yellowstone National Park - Ice Lake Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 18mm ISO 100 9 sec / f 3.5 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

The colors of the hot springs.

Yellowstone National Park - Hot Springs Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 56mm ISO 100 1/200 sec / f 7.1 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

A common scene in Yellowstone.

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 18mm ISO 100 1/250 sec / f 8.0 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

From our camp site the light night, what a view.

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 24mm ISO 400 1/45 sec / f 16.0 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB
Burnt trees by our campsite on the last night as we hiked back from Fairy Falls to our camp site.

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 62mm ISO 200 1/60 sec / f 4.8 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

The Bison that invaded our camp site, this dude was not happy with us.

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 200mm ISO 400 1/45 sec / f 5.6 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

That morning’s beautiful sunrise.

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 31mm ISO 100 5 sec / f 22 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

Another photo of our last morning there

Yellowstone National Park - Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 18mm ISO 100 1/100 sec / f 5.0 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB

Can’t go to Yellostone without posting a photo of Old Faithful

Yellowstone National Park - Old Faithful Nikon D200 18-200mm @ 70mm ISO 100 1/320 sec / f 9.0 on a SanDisk Extreme III 8GB