Surviving the wedding shoot

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

In Tulsa, wedding photography requires scrupulous attentions to all the intricacies of the wedding day… the dresses, the people… with high tensions, tight schedules, and charged emotions, Tulsa wedding photography tests your absolute vigor as a wedding photographer. It leaves no scope for you to test your ‘people skills’ or ‘your experiments with portraits’; but it demands you to practice everything you have ever learned.

There are a few basics that are needed to go about capturing beautiful shots in unpredictable and varied settings. With a little bit of hard work, following tips will help one cover essential preparations for a successful wedding shoot.

• Style: Wedding couple must have some views as to how they would want their wedding photo album should appear, i.e. conventional or candid. Try to figure out with a proper communication with them.
• Bridal Photos: Pre-wedding bridal photos should include wedding preparations, bridal portraits, bride with the groom, outdoor-indoor, etc.
• Staying Connected: Have contact numbers of key people like the groom, the bride, wedding coordinator, the best man, the bridesmaid, and bride’s personal attendant.
• Assistance: For any wedding photography having an assistant or a primary shooter helps a great deal. They are like assistant directors, who will keep track of the shots list, manage the people (especially for group wedding photos), carry equipments, keeping track of the mobile phones, or holding reflectors.
• Shots-List: The bridal couple will undoubtedly have their preferred shots. Generally, the couple will stress the importance of wedding photos with family members, relatives, and friends. Once you have this initial list, you can build a more detailed list for your own reference. A shot list will keep you focused as you go about the 5-8 hour shooting day. If you keep referring to your shot list throughout the day, you won’t have to worry about forgetting anything.
• Locations: Wedding photography requires a wedding photographer to be present at the venue at least an hour before the wedding ceremony commences. Utilize this time to comb out all the locations where you might want to take wedding photos.
• Be A Sport: Wedding day is one huge day with a huge crowd, scheduled ceremonies, people’s excitement/boredom/restlessness… many things can fail to go as anticipated. It is of utmost importance to ‘already expect’ these things and keep calm during the wedding photography.

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

Epic Photography Tulsa

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Beginner’s Guide For Understanding Your Wedding Photography Needs

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

There are certain key elements that you can focus upon when trying to understand successful wedding photography.

Preparation

Keep in mind that Tulsa wedding photography preparation doesn’t start the previous night of the wedding, but it starts several months prior to it. Tulsa wedding photography is looked at as a highly professional and responsible profession, and in order to establish what fits you best, you might want to ask yourself following questions,

• How many photographers do you need? (2 or more are usually needed to get all of the reaction shots you may desire, 1 will be able to get all of the major events)
• What wedding photo style is required, traditional, candid, or modern?
• How many guests are there? Are they mostly relatives or friends? Do you want a lot of group photos with these people in them, or just the main ones (like bride and groom, bridal party, etc.)
• Which location will be used? Will there be a reception or a dinner? Will the photographer be there long enough to capture all of the events and moments you want to be captured, or will they leave at a predetermined time?

Locations, Events, and Time

Plan out the event so that there are no schedule conflicts the day of. Now, not everything goes according to plan of course, but having a general outline of the day will calm your nerves. You will undoubtedly feel more at ease if everyone is on the same page. A shot sheet is good to have as well, as it can prepare you for all of the shots you will want to have, but may not remember to ask for during the big day.

The Photographers gear:

It is a good idea to ensure the photographer has all the gear needed reserved for your shoot and your shoot alone. These gear items may include:

• Back-ups

Cameras: It’s always good to have extra camera’s should the main one malfunction.

Camera lenses and filters: Same as above, to ensure nothing goes wrong.

Tripod: This is important for indoor shots and other low lights.

Assistant: Will there be a second photographer, or at least an assistant? An additional human will certainly make the photography experience flow much smoother.

• Photo presentation:  How do you want your photos presented? Online for everyone to be able to view easily, or do you want to order all of your own physical prints, to hang in your house.

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

Epic Photography Tulsa

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3 Stages Of Wedding Photography Preparation

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

The failure to prepare, is preparation to fail. – John Wooden

While this may have been applied to basketball at the time of the quote, this principle applies to many important things in life, including wedding photography.

This preparation for the wedding day can be followed in three steps. Treat them like wedding rehearsals. Let’s see how.

A Few Months Before

A few months before the actual wedding, a tulsa wedding photographer should

try and do a planning ‘run through’ with the wedding couple, and plan out the day. You may not have all the details chosen yet, but it is a good starting point to get things narrowed down. An experienced photographer can also help you with ideas that you may not have thought of, and details to consider.

Another thing to potentially plan for is a “photo-run-through” aka, engagement photos. As a photographer, you get to know the couple even further, learn about their personalities, and get them ready for feeling comfortable when posing for pictures. Besides these advantages, you get the opportunity to discuss style with the wedding couple, and inquire more intricate details they would want to incorporate in their wedding photos.

You can also use this time (either in addition to, or in place of) to do bridal portraits. Usually featuring the bride and her dress, many times at the place of the ceremony (or at another scenic location) the bridal portraits offer the bride a chance to get some beautiful shots that she and all of her family members will want to keep, and possibly more importantly, gives the bride another excuse to be the princess if the day. Getting dolled up, hair and makeup done, and donning the dress that she plans to be married in is a great run through for the big day.

One Week Before

This is ‘making sure’ rehearsal for the wedding day, in order to ensure the same situations discussed previously are still on the list.

Most important shots like pre-ceremony and post-ceremony shots of the couple or the group shots should be planned at this time. Shot sheets that feature specific family member names can also be very helpful in organizing the day, since it is difficult to off hand remember every shot you may want, especially in the whirlwind of the day.

The Night Before

Sleep well! Your big day is ahead of you, and your photos are the last thing you will need to worry about. With the preparation you have gone through for the day, everyone should be on the same page, and you are free to enjoy your big day!

By: Tulsa Wedding Photographer

Jake Aldrich

Epic Photography Tulsa

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Which Lens Should You Get?

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Choosing the lens is every bit as important as choosing your camera, perhaps even more so. While an SLR camera will last a couple of years, new technology will make you want to upgrade it quickly. A good lens can last you through several camera bodies, especially if you take care of it. For this reason, you want to make sure you get a high quality lens. Light must pass through the lens to get to the sensor, so your top-quality camera won’t do much good if you have a cheap lens. On the flip side, a high quality lens can make the pictures from a lower quality camera look better. A good lens is probably the best thing to invest your money in when first starting into photography; you can use the same lens as you upgrade your camera body.

There are many types of lenses to choose from, and knowing the pros and cons of each can help you make a smart decision when purchasing your lens. The main types of lenses are fixed focal length or zoom lenses, and each of these categories has different types of lenses in them. Fixed focal lenses, also called prime lenses, are generally sharper than zoom lenses in the same price range, but zoom lenses give you more options when you’re shooting. A zoom lens can change its focal length so it is more versatile than a prime lens. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I mostly use a zoom lens. When capturing once in a lifetime moments, I rarely have time to change lenses. A zoom lens gives me greater options to get the perfect shots. Of course, both of these types of lenses come in different focal lengths, and include wide-angle, normal, and telephoto lengths.

A normal lens is usually referring to a 50mm prime lens, although there are many wide-angle zoom lenses that cover that focal length. The advantage to using a normal lens is that the view is similar to the human eye, so the photo doesn’t look distorted or compressed like it would with a wide-angle or telephoto lens. A 50mm prime lens will usually have a very large aperture, so they are great in low lighting. They are also a good choice if you want a high quality lens on a budget, as they are usually cheaper than a zoom lens of the same quality.

A wide-angle lens will usually be a zoom lens, and most beginner SLR cameras will come with one. Wide-angle zoom lenses are great for most situations; the low f-number lets in a lot of light, and the wide angle will show less camera movement, so these lenses are ideal as a Tulsa Wedding Photographer. They allow me to get large group shots in low-light conditions without having blurry or grainy shots. The only time I don’t like a wide-angle lens is when shooting portraits. A wide-angle lens causes distortion around the edges of the picture, which can be unflattering in close-up portraits. This distortion can be used to get some very unique shots, but for the most part I try to avoid it.

Telephoto lenses are great for making the subject of your photo stand out from the background. The shallow depth of field will really make your subject pop. Telephoto lenses are also great for capturing sports or wildlife photos, because they let you get a close-up shot without needing to stand close to the subject. Telephoto lenses do have a drawback, however. The longer focal length requires more light, as well as making camera shake more noticeable. High end telephoto lenses can be purchased that have a larger aperture as well as image stabilization, which will help you get more light while reducing camera shake. If you don’t want to spend too much on a lens, using a tripod or monopod is a good option when shooting with a telephoto lens in a low light situation, as it will eliminate camera shake, which will let you shoot at a slower shutter speed to get a brighter picture. While not great for every situation, telephoto lenses can create very powerful photographs.

Picking the right lens isn’t always easy, and in the end most people end up owning several different lenses for different situations. If you don’t want to change lenses very much, a zoom lens will definitely be the way to go. One good zoom lens will work in many situations; you can get lenses that zoom from an 18mm wide-angle focal length to a 200mm telephoto focal length. The best advice when picking a lens is to do a lot of research, and rent or borrow one if possible to try it before you buy it.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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What is RAW?

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

RAW file is a type of picture formatting that is used in by most professional photographers. The file extension may change based on the camera, as every camera developer (and some software tools) has a different file type. However, the formatting is very similar.

The RAW format records everything the camera sensor sees and writes it in with the metadata information in the file. All cameras actually shoot in RAW, but they will compress the information down to a JPEG if not properly configured. Some point-and-shoot cameras don’t have the option for RAW, but most D-SLR cameras do. Some point-and-shoot cameras have developer tools that let you reconfigure your camera to take your pictures in RAW. There are pros and cons to using RAW, and with a little explanation, you can learn whether RAW is right for you.

So What Is the Upside of Using RAW?

RAW files are uncompressed (or use a lossless compression, as opposed to JPEG files which are compressed, which means that you get great image quality, and the camera stores a lot more information.

When editing, the photographer can manually adjust the white balance without lower the quality of the image, allowing for more perfect colors; you’re able to choose a certain point to set the white balance at inside you photo editing software, instead of having to settle for a preset like “tungsten”. This lets you keep your camera in Auto White Balance, and you get full control over the color temperature in post-production. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, this lets me not have to worry about the white balance of the shots as much, because the RAW file will let me fix problems in editing.

The reason for this is that the RAW format saves the settings for color saturation, contrast and sharpness into the metadata, while most other formats do not. If your camera shoots in JPEG, all of these settings will be lost when the picture is compressed into the file, and adjusting these settings in post-production can lower the quality of the image. Shooting in RAW gives you the ability to decide if you want to use the automatic cameras settings or change them using image manipulation software.

Raw files save a lot more color information, so they give you the ability to bring detail to your shadows and adjust highlights to a greater extent. The compression used in JPEG files gives a lot less detail in the shadows and highlights, so changing them later can decrease image quality.

Alright, So What Is the Catch?

Unfortunately, this extra information that the RAW format saves does come at a cost.

RAW files are a lot bigger than JPEG files, but as prices continue to come down on hard drives and flash cards, this is less and less of a problem. RAW files do take a bit longer for the camera to save, so this can mean fewer frames per second because the camera will need to buffer longer. This can be an issue for photographers trying to capture motion in a quick set of shots. The large amount of information saved with the RAW format is not needed if you plan to get your photos printed right from your camera. This format should only be used by people who plan on doing so editing to the photos before they are printed.

Another downside to RAW files is that they don’t have a standard file extension, so each camera developer will have a different file type, sometimes even a couple different extensions for cameras in the same series. This isn’t really a big deal, but it means that your photo editing software must be constantly updated to keep up with developers.

Soooo… Which One is For Me?

IF you are the type of person who just has a camera to capture snapshots and put them on Facebook, then shooting in RAW is not necessary. RAW files are only needed by people who plan to edit the photos later. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I always shoot in RAW because it lets me use software like Photoshop or Lightroom to edit my photos before I have them printed. RAW is an amazing way to let you have full control over all aspects of the photo without sacrificing quality.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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Tips to Avoid Problems in the Field

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

With photography, preparation is incredibly important. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I find myself at a lot of once-in-a-lifetime situations, and there’s nothing worse than missing a perfect shot because of a problem that a little preparation could’ve fixed. Here are a few of the tips I have for avoiding common problems.

Bring Extra Batteries

Let me repeat that: bring extra batteries. Don’t ever think, “My battery isn’t going to die” because that’s the time that it will. Just keep some extra batteries in your pack. Also, camera batteries drain very quickly at lower temperatures, so make sure you have plenty of backups with you if you need to take photos in a cold environment. When buying batteries, the cheapest option is usually not the best option. My Sony batteries last about three times as long as the off-brand battery I have, and I’ve seen some that are worse. Spending the extra money on a quality battery will be worth it in the long run. Also, keep in mind that the LCD is a big drain on the battery, so if you don’t ever use it, you can turn it off. If you do use the LCD, make sure you have the auto-off setting turned on, set the auto display of your photos to the shortest time you need it to be. This will save on battery life, allowing you to take more pictures. The auto-off feature is a good way to make sure you don’t waste battery if you have breaks between shoots. Lowering the LCD brightness can also help add shots to your precious battery life. Even doing all these things, make sure that you bring extra batteries.

Be Careful With Your Lens

When you change your camera lens, you open up the sensor to the outside world, and it could get dirty or scratched. When changing lenses, try to be quick, but it’s more important that you are very careful. Never change the lens in a dusty area, and try to avoid the wind if you can. If you can, try to change the lens inside, where it’s less likely for dust to get in. If you do get dust on the sensor, the best way to clean it is with air blower. Keep the blower slightly away from the camera itself, to avoid scratching the sensor. Keep an air blower in your camera bag, because no matter how careful you are, you’ll eventually get some dust inside your camera.

Bring a Lens Hood

Lens hoods are a good way to improve the quality of you photos, with the added benefit of protecting your lens from accidental touches. The lens hood is mostly for stop harsh glares from direct lighting, but it also makes the front of the lens a little harder to touch. This is especially important when taking pictures of pets or children. Accidents happen, but a lens hood can help lessen the chances of scratching your lens. Try to avoid using a lens hood when you are shooting with flash, as it can cause unwelcome shadows on you pictures. If you feel that you need a lens hood and flash, take test shots and adjust the angle of the flash accordingly. You’ll be really glad you have a lens hood when it protects your expensive lens the next time you accidentally bump into something.

Bring Extra Memory

This is just as important as bringing extra batteries, because you will always run out if you don’t bring extra cards. With the size of flash cards these days, there is no reason to ever stop shooting because you ran out of memory. You can go through and delete photos, but unless it’s totally under or overexposed, you never want to delete a picture directly from the camera. The photos will look very different on a monitor, and you will be able to see more detail. Having extra memory cards will let you keep all of the photos, and you can decide which photos to keep when you view them on the computer. Also, when choosing flash cards, make sure you get cards that will record the images as fast as you want to shoot them. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I sometimes need to take photos very quickly, and I’ve had to wait on some slower cards to save the pictures. So as with batteries, you get what you pay for.

As I final note, I’ll say that none of this does you any good if you don’t have it with you, so buy a good camera bag to keep all your problem solving items in.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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Tips for Shooting Outside

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

When shooting portraits outside, you may at first believe that more light will mean better shots. Unfortunately, more light can actually make the shots worse. The bright light will make shadows harsher, which can be unflattering in portraits. The sunlight can also cause your subject to squint their eyes, which will make them look like they’re in pain in their pictures. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, most of my outside shoots are in bright sunlight. Here are some tricks I’ve learned to help minimize this.

Keep Your Flash On

It may seem weird to have your flash on when you’re out in the sun, but this is very important when shooting in bright sunlight. When the sun is directly above your subject, they can get harsh shadows across their face and under their eyes. The extra light from your flash will soften those shadows and make your shot a lot nicer. When shooting inside, you try to bounce your flash off of a wall or ceiling to your subject won’t get blown out. When shooting outside, point your flash directly at your subject, because there is nothing for the flash to bounce off of. Also, most flashes have an intensity dial, so you can adjust it to get the most natural look to your portraits.

An added benefit to using flash outside is that it will make your subject brighter than your background, so it will stand out more. Fill flash can also reflect off of you subjects eyes, so it will cause them to really shine. Another use for flash is when you want to get the sunlight behind your subject, which can give you a cool halo effect for your pictures.

Don’t Shoot in Direct Sunlight

When shooting outside, try to find a shaded spot to shoot in. This will give you more even lighting on the subject. A larger shaded area will get rid of the harsh shadows on their faces. It’s important that you look for a spot that has even shade, not dappled like under a tree. If you have spots of bright light, this can actually make the pictures worse than they would be in direct sunlight. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I shoot a lot of engagement photos in parks. I try to look for areas with many trees, which will help make the shade more even. If you are getting a close-up portrait, you can have someone hold something to block the sun on your subjects face, just be sure that the person holding the object doesn’t get in the shot.

Use a Reflector

You may not want to carry a reflector with you, but it can really help light up the underside of your subjects when shooting in bright sunlight. Keeping a foldable reflector in your camera bag can be a good idea in case you have to shoot outside. Any white or near-white surface can be used as a reflector in a pinch, so keeping a white t-shirt stuffed in a pocket of your bag would be better than nothing. I know a photographer who has used tin foil that he had in his car as a reflector during one engagement shoot. Anything that can be used to add extra light to the shadowed areas of your subject will help improve your photos.

Choose the Right Time

If you know in advanced that you will be taking pictures outside, you can try to plan your shoot for the best possible lighting. I find that the couple of hours before sunset are the best for shooting outside. The lighting isn’t as direct during this time, so the shadows aren’t as harsh. This will also let you use the sunset in the background of your shots, which can lead to some spectacular portraits.

Shooting in direct sunlight can be a little difficult at first, but with a little practice and the right equipment, anyone can get great photos. Using these techniques, you can start getting better shots outside in no time. Once you’ve learned how to get rid of shadows, you can start using them in your photos to give them a dramatic or artistic look. Shadows in portraits can be great, but only when you plan on them!

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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Introduction to Camera Modes

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Most modern digital cameras have many different shooting modes to choose from; these modes range anywhere between giving you full control over all of the settings to the camera making all of the decisions. Most of the time the automatic mode on the camera will get good shots, but sometimes you may need to help the camera a little bit to get the shot you want. While most cameras have preset modes for things like sports, landscapes, portraits and night time shots, if you want more control over your shots than you need to learn some of the more advanced modes. Program mode lets you control the ISO speed, but let’s the camera choose the shutter speed and the aperture size. Higher end digital cameras also have aperture priority mode and shutter priority mode that allow you to control either the aperture size or shutter speed, and lets the camera adjust the other.  The most advanced mode is manual mode, which gives you full control over all of the camera settings. Once you learn these modes, you can start getting the picture you really want, every time.

The biggest question to ask yourself when deciding what mode to shoot in is what you are trying to do with the picture. If the subject isn’t moving and you want a very shallow depth of field to really make the subject stand out, you will want to go with aperture priority mode. This will allow you to directly control the aperture size, which means you can set it to the appropriate size to allow the depth of field you are looking for. The camera will then adjust the shutter speed to get the best exposure. This mode is also good for when you are taking photos of a large group of people, and you want them all to be in focus. I use this mode a lot in my job as a Tulsa Wedding Photographer when I’m taking portraits, because aperture priority works well with still subjects, and it allows more control over what parts of the picture are in focus.

If your subject is moving and it’s more important to get them in focus than it is to have the background out of focus, shutter priority is usually a good option. Shutter speed priority gives you the ability to change the shutter speed. A fast shutter speed will allow you to capture moving subjects in crisp detail, and the camera will then adjust the aperture size so the pictures are properly exposed. This is also a good mode to shoot in if you are trying to get some motion blur, as it lets you use a really slow shutter speed. This should only be done with a tripod, or you will get camera shake, which means you moved the camera while the shutter was open, so the pictures come out unintentionally blurry. Anything below 1/60^th of a second runs the risk of getting camera shake, but with a tripod you can get some amazing effects using a slow shutter speed. Shutter speed priority is best used with moving subjects, and lets you either freeze them or show their movement, depending on the effect you want.

These modes get great shots most of the time, but sometimes the camera just can’t get the amount of light that you want. Both the aperture priority mode and the shutter priority mode will also allow you to control the ISO speed, which is great for minor adjustments to the exposure. Occasionally though, the automatic settings of the camera are way off, leaving you pictures either under or over exposed. This usually happens when shooting in either really bright areas or really dark ones, and that’s when manual mode comes in. In aperture or shutter priority mode, when you adjust your settings up or down, the camera compensates by moving the other option the same amount the opposite way.  This works great when the camera gets it right, but it doesn’t allow you to fix exposure problems when the camera can’t. Manual mode lets you change everything, so adjusting one setting won’t affect the others. Using manual mode, you can fix exposure problems, and you can still decide which setting is the most important for what you are trying to do with your picture.

The best way to learn which mode to use in any situation is simply to practice. Try shooting the same subject in the different priority modes, and see how the pictures change. Also practice manual mode; it may seem difficult at first, but it can get you the most creative shots. Once you get good at using the different modes on your digital camera, you’ll be able to get the shot you want in almost any situation.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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How to Stabilize Your Shots

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Camera shake is one of the easiest ways to mess up an otherwise perfect shot. While sometimes you want parts of your picture to be blurry, whether they’re out of focus or moving, you want to try to avoid camera shake, because this causes a different type of blur that is usually undesirable. Camera shake is not usually an issue with fast shutter speeds, but when shooting in low light areas with a low shutter speed, camera shake can be a big problem. Here are some ways to avoid camera shake and help you get clearer pictures.

Use a Tripod

A tripod is the first choice for many photographers. A tripod lets you have a steady camera, so you can have a really low shutter speed. This can help when you need more light in your pictures, or if you are trying for a motion blur effect. Like cameras (and just about everything), tripods come in many different sizes and price ranges. When buying a tripod, you need to consider what you will be using it for. Are you using it indoors or for outside shoots? Are you going to be using a heavy telephoto lens? What type of head do you want? If shooting outside you will need a sturdier tripod than you would need for shooting in a studio. The same is true if you are shooting with a heavier lens. Keep in mind; a sturdier tripod is usually a heavier tripod, which adds to the gear you have to carry with you. There are tripods that are both light and sturdy, but these tend to be more expensive. It’s a good idea to get a tripod with a level on it, because this makes it easier to get level shots on uneven ground. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I don’t usually use a tripod, except when shooting large group shots in a dark wedding venue.

Forget the Tripod; try a Monopod

If you don’t want to lug around a tripod with you, you could use a monopod. A monopod is lighter than a tripod, and it’s quicker to set up. A monopod usually won’t allow you to take shots with shutter speed of more than about thirty seconds (and that’s being optimistic), but that’s not what it is intended for. A monopod is meant to be a quick way to stabilize your camera without needing to set up a tripod. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I use monopods in low light receptions to get the light I need without moving the camera accidentally. The best way to use a monopod is not to place it in front of you; you want to stabilize it against your back foot. You may have to practice the right posture to get steady shots, but the monopod can be a simple alternative to a tripod and lets you get steadier shots than handheld.

But Handheld is So Easy

Handheld is indeed the easiest if you are going to be moving around a lot, and as a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, do all of my outside shoots handheld.  Handheld works great most of the time, but make sure you do it right so you can get the clearest shots. Hold the camera near you; use the viewfinder, not the LCD when taking pictures. This won’t work if you have a point-and-shoot camera with no viewfinder, but you can still prop your elbows against your ribs. Take a breath and hold it in when taking your shot. Try to press the shutter button in a fluid motion, and hold it down for a second after shooting. Don’t hold your camera body with your left hand; keep it under the lens so you can support the whole camera. All of these things help reduce the motion of the camera, so you end up with less camera shake. Kneeling or lying down can help you get more stability, but this is not always possible. You can also lean against a wall or a tree, or place the camera on a table or rock (really anything that won’t move). Of course, all of these things are much more important when shooting handheld with a telephoto lens. The more zoomed in you are, the more camera shake you get. While it can be harder, handheld shooting is by far my favorite, and learning to get steady shot without the use of a tripod or a monopod is definitely worth it in the long run.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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Exposure Basics

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Exposure is one of the most important parts of taking photos, and one that may seem difficult to learn at first. There may be some technical terms that seem scary, but with a little explanation it’s actually quite simple. Exposure is basically just the amount of light that is in your photo. If a picture is underexposed, it means that it’s too dark, so you will lose detail. If a picture is overexposed, it means the picture has too much light, and parts of it may be blown-out. Controlling exposure in your photos is vital to taking professional quality photos. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I’ve had to learn how each of these settings affects the others, and which ones are more important in which situations. I’ll explain how using the ISO, shutter speed and aperture settings on your digital camera, you can start taking perfectly exposed photos in no time.

The ISO setting is the simplest of the three exposure settings to learn. The ISO is just the camera’s sensitivity to light. IF you have a high ISO, the camera is more sensitive to light, and vice versa. Changing the ISO is a quick way to adjust the exposure of your photos without affecting the more complicated settings. The right ISO setting will vary depending on your location. Outside in the sun, you will probably want you ISO pretty low, like 200. If you are inside with less light, you can raise that number. Just try to keep it below 1000, or your pictures start to get a little blurry. Sometimes though, you have no choice but to go above that. As a Tulsa Wedding Photographer, I’ve shot receptions that are so dark that an ISO higher than 1000 is needed. Remember, a grainy picture is much better than a picture that is too dark to see anything.

Next we have the shutter speed. Shutter speed is simply how long the shutter in the lens of your camera is open. The longer the shutter is open, the more light the camera sees, so the brighter your picture. The opposite is true if the shutter isn’t open very long. Shutter speeds can be anywhere from 1/1000^th of a second to several seconds or more. Fast shutter speeds allow you to capture movement in crisp focus, but it doesn’t allow much light to the sensor. A slow shutter speed will give you a lot of light, but be warned – the slower the shutter speed, the easier it is to accidentally move the camera while the shutter is open, which can cause the picture to come out blurry. The right shutter speed depends on the subject of the photos, but for most shots somewhere between 1/250^th and 1/60^th of a second works well. Anything slower than 1/60^th and you will probably need a tripod to get crisp shots. Practice with the shutter speed setting, and you’ll start capturing any amount of motion in crystal clarity.

The aperture also controls exposure, but in a different way. The aperture controls how much light reaches the sensor of the camera. The larger the aperture, the more light reaches the sensor, and the smaller it is the less light. Think of the aperture as the pupil of the camera, because it works the same way as the pupil in our eyes. Aperture size is measured in f-stops.  Basically, the smaller the f-stop number, the bigger the aperture is. An f-stop of f/2.8 is a very big aperture size, while f/32 will be a very small aperture size. Learning how to control the aperture size may be a little difficult for beginners because the measuring system might seem backwards at first.  Just remember, a big f-stop number means a  small aperture, which means less light. A small f-stop number means a larger aperture, so that gets more light to your sensor. Remember that, and you will master your aperture setting before you know it.

This is a very basic explanation of these settings, and they all affect more than just the exposure of your picture; finding the right balance between the settings can be difficult to learn. Luckily most cameras will automatically control these settings, so you don’t have to learn more than you want to. However, learning to effectively control your camera’s aperture, shutter speed and ISO settings will help you take properly exposed pictures, as well as giving you more creative control of your photos.

By Tulsa Wedding Photographer Jake Aldrich

Epic Wedding Photography Tulsa

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