- Bride
- Funny
- Soft Light
- Playful
- Natural Light
- Leading lines
- Laughing
- Golden hour
- Fun
- Bright
- full body
- Free
- Energetic
- Drone
- Compression
- Center Framed
- Castle
- Sunset
The story behind the image
Even though our couple shoot was so time-restricted and much shorter than what we would have liked; we made sure not to forget this simple but fun request; and you know what? We had an incredibly happy bride afterwards. I mean, just look at that smile! It’s the small things that count and can go a long way.
Directions
Describe how you spoke to your subject(s)
We asked our bride to fly the drone a couple of feet higher than us but not so much that we couldn’t get it in our frame. We then threw in some silly jokes which got her laughing; especially when asking her to make the drone do a backflip!
What did you say?
Just take the drone up and keep it about [this] high and totally focus on it. Okay, now show us how good you are; make it do a backflip!
Composition
For this composition, we took a few things into consideration. Where we were was on a driveway up to the reception venue and along each side was the car park. We obviously didn’t want cars in our shot; so we framed this vertically and shot it with a 50mm so that the compression would mean that our bride & the drone took all the attention. We also had our bride stand in the middle of the road which was naturally forming leading lines. A very simple, but strong composition.
framing
Center Framed
Focusing
Describe how you spoke to your subject(s)
Focusing on this was definitely a challenge because we had to decide whether we wanted to have the drone sharp, or our bride (along with a shallow depth of field). We chose to focus on our bride for this moment as she was honestly having so much fun. We moved our single focus point over her smile to tell the camera to only look for focus there.
Focus Mode
Single Shot Autofocus
Focus POints
Single Point
Focused on
The Brides Face
Equipment &
Exif
Camera
Lens
Flash
Filter
1/160 @ f/2.5 ISO100 WB-Auto
The way the EXIF is written out follows the common photographic method (with the inclusion of White Balance at the end). Here it is broken down:
Shutter Speed @ Aperture ISO White Balance.
Light & Weather
This was taken just after the sun had set, meaning we had a really beautiful soft light to work with. Even though the sun had set, we still opted to have our bride turn and face us since the sun had set just behind her and to her right (out of frame). The light coming from this angle meant that we have a beautiful rim light on the right of our bride helping to separate her from the background.
Light Type
Natural Light
Time of day
Sunset
Editing Workflow
How did you edit this image?
The edits are made to be warmer with a big focus on skin tones and light play with shadows and highlights. A few minor local adjustments were made (Gradient and Brush) as well as finishing off with a fine layer of grain. The whites are not blown out nor are the blacks 100% crunched.
Editing Software
Adobe Lightroom Classic
Preset Used
Challenges
The biggest challenge was probably getting the drone into a position where it balanced the composition. It very easily could have gone too high, or too low that it was would be hidden by the background castle.
Solutions
Shooting in live view really helped us out here since not only were we able to see exactly the composition we were getting but it also allowed us to hold our camera above our heads to help frame our bride in the leading lines of the road.
Location
Location Name
Private Home
Location aDDRESS
Via Turrita, 06081 Sterpeto PG, Italy
Loation Type
Private Home / AirBnB / Apartment
Country
Italy
It won’t always happen that you get a bride that happens to have a career that you could easily incorporate into a photo, but the message stays the same. Small things do matter and going that extra mile is always worth it.
When you’re getting to know your couple; really pay attention to what they tell you about themselves as you never know what little gems can be found and used in your shoot. It could even be as subtle as “He is always picking me up and carrying me around”.
