- Back lit
- Center Framed
- cliff
- full body
- High Angle
- Horizon Line
- Islands
- Moody
- natural frames
- Natural Light
- Ocean
- sea
- Soft Light
- Sunset
The story behind the image
When this couple asked us if we’d be keen to travel just north of the Arctic circle in Norway to capture their elopement, how could we resist? We got there a few days early and spent an entire day location scouting and just enjoying the whole experience of being up there. We found this spot, made sure it’d work with the light & then planned everything with our couple on the day of.
They had a beautiful, gentle, self-made ceremony just between themselves. They shared their words, shared their tears, and shared their love and this moment was the conclusive end of their little ceremony. They embraced for a moment, and right then and there – nothing else mattered but them.
Composition
We found this spot on a hill that gave way to the view of the ocean and the islands. I had the couple stand in the middle of all the landscape features to let them be framed naturally. I also held the camera slightly above my eye level so I could keep them framed within the water as to not have any lines cutting through them.
framing
Center Framed
Focusing
Describe how you spoke to your subject(s)
Since I had the camera away from my eye, I had to use live view which helped me find this composition a lot easier. Focusing was no problem at all as the couple wasn’t moving too much from their spot, and I could simply keep the focus-box over them without too much effort.
Focus Mode
Single Shot Autofocus
Focus POints
Single Point
Focused on
The couple
Equipment &
Exif
Camera
Lens
Flash
Filter
1/4000 @ f/2 ISO1000 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
The sun was just out of the left side of the frame and was still relatively high in the sky. The made it quite challenging to capture the full dynamic range of the image as the sun bounced off the water pretty strongly. Because of this, the spot we chose needed to allow us to shoot into the light as we would then photograph the shaded side of them; a much softer light to work with at the expense of losing dynamic range.
Light Type
Natural Light
Time of day
Sunset
Editing Workflow
How did you edit this image?
Editing this image was definitely a bit more tricky than usual. Since the sun was still quite harsh, it bounced off the ocean water causing a lot of the highlights to almost blow out. After applying our Protea preset, we used our brush tool to paint over the water and make local adjustments to the exposure, saturation, white balance and contrasts to help bring back the detail. The same was applied to the sky and to the couple themselves. We also added in a sun-enhancing radial adjustment to help warm up the light.
Editing Software
Adobe Lightroom Classic
Preset Used
Challenges
The hardest part was editing this image to bring back details that we felt were important to the overall mood of the image. Since the sun was still quite harsh, the highlights struggled to keep details.
Solutions
Taking extra time to really focus on adding brush adjustments, radial adjustments and gradient adjustments made all the difference. We broke it down into pieces and slowly built the image up until we liked the result.
Location
Location Name
Hillesoy
Location aDDRESS
Hillesoy 9110 Sommarøy, Norway
Loation Type
Beach / Coastal
Country
Norway
If you have a tricky image that doesn’t quite follow your usual editing routine, then take a break and come back to it later if you can. Sometimes seeing it with fresh eyes and new energy can be motivating to spend that extra time going into detail to bring out the best of the image.
Absolutely always, always, always do a location scout. Especially when it’s an elopement and your couple have asked you for suggestions on places to go. Make sure you get there a day or so before and have plenty of time to explore different options. Bring sun-tracking apps with you so can also see when and where the sun will be at any given point. Finally, have a backup plan just in case this location is inaccessible on the day you want to shoot.
