- bouquet
- Natural Light
- stone wall
- Still
- Soft Light
- Simple Pose
- simple
- Shade
- Outdoor
- Natural
- calm
- Looking over shoulder
- Looking away
- full body
- Flowers
- Directional Light
- Courtyard
- classic pose
- Center Framed
- Wide
The story behind the image
There’s beauty all around us, and sometimes it’s not the fanciest, most extreme settings that take all the credit for beauty – it’s also the simple ones. Keep your eyes open and you’ll see that they’re actually not too hard to find.
Directions
Describe how you spoke to your subject(s)
We had our bride stand facing us while holding her flowers up by her waist. From here, we simply asked her to look over her right shoulder towards the light and threw in all our encouragements and genuine praise. It’s a very simple pose, but a very strong one nonetheless.
What did you say?
I want you to stand facing me and hold your flowers up by your waist. There you go… Now just look over your right shoulder! And smile! you’re absolutely gorgeous!!
Tone of Directions
Calm
Composition
For a pose like this, we wanted to capture our bride in full so we can see her entire wedding dress. We chose to shoot this in portrait since it meant we could let her take up most of the frame; which in turn meant that the attention goes straight to her.
framing
Center Framed
Focusing
Describe how you spoke to your subject(s)
We had no particular challenge with focusing here as we had plenty of light and contrasts to work with. We moved our auto focus point over our bride and let it lock on before we shot. With each new position we guided her into, we did refocus just to make sure that we had our images as sharp as we could.
Focus Mode
Single Shot Autofocus
Focus POints
Single Point
Focused on
The Brides face
Equipment &
Exif
Camera
Lens
Flash
Filter
1/2000 @ f/1.8 ISO320 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
During the time period where we were to photograph the bridal portraits, the sun was out in full force and was really too harsh to work in. Not only was it challenging for us, but it would have been uncomfortably hot for our bride. So, we found this courtyard that had a few sections of shade. We noticed that the sunlight was bouncing off of a wall to our left ,which was working as a giant reflector. We simply had our bride in our pose, and asked her to look towards this wall so we could light her face and let the shadows fall off on the other side.
Light Type
Natural Light
Weather
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
Although it’s not noticeable from the image, the heat during the shoot was actually starting to get to all of us. It was an incredibly warm summer’s day and we had to be pretty careful with where we had our bride as we didn’t want her to get too uncomfortable, and even ruin some of her makeup.
Solutions
It helps to stick to the shade and to find spots where there might be a bit of wind. Otherwise, take breaks and go indoors to cool off.
Location
Location Name
Schloss Freudenstein
Location aDDRESS
Castel Freudenstein Str. Masaccio, 39057 Appiano sulla strada del vino BZ, Italy
Loation Type
Castle
Country
Italy
Try and nail your simple poses before going into more complex ones. Those simple, easy to do ones can be incredibly powerful and beautiful and will always work as your “safe” shots before trying something more… adventurous.
Encouragement during Bride (or groom) portrait sessions is really something important. It’s likely the first time your subjects are in front of a professional camera and as they’re probably already very excited or nervous about the day and the coming events, it’s a really good idea to keep your genuine encouragements up. It can go a long way to helping your subjects start to feel good in front of your lens. Throughout the whole day even.
