As our groom turned towards our direction, we made eye contact and very softly (as to not draw attention to ourselves from anyone else) asked him to put his arm back around his bride like he was just doing. We used a lot of our own body movement too so he understood what we meant without too much thought.
[very softly and while looking directly at our groom] Could you just put your arm back around {bride} like you were just doing? perfect!
The composition in this shot is all about balancing the frame. We had our groom fall on the right third of the image, with our bride in the middle while also allowing some space on the first third to show the setting of the environment. So there are 3 main points of interest in this composition. The dinner, the bride and the groom. Balanced throughout the frame.
Center Framed
Sometimes we want to compose an image from a certain angle that would be quite awkward for us to bend over and look through the viewfinder to find the frame. In this case, we held our camera low and switched on liveview. That way we could easily see what we were including and excluding from the frame while also allowing the camera to focus on our couple.
Single Shot Autofocus
Single Point
The Brides Face
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.
The main light source was coming from the open doors just behind and to the left of our couple. Since the barn was quite big with a few more windows around, there was a decent amount of ambient light filling the room. We positioned ourselves to frame the composition to allow just a bit of the door light to appear in the image as to not let it wash out with too much flare.
Natural Light
Indoor
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.
The main challenge we had here was actually building up the courage to ask our groom to go back to this position. We really wanted this image but were also conflicted at that moment about staging it, and in return have an image that looks very unnatural.
We came to the realization that it’s just simply worth it. If we said nothing, the moment was gone anyways. And if it didn’t turn out as great as we had hoped, then perhaps it wouldn’t have made it in the final gallery. No harm, no foul. We have no regrets asking our groom to do this for us.
Private Home
Helsinki, Finland
Private Home / AirBnB / Apartment
Finland
It can happen to all of us that we just miss a moment. Don’t let anyone tell you differently. After all, there are a ton of things happening all around us the whole time and we simply can’t be in 10 places at once.
It doesn’t hurt to ask someone to redo something so long as it would be natural. Try not to force it and rather than go and direct the person/people into that position again, just signal with your body langue or hand gestures to do it once more. You may come out with an awesome shot, you may not – but you won’t know if you don’t try.
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