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The Five Biggest Lies In Wedding Photography

wedding picture — February is Pop The Question month which officially kicks off the spring wedding rush - by Diamond Farah via Flickr

We’re coming up on Valentine’s Day, which a wedding photographer friend of mine euphemistically calls Pop The Question Day. No matter how you look at it, there will be a lot of rings in a lot of champagne glasses by the middle of the month.

The Valentine’s Day rush will inevitably kick off the wedding booking season, which promises to be a good one in 2012. Wedding photographers I know are already seeing healthy bookings for the season, with one reporting 15 deposits in already.

As brides pull out their checkbooks and the real stampede starts to book venues, arrange catering, find a DJ and book a photographer, this is a good time to review the basics of shopping for a wedding photographer and to be aware of the most common untruths that can slip through unnoticed in the rush.

Sometimes it’s not a deliberate lie. Wedding photographers have a natural tendency to answer every question with yes, yes, yes. That sometimes leads to misunderstandings with brides thinking they’re getting service that isn’t in the contract.

The “Now Or Never” Lie

wedding 4 — "Now or Never" is a love song, not a negotiating strategy - by I.A. Walsh via Flickr

If a wedding photographer tries to tell you that you have to book today or the slot won’t be available tomorrow, leave. Anyone trying to bully you into signing a contract is a major red flag.

The best photographers will book early but that doesn’t mean you need to be in a rush. There are many great photographers out there and cancellations happen. In fact, be suspicious of any photographer who tries to use fear of availability as a pressure tactic to get you to sign a contract without giving you a chance to sleep on it. The best photographers will show you their calendar, show you the dates they have open, remind you that bookings are only finalized when they get the deposit and let you leave with the contract to read at your leisure.

The very best wedding photographers will also have a shelf of books you can sit down and page through at your convenience.

The “Sure, I’ve Shot That Venue Before” Lie

wedding shot 2 — Sure I've shot that venue before...where is it again? by Photos In Cancun via Flickr

Some photographers will say they’ve shot a venue knowing they can figure it out. If they really have shot that venue before, then they’ll be able to show you a wedding album shot there.

If they haven’t shot a venue before, an honest photographer will just admit it and the really good ones will swing by on their own time beforehand and take some background shots to make sure they have the proper lighting gear on the big day.

The “Preferred Vendor” Lie

This is a big one and usually comes from a caterer or venue operator, but sometimes a photographer will trot out a list of local venues and caterers that claim them as a preferred vendor. Those endorsements are almost always paid.

Carters and venue operators rarely get to the see final pictures anyway, so why would you take their word in the first place?

The “Top Rated Wedding Photographer” Lie

Some wedding photographers will trot out some really impressive ratings and endorsements from groups with names that sound really impressive. Anyone can manufacture endorsements and there are companies specializing in what’s called “online reputation management” that can boost vendor ratings in online forums and rating sites.

The best wedding photographers have a blog and post a few pictures from every wedding they shoot so you can see consistent quality from one wedding to the next. Pick out your favorites and ask for the bride’s contact information as a reference check.

wedding 3 — If their assistants were that good they'd be running their own business - by Harold Hoyer via Flickr

The “My Assistants Are As Good As I Am” Lie

Really? Then why aren’t your assistant photographers running their own successful wedding photography business? The real pros are members of a professional association or a guild and when they need help, that’s where they go.

This is a topic to approach with some caution. After all, if the photographer you really want is sick or ends up under a bus, you want someone there, right? Many photographers do have hand-picked teams doing most of the work while the top person goes from wedding to wedding inspecting the shots and maybe adding a few of their own. That’s okay as long as they explain that all up front and you agree to it.

Sometimes there are really good reasons for a person not to be available and you want to be a little flexible. What you do want in writing is some reasonable assurance that the photographer you want isn’t merely handing the paper off to someone else while they’re out playing golf.

Pentax’s new Mirrorless Camera the K-01

Pentax finally announced their newest interchangeable-lens mirrorless camera, the Pentax K-01, will be available starting in the middle of March. Judging by the initial specs, it looks like it will be worth the wait, with Pentax avoiding the mistakes made by many of their competitors.

Pentax started with a big chip. At its heart the K-01 sports an APS-C CMOS 16.28 megapixel sensor, avoiding the mistake of some camera makers in hobbling their mirrorless cameras with tiny chips. Backing that up is the new Prime M imaging engine that boasts an ISO rating to ISO 100 to ISO 12800, or to ISO 25600 with the noise reduction features enabled.

pentax k01 top view — Top view of the K-01 showing the hot shoe and mode dial - by Pentax

Then they take the big chip coupled with a fast processor and layer on all the fun mirrorless goodies, like the choice of four image aspect ratios (4:3, 3:2, 16:9 and 1:1) to accommodate different subjects and it also supports RAW output.

The K-01 boasts a six frame per second burst mode with near silent operation so you can take pictures even at events where noise would be a problem.

Software features an in-camera, ultra-wide HDR mode, an 81 point contrast detect auto-focus system and it’s one of the few digital cameras to sport a multi-exposure mode.

The video shooters will flip over the K-01’s video specs with the diminutive camera offering 1080p at 30/25/24 fps. Pentax is claiming HDMI full HD output with sound, but it’s not clear if that’s live output or just for exporting video clips. Here’s the claim right from Pentax, decide for yourself:

“The PENTAX K-01 also comes with an HDMI type C terminal, which allows the user to simultaneously output both Full HD movie clips and stereo sound, as well as an external microphone input terminal.”

Pentax included both an intelligent hot shoe and a pop-up flash when some manufacturers mysteriously dropped one or the other.

Anti-shake image stabilization is accomplished by sensor-shift technology and it uses focus peak technology for faster response.

At $749 for the body and $899 for the camera and a 40mm XS pancake lens, Pentax may have a winner on their hands with the K-01.

Phase One A/S Merges Mamiya, Leaf

mamiya 645DF — Whether Mamiya Leaf is combing for efficiency or clinging together for survival is yet to be seen

Phase One A/S announced today that Mamiya Imaging and Leaf Imaging would be merged into Mamiya Leaf Imaging. The merged company will enter into a licensing agreement with Kodak, which likely means their sensors and image processing will be under the hood of the merged brand.

Whether medium format is merging to optimize service and support as the company claims in their press release, or if the companies are clinging together for survival in the face of rapidly improving DSLR competitors, remains to be seen. Right now it’s all sunshine and lollipops from Phase One. From the press release:

“We’re pleased to be part of this effort. The combination of products brings together the best in medium format photography delivered with service and options to expand the capabilities of professional photographers,” says Henrik Hakonsson, President of Phase One.

The real question is will photographers feel compelled to purchase an 80-megapixel Mamiya Phase One combination which, at over $40,000, is more than the cost of a shiny new BMW sedan. Compare that to Nikon’s new D4, which is just under $6,000.

Megapixels, Shemgapixels

This is where I have to remind people that comparing cameras by their megapixel rating is like my wife picking a new car because she likes the color. The number of megapixels has very little to do with the quality of the final image. Color, tone and sharpness will have far more sway over the quality of the final image, one of the reasons the highest rated cameras are all over the road when it comes to the megapixel rating of the sensor.

The difference in megapixels does effect the resolution of the final image, but even that is a geometric comparison and not a linear scale. In order to really notice a difference in resolution, you have to nearly double the chip size. Doubling the chip size quadruples the number of megapixels.

That’s why comparing the Canon T3i to the Nikon D5100 just on megapixels would be a mistake. While the T3i boasts a 17.9-megapixel chip and the D5100 a 16.1-megapixel chip, the difference is meaningless. Overall the D5100 is generally considered the superior camera.

Which brings us back to megapixels in the digital age and the continued quest of medium format to stay relevant in a camera market where DSLRs are producing incredible quality at a price point that’s a fraction of what you’d pay for a medium format camera.

Another factor impacting the debate is the march of software. In the old days of digital photography, like five or ten years ago, trying to scale low-resolution bitmap images, like JPEGs, was quite hard and most often the blow ups looked like doody.

Today software is much better at scaling JPEG images and you can, for all intents and purposes, scale them indefinitely with little loss in quality.

It should be interesting to see if medium format can find a way to stay relevant in the digital market, or we’ll see the medium format camera go the way of Kodak.

First Steps On Your Journey In Photography

Many of you are just beginning your journey in photography with cameras you received or bought for yourself over the holidays. 2011 may not go down in many record books as a banner year, but it was a great year for discounts on high end camera equipment. Many of you are now carrying in your hand some of the most advanced and sophisticated optical imaging devices ever created!

Starting out is an exciting time. Every photographer remembers their first really amazing image the same way romantics remember their first kiss.

So, from those of use who have been in the business for many years, here are some suggestions for your first steps in your new passion of photography.

Learn About RAW

Raw vs JPEG — Jared Polin from FroKnowsPhoto.com looks at the difference between RAW and JPEG. Raw photos save more info about the image, allowing greater control when editing.

While many of you may have a fantastic new camera, you may not have an editing program capable of handling RAW images. It’s okay if you can only work with JPEGs at first but, if your camera supports it, do shoot RAW+JPEG even though it will burn through your card storage space like wildfire. Even if you can’t work with RAW images right away, save copies of your images in RAW format so you can revisit them in the future.

RAW images are everything your camera sensor records while capturing an image and much of that data is discarded by the compression to JPEG. Once that data is gone, it’s gone forever if you don’t have a RAW backup.

Compression artifacts are not the problem they were a few years ago. JPEG compression has improved dramatically over the years but it’s still a good idea to keep those RAW image copies around in case new imaging technologies arise in the future.

Read The Manual

I know I sound like a broken record when it comes to reading the manual, but cameras are so sophisticated today, packed with so many features, that it really is time well spent. You don’t have to memorize where every feature and menu item is located, just know they’re in there. You can always drag out the manual later if you need to look up a particular feature.

Get A Skylight Filter

Look on the barrel of your lens or check the manual (wink-wink, nudge-nudge) for the filter size of your new lens and order a skylight filter right now. It’s really just a clear piece of glass, but it can save your lens.

Every photographer in the business very long has a cracked or crushed skylight filter on a shelf somewhere that would have been their lens without the sky filter.

Get a Rain Sleeve

2854066667_221070c0b2_z — Photo by Rachel

While you’re ordering your skylight filter, add a rain sleeve like this or this and keep one in your camera bag or jacket pocket at all times.

Weather happens and, even though most new DSLRs have fairly good weather sealing, the amount and quality of that sealing can vary widely. Why risk your camera when rain covers are so cheap? Some day you’ll thank me for that advice when you get back to the car soaking wet but your camera is safe inside its rain sleeve.

Now get out there and take pictures!

Fun With Filters

A neutral density filter is one that you'll still want to have in the digital age

In the old days film photographers always carried a little wallet full of filters. You had an 81A for a warm up that made photos in full daylight a bit warmer, and an 80A, FLD, and 85C for correcting different types of artificial lighting. If you’d been in the business for a while, you may have had one of those boxy filter holders more common on movie cameras and a set of the square glass filters that might have included gradient filters for making the sky more dramatic when the foreground was lighter colored.

Digital cameras have done away with most types of filters. White balance on pictures in RAW format can be made after the fact and there’s little need for filters to correct lighting. Gradients and other effects are now easier in post-processing and few photographers bother with gradient filters anymore.

Yet, even in the digital age, there are still a few filters that are nice to have.

Skylight or Sky 1A

broken fliter — broken filter photo by Patrick Lauke

When is a filter not really a filter? When it’s a sky filter. A skylight or Sky 1A is really just a clear piece of glass, yet it’s one of the most important investments you can make. A sky filter isn’t on the lens for your photos, which it doesn’t change at all, it’s there for the lens. Specifically to protect the front glass of your lens from dust, dirt, sand, scratches and forward impacts. It’s not just a good idea, it’s the cheapest insurance you can buy for a lens.

Polarizing Filter

Polarizing filters are a big help getting the sky colors more saturated on a sunny day with haze. It also helps saturate other colors and cuts reflections from glass and metal.

Polarizing filters come in two flavors: Circular and linear. A linear polarizer is a rotating element that lets light aligned along a single axis into your lens. A circular polarizer has a polarizing element, just like a linear polarizer, but behind that is a quarter-wave scrambler that depolarizes the light.

Polarized before and after — Photo by Doug Kukurudza

The circular polarizer is the most common, but I use them both. The circular polarizer is supposed to be more consistent for beam splitting cameras, but really it helps the auto-focus more than the exposure. I use a linear polarizer when I don’t care about predictable results, when I want to shake things up and get a different perspective on a scene.

A polarizer can also function similarly to a neutral density filter on sunny days, cutting the exposure up to two stops.

Speaking of Neutral Density

A Neutral Density (ND) filter is very handy to have, particularly on bright days. It will cut the available light and let you select a wider aperture on a sunny day. ND filters come in multiples that provide a predictable reduction in the amount of light staringt at 0.3 (one stop),

Water neutral density filter — A neutral density filter can make water look silky-smooth. photo by Paul Bica

and go in steps like 0.6 (two stops), 0.9 (three stops) and 1.2 (four stops). ND filters go all the way up to specialty filters like the 3.6, which is a whopping 12 stop reduction. You need a really bright scene for a 3.6. Think white cat on a snow field in broad daylight using an arc welder as a fill.

Those of you using your DSLRs for video, this is not an optional investment. You’re limited in your selection of shutter speeds and the only way you’ll get the f-stop you want in some shots is with a neutral density filter. Very seldom have I needed more than a 0.9 shooting video and, if that situation arose, you can stack ND filters for even more light reduction. Most of the video shooters I know carry a 0.3, 0.6, and 0.9.

So, there are still places for filters in modern digital photography, just not as many as the old days and the filters serve a different purpose.