An afternoon with Sandra and Stephan

June 6, 2010 1:06 AM Category: Couple, Engagement, Generally, Shooting, Wedding

Hi, finally there is some time to write a new blog post. The last weeks have been very exhausting. Appointments for news agencies in politics and miscellaneouses, two concerts (STING and Green Day – both really awesome!) and assignments for companies† – wished the days had 48 hours ;-)

A small ray of hope was an engagement shooting I did with Sandra and Stephan two weeks ago. It was my only really free day in two weeks, but I was happy to have the time for this really nice couple. It’s something really different from all this stiff politicians and the agency appointments where you have the feeling that bring in your creativity is like to throw pearls before swine…

So Steffi and I met them on a saturday afternoon in the city of Hanover at an abandoned big goods station. When we had talked the first time some weeks before, both told me that they wanted no typically wedding pics like in front of a tree grinning into my camera.

You know, I really prefer to meet a couple at a coffee and do small talk to find out what preferences, what kind of personalities they have. In case of Sandra and Stephan I heard of their journeys through different countries (Thailand) as backpackers with no hotel suite to check-in every evening. Even their honey moon will be a journey through Vietnam. Worth admiring!

So, really, to put them in front of a tree wouldn’t have been the right place ;-) I remembered the old goods station that would give us a lot of shadows, contrasts and some bedlam. And afterwards I think it was the right place for them. But see for yourself, here are some of the pictures…

I’m really looking forward for the wedding photo shoot in three weeks! I think we will do it right in the streets of an older part of Hanover… ;-)

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by Stefan Simonsen

5 comments

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Jim Horne - Hey Stefan – I’ve been anxiously awaiting a new post from you, and here it is – once again you have truly captured some spectacular moments in time….

-Jim

Stian - Hi Stefan! Outstanding photos as always.It is truly inspiring looking at you pictures.
Good luck with the wedding, im sure they will be very happy with the result :-)

Stian

Stefan Simonsen - Thx Jim and Stian, hope to bring a new post with some pics of Green Day and Sting on the way this week. And I have already three videos in the pipeline with BTS’s ;-)

PS: Stian, I corrected it ;-)

Sheena - In one of your videos you said before shooting you checked the ambient light around first then added the flash. I was wondering do u take and use the settings from the absent light and add the flash. I was just wondering how u got the background colors looking great without making it to light.

Stefan Simonsen - Hi Sheena, thanks for your comment!

I’m sorry but I didn’t understand what you asked… Do you mean how the background get full of light even when the flash did not hit it?

This is really easy. Just make the exposure time longer! A flash like SB-800/900 or Canon 580/430 has a flash time of around 1/1000 to 1/1300 of a second. Changing the exposure time will only let more of the available light hit the picture while the flash still fires only 1/1000 to 1/1300 of a second. So you can easy get from no ambient light in the photo to a of of ambient light just by changing the exposure time WITHOUT touching the aperture value!

Sorry, I don’t know how to describe it better without pictures. So maybe you should do a simple test at home:

Choose a room with some windows at daylight, use a wide angle lens to have the room on the picture too. Put on your flash on the camera, directed to the ceiling and set to iTTL/eTTL.

Take one photo in A(v)-Mode set to 8.0 at ISO 200 at daylight and REMEMBER the aperture and the exposure time the camera chose. You will get a picture with a well-lit room.

Put your cam in M and set the aperture and time to the one you remembered. Take a photo, it will be still the same photo as before.

NOW the magic start *hehe*: Shorten just the exposure time for three steps. You will see a picture with less lights outside the window. Repeat this as often you have to do until you have no more light coming through the windows.

It will look like a photo taken at night!

Now do the opposite and make the exposure time longer. Still JUST THE EXPOSURE, don’t touch the aperture.

That’s all of the secret how photographers kill the ambient light in photographs or let more a-light into the picture to make the colors more impressive even when the flash do not hit the background.

Puh, hope you had success? Then please let me know.

If this wasn’t your question please give me more details about it!

Stefan

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