This past weekend, I was at an old friends wedding. Now being the camera nerd that I am, I am always checking out the photographer, noting what kind of lights he is using, and how he sets up etc… I’ve picked up a few lighting tricks like this…
Now normally, I see most wedding photogs primarily using a diffused on-camera strobe, generally bracket mounted, often with an assistant carrying a second “pole mounted” strobe that is triggered wirelessly for a quick, moveable secondary light source. Usually there will be a studio light or two (often a softbox) for the formal portraits or whathaveyou…
This wedding was different…
first off there were 2 photographers, each with a standard shoe mount strobe (interestingly one was shooting Canon, and one was shooting Nikon). Each had an assistant with a “strobe on a stick”. Farly standard fare…
BUT…
in addition, set up througout the room, there were:
- 2 massive continuous lights, through diffuser brollys. I couldn’t even guess at the wattage, but they were enough to bring the room to 1/60 @ f/2.8 at iso800 (according to my camera’s meter)
as if that weren’t enough, there were 3, that’s right, 3 – large Elinchrom studio strobes placed throughout the room on what looked like 15′ stands, bounced off the walls and ceiling. All 3 were triggered by PWs, in addition to the continuous lights, the on camera flashes, and the strobes-on-a-sticks…
Believe me, you could tell, every time a photog. took a picture. The flash was almost overpoweringly intense (even for us folks just sitting off to the side). Of course the fact that one of the walls was entirely mirrored which reflected the flashes even more didn’t help!
It really seemed like they were trying to light the entire room to f/16!
Now granted it was a pretty big room, but I was just amused by the whole thing… seemed to be a bit of “light-overkill” to me.
On the bright side (sic), I’m pretty sure they won’t have any underexposed pictures in their wedding album!
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