anyone tried shooting entire weddings without flash?


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Paul_Yeo

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Feb 27, 2004
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have anyone tried shooting the entire weddings (chinese wedding from morning, tea ceremony and night dinner) wiithout flash?

i wonder if it works?

dun worries, i never experiment on my couples.
 

i know of someone

shoot whole wedding on film, no flash and manual metering
 

wainism said:
i know of someone

shoot whole wedding on film, no flash and manual metering

Awesome man! Care to share who's that person? Local or oversea's?:) Thks
So far I only know Sam Abell don't shoot with any flash. But does he shoot weddings too? I have no idea at all.:confused:
 

Colour print film has much better exposure latitude than digital. And if you're shooting black and white, your exposure latitude will be even more forgiving.

One only has to take an exposure reading for each room or setting, and stick to it for the whole roll of film, while adjusting shutter speed or aperture accordingly half a stop or one stop to compensate for shadowy or especially bright areas, like a spotlit stage for example.

Clarence
 

i am thinking of creating a style based totally on ambience lighting.

but think indoor wedding dinner (those hotel ballroom type) may not be possible with no flash?
 

clarencelee said:
Colour print film has much better exposure latitude than digital. And if you're shooting black and white, your exposure latitude will be even more forgiving.

One only has to take an exposure reading for each room or setting, and stick to it for the whole roll of film, while adjusting shutter speed or aperture accordingly half a stop or one stop to compensate for shadowy or especially bright areas, like a spotlit stage for example.

Clarence

Just curious as to where you got your information that film has more latitude than print film and black and white is more forgiving??? I am at a loss.

From my years of working with film and digital, I think you have it wrong. It is digital that has more latitude than film. Transparencies have a latitude of 2 to 2 1/2 stops, print film or negative film has a latitude of 5 stops and digital has a latitude of up to 10 stops.
 

that is correct, digital now has far better dynamic range than film does.

to the original poster, i dont see why you couldnt shoot a whole wedding without flash.

you would need a camera that has workable high ISO 800 or 1600, big aperture lens , Image stabilisation would also be helpful.
 

Spectrum said:
Awesome man! Care to share who's that person? Local or oversea's?:) Thks
So far I only know Sam Abell don't shoot with any flash. But does he shoot weddings too? I have no idea at all.:confused:

i'm sorry. i am not too sure if he wants ppl to know.

but basically he used an xpan. from wat i heard from him is that the problem is shooting in different lighting. like indoors vs outdoors. so u need to understand ur ISOs really well, cant just whack high iso and hope for the best. then will waste a lot of film too.

he only managed abt 20-50 gd prints from the whole day. so i reckoned that its really tough
 

It is not totally out of the question to shoot a wedding without a flash, but, however, you need to know what kind of situation and conditions you will be shooting under. If it is an out door wedding in the the late afternoon, I would say no problem. You could probably get away with using a ISO 100 film. But if you are shooting indoors, you could still shoot without a flash but you will probably find yourself using a ISO 800 or faster film.

I usually shoot with a flash and I like to balance the ambient with the flash. In some hotel ballrooms, the lighting is insufficient to shoot without a flash. I must admit sometimes I do turn of my flash to get a dramatic shot but other than that the flash is used.

If you are thinking of experimenting, I would strongly suggest you not to do do it, not on a wedding you are getting paid to do. You can't afford to not get 'the shots'.
 

wainism said:
i'm sorry. i am not too sure if he wants ppl to know.

but basically he used an xpan. from wat i heard from him is that the problem is shooting in different lighting. like indoors vs outdoors. so u need to understand ur ISOs really well, cant just whack high iso and hope for the best. then will waste a lot of film too.

he only managed abt 20-50 gd prints from the whole day. so i reckoned that its really tough

Thanks for sharing dude.:)
 

hondasleeper said:
...


If you are thinking of experimenting, I would strongly suggest you not to do do it, not on a wedding you are getting paid to do. You can't afford to not get 'the shots'.


yes. I never do experiment on paid assignment :angel:
 

canon 5d + 50mm f1.0? or 85mm f1.2? :bsmilie: :thumbsup:

anyway i think its possible under normal indoor condition with iso 800 or close bundle with a wider than f2 lens.
 

Yes, I remember there's a photographer who called his service Availablelite. His wedding coverage is all using available light.

It works if you know how to work with the ambient light to your (the picture's) advantage.

Check out http://www.jeffascough.net/ . Ok it's not your normal chinese wedding in HDB flats and florescent lighting, but just to show the works of a photog who knows how to work with ambient lighting.
 

In theory it is possible with the better cam and "L" lens but in practice, IMO it is not going to give you very good results for certain shoots (not fast enough, too much shadows, etc..) ... as such i think it is not recommended for newbies....... :nono:
 

I think without flash gives better skin tone and colors. I think iamasaint shoots without flash most of the time. Pro!
 

hondasleeper said:
Just curious as to where you got your information that film has more latitude than print film and black and white is more forgiving??? I am at a loss.

From my years of working with film and digital, I think you have it wrong. It is digital that has more latitude than film. Transparencies have a latitude of 2 to 2 1/2 stops, print film or negative film has a latitude of 5 stops and digital has a latitude of up to 10 stops.
Up to 10?! :bigeyes: I know (from my limited experience in taking photos)that S3Pro the current 'king of DR' can pull a 4 stop stunt. Even so, one will have to shoot in raw and recover the hilights then shadows and combined the 2 back into the same photo.

But 10?!:eek: :sweat: Multiple frame exposure + CS2 HDR is not counted.:sweatsm:

edit: Just found out that the DR of human eyes is around 15 stops.
 

exposure latitude is the dynamic range being captured.

2 ways to measure it.

1. Dmax
2. F-stops

conversion Dmax 1 = 3.322 f-stops

negative film has dmax of 2 - 2.5
velvia has dmax 3.3
most digital probably works around dmax 3.

the problem here is not the dynamic range. it's the tonal bias. choose your own poison truly..

When you actually shoot and print a photo, it seldom stretches beyond Dmax 1.8 for ALL commercial material. because beyond that it loses useful details which laymen cannot pick out. I know this cos I sell reverse telecine machines and 35mm film scanners(motion picture).

hope this clears up some clouds... chill guys..
 

jdredd said:
that is correct, digital now has far better dynamic range than film does.

to the original poster, i dont see why you couldnt shoot a whole wedding without flash.

you would need a camera that has workable high ISO 800 or 1600, big aperture lens , Image stabilisation would also be helpful.
have you tried before using ISO1600,F2.8 indoor in a banquet?
can you give a rough idea how will the shutter speed like?
Assuming given mid range zoom of f2.8 aperture unless you are shooting 85mm f1.2 or 50mm f1.4 through out which is highly unlikely.
 

zaxh81 said:
have you tried before using ISO1600,F2.8 indoor in a banquet?
can you give a rough idea how will the shutter speed like?
Assuming given mid range zoom of f2.8 aperture unless you are shooting 85mm f1.2 or 50mm f1.4 through out which is highly unlikely.
depending on the lighting really.

with spotlight (on stage, during march in), around 1/250 (can even be faster)

with very dim ambient light, 1/15?

anywayz, on the topic of shooting without flash, it's definitely possible, and i would say iso800 isn't enuff.. u need iso1600.

also, shooting at f1.4 even if you have the lens is not feasible. even at 2.8 you have to deal with a pretty shallow DOF. couple that with slow shutters at times (even if you are stable as a rock, pple do move) it's a very very difficult task.

do what most of us do. mount the flash, use it when you need to, don't die die also dun use flash, just to prove that it's possible.

the shots below are all "flashed" at a wedding banquet.... i think most of you might agree it doesn't look that "unnatural" does it? :)


DC083.jpg


DC088.jpg


GR043.jpg


GR044.jpg


feel free to download the images to check exif. =)
 

pardon my ignorance but what is flash with strobe returns?:)
 

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