Back to work and wedding preparations

I nearly went into work today, but still felt a bit under the weather this morning and decided to rest a bit more. So tomorrow, I’m going to head into work and see if I can pull off a full day. I tried to go to the clinic tonight for a check-up, but there was over a two hour wait, so I’m going to try again in the morning on my way to work.

Also, this weekend I’ll be attending Mike and Kim’s wedding as the primary photographer, which is both exciting and a bit stressful. It’s not hard to grab a camera and take a bunch of photos, but it is hard to be prepared, both technically and mentally, for all the little problems that can arise during the day. The one area I’ve been practicing a lot with is flash photography. While I’m not a huge fan of flash photos, the simple reality is that there are lots of situations where if you don’t use a flash, the photos simply won’t turn out. Another example is outdoors in bright light — if you don’t use fill flash, everyone ends up with huge shadows on their faces and under their eyes.

You can get around this if you have a helper and a reflector (at least outside), but that’s not always realistic. So I’ve spent the past month practicing bouncing a flash, diffusing it, etc. I’ll mix it up quite a bit during the wedding, and try to get a pile of shots without the flash, but I’m at the point where I feel comfortable pulling a flash out and making a shot look decent with it.

The rehearsal is Friday after work, and I’ve told myself I’m not really going to do much prep before then, simply because I think it will all change once I see the venue and get some thoughts in my head. My friend Hesty is going to come and be backup photographer, mainly focusing on the crowd and the guests while I focus on the bride and groom, so that will remove a bit of the pressure from me.

In terms of gear, I pretty much have duplicates of everything important, so I don’t think there’s a problem there. I have two digital bodies and a full frame film body, but after talking with a bunch of people, I’ve decided to stick to digital at the wedding. That means I’ve been forced to rent a 12-24mm from Leo’s camera so that I can have a wide-angle lens for group shots or wide-angle shots of the bride and groom. The cost is only $15 for the weekend, so it’s a good investment.

It’s going to be a long day, and I’m going to do my best to have fun while taking photos. I’m going to get a hotel out near the reception area on Friday so I can have a good sleep without worrying about fighting traffic in the morning. I’m still a bit sick, so I hope I can make it through the day without any problems. But once it’s all over, I’m hoping I’ll look back and be happy with the job I did, and with the good times I spent with my friends.