I ended 2006 with a great wedding on Grand Island and made some positive changes as a test for 2007 .





















Check out more in the slideshow on my blog

I didn't have a second shooter or an assistant but I did have a really helpful videographer who acted as a second set of eyes for me a few times during the night when I was working in one of the three reception rooms

A Garmin Streetpilot or a TomTom GPS unit is well worth the money if you travel for weddings. It made me very comfortable being able to listen to the GPS voice commands and look at the live map while driving.

DJ's brilliant settings are excellent and extremely fast to use. After a few changes to the settings to make my Nikon pictures look great I had a preset for all but 50 out of my 1200 photos. The editing took about 35 minutes of active time instead of the 3-4 hours that it used to take. The only thing I need to fine tune is the editing of slightly off pictures, Brilliant seems to excel at dead on photos and far off photos but the slightly over/under exposed and the slightly warm and cool needed to be edited by hand

Pictage is growing on me and I think I'll use them for more 2007 weddings. I just have to get used to how slow their FTP server is compared to my old lab and add on a few days to when I expect to get the pictures online

The 85mm f-1.4 or f-1.2 is a solid investment; I used it plus the 12-24mm for almost all of the images for this wedding.

wow, really fantastic job on these brady! that second cake shot (with the black space) is so designer chic!

thanks for sharing what you've tried and what works, that's always great information to hear!!


superb imagery!

Solid work Brady. I'll check out the slideshow and leave some love on the blog.

All the best to you in 2007 bro.

really nice work brady. great emotion in the pics. they will love them.

Well done my man, your clients will love them!

Thanks, it was a fun wedding with some great people

Brady, just wanted to say, like everyone else, your pics look great! I especially like the last one you posed here with the groom gettin' down - SO funny!!!!

Solid work Brady! I really enjoyed the photos and the insight below! I especially love the necklace shot and the first of the bride & Dad!

Thanks, the groom and the FOB were doing air guitar solo's, it was great!

The mother, father and bride were all really close, it made getting emotional pictures easy and meaningful

Those are some really great moment shots, Brady! I especially like the the bride and FOB shot...nice work!

Beautiful! The second cake shot is killer!!!

Brady, that 2nd shot is awesome. Definitely caught my eye. Great stuff.

yeah-
I really love that overhead cake shot-
great idea-

next wedding..I'm going up:)

fun images!

Thanks... I love being 6'5", all I have to do is reach straight up with a 12-24mm and it looks like I am three stories in the air

Dude, that's BS. I have to use a chair to get those shots.

Great stuff. What a wonderful way to end the year, huh?

I was reaching straight up with the 12-24mm during the receiving line to get candid group pictures and it worked great, I can't wait to see if they sell since I got just about every guest with the B&G

NYE's weddings are always great fun

Brady,

love the shot of the bride and her father before the ceremony. what a great moment!
these are really nice. great work!

Thanks so much, the bride and her father seemed like best friends, the whole family was really close .

By the way, I love the LaCour blog

hey brady………lovin these!!!!!

we gotta get together

I give Kudos and echo the others: Great captures. The overhead cake shot and the bride and father shots - both of them - before and the dance (expressions are priceless!). WOW!

Thanks also for the workflow comments. Very enlightening.

Let's meet for lunch or coffee again in Canandaigua, it is always a good time

Thanks Matt

Really like #1 very classy looking!

Thanks so much

These clients have not actually checked their email on the honeymoon yet so they haven't even seen the sample of photos, I am really excited for when they get back. I know their reaction is going to be great!

I always sit at home and wonder what the how people react when they first see their photos...

I shot my soon to be brother in laws wedding in November and was there when they first saw them, and it was the most incredible feel I have ever had. To see a smile plastered to someone's face for 45 minutes straight, and tears rolling down cheeks was waaay cool!!

I'm sure your couple is going to love them!

The one real thing I miss about having most of my clients live so far away is that I don't ever get to see them look at their photos for the first time. I love getting the great phone calls and emails but watching their reaction is so much better

Ooo! can we hear more about your camera presets? I've been messing around alot with mine lately and am very interested in hearing about other people's...

Please...pretty please...

Very nice. Great clarity!!!!!! I love all these shots bro!!!!!

Thank you .

The 85mm f-1.4 is awesome for my style of work, it is sharper wide-open than most of my other lenses at a middle aperture. I think I used that for most of the pictures here.

Davina, I'll post my workflow details on OSP or put them in my email newsletter

I love the cake shot from above. The graphical elements are striking.

Thanks, I am really happy with that cake picture, I love when everything works out right and you get a photo like that

I'm just starting to get interested in photograpy - can you tell us what your settings were for the pictures? Did you use a flash?

All of the pictures shown here had flash that was bounced off of various objects around me. As to exposure settings, without looking up the meta data I am guessing.

A mix of A-priority and manual
ISO 400
1/15-1/60
Bounce flash
A mix of AWB and custom WB
f-1.4 through f-5.6

Thanks for the response. Awesome pictures and it really doesn't look like you used a flash at all - I guess because it's bounced. Was the picture with the bride and dad bounced at the ceiling? I'm trying to learn where lighting comes from - I'm thinking that if I learn where the lighting comes from then I'll pay more attention to it when I do pictures.

Gorgeous shots brady! love the bokeh ;-) really nice emotion and composition.
submit this stuff to the knot or something!

It was bounced off of the back wall and ceiling .

Abby, I love the way the 85mm f-1.4 renders the background wide open

i just splurged on the 1.2 myself-i'm in bokeh heaven!!!

That is excellent!

I can't wait to see some of your photos with it

Brady, these pictures are awesome! They are just perfect - the couple will love them. I know you like using prime lens, how hard is it to learn how to shoot with these when you have been shooting with a zoom. I love the look and the quality you get.

I have pretty much always used prime lenses, so I don't know if the switch would be hard .

I like that prime lenses force me to see things a little more creatively, I can't just zoom in or out to the perfect composition... I need to move from side to side, step in, back up or use the elements around me to make a tighter or looser composition work .

The two biggest positive features that I love about prime lenses are that I can shoot so wide open and that the lenses are so small that they are not drawing extra attention or tiring me out

I’ll have a little article about my opinions on prime lenses in a future version of the newsletter!

EDIT: thanks for the blog comment

I loved the slideshow! I looked up the lens, and I can see what you mean, it is small, a bit expensive, but looking at your pictures, well worth it. Looking forward to the newsletters - always enjoy them and learn so much. Hope Gavin will have you on another one of his shows soon. This lens is my next purchase.

Good stuff man!!!

I'll talk to Gavin in a few weeks and see if he is interested in speaking with me again . The 85mm f-1.4 (or f-1.2) is a great lens, you won't go wrong with it!

Thanks John. I love looking at your work, it is always solid

i LOVE the bride and dad(?) shot - that's amazing and so fun and sweet.
<3 kristy

Thanks, I appreciate it. It sure was the bride with her father

The couple hasn't gotten back from their honeymoon yet and they haven't checked their email since they left... I can't wait for them to see the photos!