Collectiblend appears to be a pricing website for antique camera gear, pulled from current eBay pricing and other online sale locations. There’s an option to build your own collection; I’m currently waiting for the admins to approve my submission.
Our friend S. has done more for the Lockardugan clan than we can possibly repay. She has nursed kitties, watched over the house, coordinated showers, served as a maid of honor—the woman does it all, with a smile.
She’s getting married in a few weeks, and asked me if I could take pictures at the wedding. This is something that fills me with alternating waves of dread and excitement, because I’m thrilled from a technical aspect, flattered from an artistic standpoint, and terrified I might fuck something up. I’ve been doing some research into basic wedding photography tips, and one of the newsletters I subscribe to had a list of good articles on the subject.
The first article is focused on making happy clients, by doing things like mapping out a shot list, using diffused light, setting expectations, etc. I know I’m going to have to scout out the location of this wedding because it’s outdoors, and definitely find a few backdrops to shoot against.
The second article adds a technical tip: shooting in Aperture Priority. I spent a lot of time fiddling with the Manual settings the last time I shot people outdoors, so I’m going to muck around with this setting a little tomorrow—I don’t know why I didn’t try this earlier.
Several of the commenters suggest lenses that are out of my current price range. The 18-200 VR lens would be a good choice, and a wide-angle lens like the 12-24; I can rent the 18-200 for $35 locally, which isn’t bad at all. I’ll have to see if they have a wide-angle too.
The thing that scares me the most is using the flash; I’m still not up to speed on settings yet, and that’s going to take practice. What I need to do is read up more on TTL metering to see if that’s my best bet, or use something else. I found a book at the store last night which had some great, simple rules of thumb for using TTL flash (especially to reduce red-eye), and doing some digging around the internets I’ve found a few places where the concepts are explained in plain english. This is an article on using multiple wireless TTL flashes. I’ll add more here as I learn.