Sometimes I think people can get way too caught up with the gear of photography. When you start getting into lighting you can really start getting gear crazy, you want multiple lights, radio slaves, light modifiers, etc…. Sometimes though keeping your lighting ultra simple can be your best bet and still allow you to get some amazing images! Whenever I am working a wedding I am always looking out for dramatic lighting and love spotlights and other very direct lighting that venues often times have.

This photo is an example of a very quick and easy shot that we got that required no lighting or anything to setup. I was photographing a wedding at a restaurant. It was actually a daytime wedding and the reception was at the main restaurant around 2:00 in the afternoon. In one corner of the room they had this little woven fabric hanging from a tapestry bar. It was a pretty cool texture to use for a background and they had it lit with just one strong spotlight. Even though it was still day and the room had a lot of ambient light I knew that with the power of that spotlight we could create a dramatic image. Setting up this shot was simple, I had to have the subject look slightly up towards the light to avoid any hard shadows under her eyes and set my exposure for the light on her skin. I don’t have the time to get a light meter out while I shoot, so all I do normally is zoom into the area I want to meter and get an exposure from my camera. So I would focus on her face, see what the exposure is there and then manually set that in my camera. That will give you the correct exposure but also since there is such a different with the light on the subject vs. the light on the background your background will become much darker. In this case since it was daylight and there was plenty of light coming in this helped me to get a nice dark and dramatic background where the subject can just pop right out of. If you would have just let your camera average out the scene it would have made that background more true to real life so it would have been much lighter and then the subject would have been way too light and blown out.

You can also change how dramatic the light is by simply having your subject move the angle of their head. The more the subject is facing the spotlight the flatter the light. The more that they turn away from the light the more dramatic the shadows will be. If you want something very dramatic like Hollywood lighting then just turn the subject slightly away from the light. Also check out our post on Hollywood lighting from awhile back here: Holllywood lighting for photography

It only took a few minutes to shoot and we captured some great images of the bride that were very dramatic, all done with existing light during the day. Here is a shot of my wonderful assistant modeling for me as we tested out the light beforehand.

For those interested here are the tech specs for this shot:
Canon 5d
ISO 800
50mm 1.4 lens
1/40th second @ f/3.2

This post is sponsored by Collages.net

I mentioned awhile back how the first dance and some of the dancing at a wedding as one of my favorite times to shoot (creative wedding reception lighting article here). The reason is with a nice dark dance floor is the the perfect opportunity to get creative with lighting. One thing that I love to do is use the videographers light backlighting the bride and groom to create a cool light. Sometimes it is just a backlight for the effect and I still will use my flash as the main light, other times I will use it as a dramatic side light with no other flash. It really depends on the effect I am going for and how much ambient light I have to deal with. Here are a few images from a recent shoot where I used the videographers light for a nice effect.

The first shot my flash was turned off and I only used the room light for my main light. With the ISO of the 5d I can shoot at ISO 1000 or above and still get a good file and I usually shoot these at f/2.8 or lower so don’t need a ton of light to get my subjects exposed. I always figure out my exposure before the dancing starts (at the middle of the dance floor) and set my exposure to manual. Then i’ll shoot some frames with the videographer in a different part of the shot. I might have their light right in between the couple or barely on the side of one of their heads or even totally to the side. Each spot the light is at will have a pretty big difference on the effect of the light so experiment. But remember to experiment after you get the shot nailed, first get the good shot you know your client will want. Then have fun!

Sometimes I’ll have my external flash units on and just use the video light as a little accent behind them or on the side. That is what I did here, I framed the videographer in just to add a extra dynamic to the shot. The subjects will be exposed perfect from your main flash and the video light just adds a visual element to the shot.

And this final example is another one with no flash at all, just exposed properly for the subject and then framing the video light in between them.

Have a dance shot you love? Post a link to it in the comments.