I thought it’d be a great idea to occasionally share a shot and tell you how I got that shot. So for this post, I’ve chosen one of my favourite images of 2018 from Anna & Dan’s stunning Southsea Castle wedding. The pair wed in May with the weather being a mixture of lovely warm sunshine, with a bit of rain and thunderstorms (at all the right times!).
This silhouette style shot of Anna & Dan at sunset just going into blue hour standing in front of the lighthouse at their Southsea Castle wedding. I was so excited when I took this photo, I just knew I had something special!
THE INITIAL PLAN
I really wanted to get back out at sunset to do some awesome photos with the lighthouse while the guests were inside enjoying a drink! We were so lucky as it rained during dinner, but stopped just in time for us to get back out there! I remember driving back in a thunderstorm, so we were definitely extremely lucky to get this shot!
As the day was slipping away and the sunset was slowly fading, I got Anna & Dan to climb the stairs to the lighthouse while I stayed on the ground to get some photos looking up at them. You can see the stairs in the image above. The sun by this point had dipped way behind the walls of the castle as it started to turn from golden hour to blue hour.
THE DEVELOPMENT
I started by getting Anna & Dan to look towards me, I took a few shots and everything was looking great. That’s when the story really begins to build. I take a few more shots of different orientations, and compositions to get a feel for what’s working best and what I want to achieve. I wanted to do a landscape shot with everything so you could get a feel for the whole scene, and I love the way Dan is looking at Anna is this one – so a definite keeper for the couple!
Then I went in for a tighter crop moving Anna & Dan further to the right, really making them stand out. I aimed a flash up at them to help light them while keeping the colours of the sky perfectly exposed. A cheeky kiss with each of their hands nice and relaxed on the railings and we had a perfectly natural, but beautifully set up moment.
Then we built on that even more. One of my favourite things to do, is to get couples to look at each other. Nothing shows the true emotion and relationship of couple better! They usually just laugh because they’re doing it in front of me. Luckily for Anna & Dan, I was all the way down on the ground and so instead we achieved something much more romantic. Getting rid of the flash and exposing for the sky, a bit of tweaking in post production really brings this image to life.
THE FINAL IMAGE
In for a kiss once more, this was the one that needed to be black and white. The one that focused on that moment between newlywed bride and groom. While still showing the iconic lighthouse, Anna & Dan loved this image and used it for their thank you cards. Which reinforces it in my mind! A beautifully stunning romantic wedding moment captured for these two.
Let me know your thoughts on this one in the comments below!
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