CBL Lens

Did Frances and Lenise’s wedding today at the Anglican Cathedral in Bloemfontein. Major Henry Warden, founder of Bloemfontein, laid the foundations of this wonderful Victorian building in 1850. The Anglican Cathedral is located in the east end of Saint George’s Street and is well worth a visit when in Bloemfontein. St Georges street is the street where Bloemfontein actually  started in 1840.

Also in St. Georges street is the First Raadsaal. This is a very modest building made of dung floors and has a thatched roof. This house once served as a church, then a conference chamber, a parliament house, school for the local children, and at one time it housed all of the city’s original civil institutions.

Here a few photos that i took in the Anglican Cathedral. I took a White Balance reading with a CBL lens and further used only available light. Camera used was a Nikon D3 and a 24-70mm F2.8 lens.

Gerhard

Wedding Photography Part 1

Over the last 15 years wedding photography became a big part of my life. One of the most common questions people ask me at weddings is if i don’t get tired of still taking photos at weddings.  My answer is always simple. As a photographer it is my passion to take nice photos and where can you find a better place and situation to do just this.  The people and specially the bride dresses up nicely,the table setting and even the church look out of this world, the people want nice photos and the best of all they paying me to take some nice photos for them. If you get tired of taking photos at weddings you just did to much in a short period of time or maybe you just doing it for the money and not for the love of taking nice photos.  My advice to young people starting of in wedding photography is to never do more than thirty weddings per year.  Rather do twenty weddings per year over a span of twenty years than fifty over 3 years because if you do over fourty weddings per year you going to hate photography after three years. You can take my word for it because there was a period of two to three years that i did to many and it nearly killed me.

If a couple want to book me for a wedding i always prefer that they must come and see me personally. This will happen approximately a year before the wedding. This meeting is just to meet the couple and sort out the package they want, sort out the deposit and write down all there details in my diary. About three weeks before the wedding i will meet with them again to sort out the detail of how and where we going to take the photos.  One thing that i always tell the couple is that i am more than willing to take some nice photos for them and will do my utmost best to do so but in return i want some cooperation from them in a sence that i need at least 45 min with the bride alone(without any other photographers nearby) and 45 min alone with the two of them again without any other photographers nearby which can get very distrackting.  It is very simple, if they give me the opportunity to taking nice photos i can try to do so but if they don’t then i can’t.  The rest of the wedding i don’t care and everybody can take some photos with there cellphones in between.

In wedding photography Part 2 i’m going to explain how one must break up a wedding in  four different phases and how much time one got to take photos during these phases. I will also show some examples of photos that i took and what i did to got the result.

Till next time.

Gerhard