So you are doing a wedding shoot in Santorini in the midday sun with no shade armed only with a Canon 5d MK11 and a mounted Canon 580 EXII speedlight and around 30mins shooting time (including the service), question: Use fill in flash or use post production to bring out the shadows?
That was the dilemma I faced when shooting a friend’s wedding at Santo Winery in Santorini Greece. It was a fabulous setting for a wedding; Santo Winery is situated on the top of the caldera cliff, with a magnificent view of Santorini volcano and the Aegean Sea. There were a few hurdles to overcome; one was going in blind it was the first time I’d seen the venue (idiot I here you cry), the other was zero shade and I mean zero due to the high midday sun and the venue location. The final hurdle was time; weddings are done throughout the day so I had basically 15 mins to take the shots of bride and groom and group shots with the splendid view in the background.
To be fair to myself, normally I would be doing a survey before a wedding looking for potential shots, direction of the sun etc. I had arranged a visit up to the winery the day before the wedding but unfortunately the trip had to be cancelled (honest). I’d also be going into the day with a lot more kit at my disposal such as reflectors to either diffuse the light or reflect the light, plus you would have a bit more time to work with the bride and groom. But it was a wonderful challenge in a wonderful setting and the experience is something that will stay with me for the rest of my career.
Back to the original question because of the time restraints I went for the option of getting the shots required and bringing out the shadows in post-production. Because of the conditions either solution was still going to leave me with shadows but you just have to make the best of the situation. Hard sunlight is one of the toughest lighting conditions to deal with. Where I can, I try to position my subjects so that they are in the shade or have them with the sun behind so they are not squinting or frowning. Unfortunately neither was an option as I said earlier there was no shade plus the bride and groom wanted shots with the magnificent view behind them and quite rightly so. The issue surrounding this was that with the view behind them the sun was behind me shining onto the subjects thus giving very harsh shadows and the subject struggling with the light. I shot in RAW format so that I would have much more control over the images in postproduction. This allowed me to easily hold detail in the highlights while bringing up the detail in the shadow areas (god I love Lightroom3).
If you take a look at Frame 1 below, it’s not a badly exposed shot but the shadow over the face is a little dark and distracting. In Frame 2 I brought out the shadows using the curves and adjustment brush in Lightroom 3. Another way to bring out the shadows would be to combine two JPG’s at different exposures using layers in Photoshop. This also can have good results, but doing it this way is even more time consuming. In normal circumstances I would have preferred to use flash to eliminate the shadows with the sun not shining directly on the subjects. Situations and locations don’t always grant you that opportunity so it’s all about making the best job of a difficult situation!
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| Frame 1 |
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| Frame 2 |
