meganbeth.com

If you’re a photographer, have a love for photography, or just want to know my favorite cupcake flavor and want to have one of your questions answered on my next FAQ post, feel free to email me here, and I’ll try to include it! For past FAQ posts check them out here.

Alicia asked: How do you get couples to loosen up and laugh?  Sometimes I feel like my couples are so nervous it’s hard to get them to relax!   Well, that’s a great question, Alicia!  I am, by no means, an expert in posing but I do have a few things I do to get my couples to laugh.  Regardless of a couples’ comfort level in front of the camera I feel that it’s my job to draw the emotion out of the subjects that I’m photographing.  Not every technique works the same for every person I photograph, and not every photographer instructs their subjects the same way, but these are a few things that I do.  My personality is full of life and crazy outgoing and my clients know that, and are familiar with the work that I produce when they book me.  Therefore they trust in me to produce the same kind of images, even when I instruct them to do some weird poses to get those images.

The Lick.  Yes you heard me, in both of these images I told the groom Ok now I want you to give your lady a little lick on the temple.  Is it ridiculous?  Yes.  But they both end up genuinely laughing like Yelena and Megan, and looking all adorable and shit.  Sorry mom, it slipped.

The Get Away.  I also like to loosen them up by getting them to play little games.  I’ll have the them hold onto each other and then instruct the bride to try and getaway from the groom.  Most of the time the groom is stronger than the girl, though sometimes he gives her a little wiggle room.  Either way it loosens them up, always produces a different result, and ends up with them laughing.  Here’s Lindsey and Charlie from their Annapolis engagement photos.

And look how happy Lydia (happy birthday!) and Marie look?!

And loved seeing Amy laughing with Bill.

The Walk and Kiss.  Now, contrary to what you might think, I’m not a huge fan of kissing shots.  I know, some wedding photographer I am?!  Fire me.  Although kissing is lovely, hubba hubba, more often than not it’s not pretty; two faces and noses smashed together, it doesn’t show emotion, and it takes absolutely no talent to tell two people to stand there and kiss.  I want the images to show the emotion from the moment, and to pull it out of them I instruct them that we’re going to walk and kiss.  Them, not me.  But, here’s the thing about walking, and kissing.  You’re aiming for a moving target, and more likely than not you’re going to miss, and bump shoulder, and foreheads,  which is the point.  They start laughing, and then I tell them to try again, and wait!  don’t stop walking! again! more kissing!   It’s actually quite comical and produces some amazing images like this one from Amanda and Scott’s wedding and another peek from Marie and Scott’s wedding!

The Foreheads.  Summers here in Maryland are awesome.  And hot.  Like so hot you might sweat on your wedding day.  So, sometimes I’ll tell my couples to put their foreheads together full well knowing that they might be a little sweaty.  Do they all do it?  No, and I don’t blame them.  But when they do, they start laughing because you’re so close and it’s kinda a hot mess.  But when you look this happy like Cat and Mike, I’d say it’s worth it.  I also do this in the wintertime when it’s really cold and will have one of them bury their cold little nose in the other’s neck.  Nothing like a cold ice cube nose on the neck to get you laughing; works every time.

The Head Bump.  The head bump is also a favorite and can be done in any pose that you set your couple in.  Below I told the grooms to gently head bump the girl wherever was closest to them.  With Rob and Jess he head bumped her on her temple, and Liz and Alden on her shoulder, and Jessica and Nico on her temple.  I normally have them do it several times and have them increase the velocity.  Ok, now this time do it a little harder!   They obviously never end up really doing it hard enough to hurt, but by the last few times they always end up laughing because it’s just so weird and ridiculous .

Contact megan beth here.  Join me on Facebook here. Follow me on twitter here. And please leave a comment, I’d love to hear from you!

If you’re a photographer, have a love for photography, or just want to know my favorite cupcake flavor and want to have one of your questions answered on my next FAQ post, feel free to email me here, and I’ll try to include it! For past FAQ posts check them out here.

Lori asked: How do you keep your files organized?  Over the years it’s taken a few systems to finally get one that worked the best, so most importantly it’s about what works best for you.  I have a filing cabinet where I keep all my important documents and backups but, on my desk I keep two file trays at arms length.  The top one keeps personal items and the bottom one keeps all my files for this seasons weddings.  They’re filed by brides last names and dates; I’ve found that by using the brides last name I can keep better track of the wedding because I’m in contact more with the bride than the groom.  Originally I kept everything in the filing cabinet but it became a huge mess every time I had to go over and pull out a file.  Now everything I need is right at my desk.  Included in each file is their contract, package selection, invoice, a copy of their payments, and their product selection sheet.  Some people are going paperless but I still need to have hard copies of some things.

Gracie G asked: Do you shoot RAW?  From the inception of my business I started shooting JPEG and that’s the format I still shoot today.  RAW format records more data in the pixels while you’re shooting which allows you to manipulate the photo more when you’re editing; therefore they are significantly bigger and then always have to be converted to JPEGs at some point anyway.  Basically if you mess up when you’re shooting it’s easier to fix during post processing.  My theory has always been…don’t mess it up in the first place.

Chris asked:  How do you handle the email load?  Email is FUN!  SIKE!  Over the past year I’ve really started to set up guidelines for myself.  No emails during non-work hours.  And no email on the weekends.  This is a job, just like other people have jobs and just because I own a business does not mean that I should have to answer emails at all hours of the night and weekends.  I am just a photographer–not POTUS.  I let my clients know that the best way to get a hold of me is by email and that I will get back to them within 48 hours or else something happened to their email.  And I quit reading my facebook email inbox long ago–someone needs to add the option to disable it.  Trying to juggle real email plus facebook email/SPAM was just too much so I added a note on my facebook that says if you need to get a hold of me, email me, and everyone does.  I encourage you to set up guildlines for your business as well, because the moment you set up guidelines for yourself other people will start respecting them!

Contact megan beth here.  Join me on Facebook here. Follow me on twitter here. And please leave a comment, I’d love to hear from you!

If you’re a photographer, have a love for photography, or just want to know my favorite cupcake flavor and want to have one of your questions answered on my next FAQ post, feel free to email me here, and I’ll try to include it!

I’ve gotten a lot of questions lately about how to shoot in undesirable lighting conditions, specifically close to high noon when the sun is almost directly overhead.  Hopefully these images from Mary Anne and Gus’s engagement photos, help illustrate how I go about lighting my subjects in those tricky lighting conditions.  First and foremost you need to practice in all lighting conditions, and learn to see the light.  Knowing how the light hits different objects and surfaces will make a dramatic difference in your photographs.

I started shooting Mary Anne and Gus’s engagement photos at 10:30AM.  One: because it was supposed to be a hundred degrees that day and we wanted to beat the heat.  And two: because I was trying to shoot their session before high noon, to avoid that direct overhead light.  We started off in Georgetown in a little alley where unfortunately there wasn’t a lot of open shade.  As exhibited in the image below, the alley was flooded with strong light on the right side, and slightly shaded on the left.  This meant that I wanted to shoot most of the images with them on the left side facing the strong light.

I chose this little corner off the left side of the alley where it was partially shaded and faced Gus towards the opposite wall.  By placing Gus in this position he was in the open even shade but facing the alley where the strong light was shining.

By placing him here he was perfectly illuminated without any shadows on his face and the background being evenly shaded.

As we moved down the alley and the walls on the right were painted cream colors, they became perfect natural reflectors.  The first thing I look for when shooting is the lighting, the second thing I take into consideration is the background.  If you notice in the following image, there is a bunch of stuff on the left side of the wall.  There is a big pipe sticking out, a fire alarm, and a parking sign.  After I figured out where the best light would be reflecting off of the right side of the alley, I then needed to place Mary Anne and Gus in a way that would crop out the junk on the wall behind them.

While I’m shooting I always crop the photograph in camera.  Rarely do I shoot a photograph that I will need to go back and crop out things later.  It’s more time and work, so I like to streamline it by doing it while I’m shooting.  So as you can see in this next image, I placed Mary Anne and Gus about a foot to the right of the no parking sign and thus cropping it out out the view finder and image.

Thank No Parking Sign for being perfectly placed in my way.

As I backed up to get a wider angel, the sign became more apparent in the shot, so I decided to reposition myself.  And that sign in the left image?  Well, it’s behind Gus’s head.  I know, don’t mess with me little sign!  And to get a full body shot I could no longer hide the sign behind Gus’s head, so I just had them move to the right about three feet, thus cropping out Mr. Stupid Parking Sign.

As we kept shooting the sunlight was getting stronger the closer it became to noon.  Which I was totally fine with, because it really illuminated their faces as I placed them on the left side of the alley.

Then we moved further down the alley, and this image was taken in the opposite direction facing where we were shooting just before.  The next set of their images, after they changed, were shot on the right side of this image, right in front of the gray painted wall.

Though the sun was quickly becoming more overhead, I placed them close to the gray wall, opposite the brightly illuminated wall.  At this point the sun was super strong, but bounced back into their faces while they stood in the even shaded area, perfectly lighting their faces.  I know it can seem like there are a million things to remember when you’re shooting, but I promise with practice, it becomes instinctive and much easier.Contact me here. Join me on Facebook here. Follow me on twitter here. And feel free to leave a comment, I’d love to hear from you!

If you’re a photographer, have a love for photography, or just want to know my favorite cupcake flavor and want to have one of your questions answered on my next FAQ post, feel free to email me here, and I’ll try to include it!

Emily asked:  How do you shoot bridal party photos, I can never get them all in focus?  I try to keep them in a straight line, but it still never works out! 

I approach bridal party photos very differently than I shoot portraits, as normally I shoot portraits with a very wide aperture, at 2.0 or lower.  But because there are always several people in bridal parties or family photos, on several different planes it is imperative to keep your aperture at least a 4.0 or higher.  I like to shoot at 5.0 or 5.6 just in case.  In shooting at higher apertures, you are making sure that a broader area/plane is going to be in focus.  Think of it this way, the lower the aperture, the lesser the amount of space in the image is going to be in focus.  The higher the aperture, the more area around the focal point of the image is going to be in focus.

This image of Jeremy and his boys I shot at f/5.0 with a shutter speed of 1/200.  Both of the guys on the ends are in focus, as well as the slightly differentiating planes that they are on.  Had this been shot at a lower aperture some of the guys who are slightly in front, or behind Jeremy (the focal point)  wouldn’t have been as sharp.

This image from Hilary and Brett’s wedding is a great example.  I wanted to layer everyone on different planes with steps, and the two wicker chairs for a casual J.Crew looking bridal party in the gorgeous gardens we were shooting in.  In order to insure that everyone was in focus and sharp I shot this at f/5.6 and the shutter speed was at 1/250.

Jamie and Joe’s smaller bridal party all fit under this little walkway.  Although they were all in a straight line, I shot it at f/5.6 and 1/60 to make sure that both people on the ends of the image were in focus as well as the middle focal point.

And this bridal party photo from Jill and Devin’s wedding at the Strong Mansion was shot at f/5.6 making sure that everyone in the photo is in focus including the little guy on the end!

Contact me here. Join me on Facebook here. Follow me on twitter here. And feel free to leave a comment, I’d love to hear from you!