metering & focus for group photos

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Mart

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Hi can anyone advise the best setting for shooting group shots outside the church. I have only done a couple of weddings so far, but am not best pleased with my results. I am shooting with a Nikon D200 with a Nikon 17-55mm f2.8 len at f8.
I am shooting RAW, spot metering off the brides face, maybe i should me using matrix?? not sure. Also the images dont seem very crisp.. I am using single area AF on the brides face for focus. can anyone help??
 
What you are doing sounds fine to me. What shutter speeds are you getting - is it movement blur? Have you tried making test images to check the lens sharpness and focus?
 
hi guys thanks for replying. i will post a few pics so you can take a look. My shutter speed is fine so its not motion blur. I am going to print off a few pics to see the clarity.

Can you answer this for me? If i shoot a group at f5.6 and the same at f11 altering shutter for exposure besides the background being different would it cause the group to be less sharp.? It sounds a bit basic i know but i honestly cant answer this.
 
It would all depend on the distance you were from the group & the lens you were using - every lens will have a sweet spot where you hit optimum sharpness (sounds like a transformer :lol:) But the higher the aperture the more bokeh will affect the image & you just have to make sure that the DOF is not too narrow to affect the detail of the guests that are further back in the shot - do you have friends or family members that you could get to stand for you together at different ranges to give you a better idea?

If it were me I'd try to up the aperture to around the f8 & upwards range dependent on conditions & range (rather than upping shutter speed to balance exposure) to ensure good DOF (& try to make sure there is a nice background to shoot against)
 
i tend to try for an f11 for the big group shots and around f8 for small groups with no-one in the background - like b&g plus 6 people. i am going to post a few pics later so you can clearly see what i mean.
appreciate your help guys
 
The 17-55mm f2.8 you are using is a great lens and should be getting pretty sharp images throughout the range but particularly at f8 and f11.

I tend to use centre weighted metering but if the bride is in a white dress on a sunny day you might be better spot metering from the dress and dialling in -2EV to compensate. What shutter speed are you using and have you any examples?
 
Get used to using fill flash for all your outdoor shots - it really does brighten up the shots.

With regard to possible focusing problems when you're using Single Shot AF. Be aware that when you obtain focus and get the green light in the viewfinder, the focus is locked and remains locked as long as you keep that half pressure on the shutter button. If you hang onto this position too long while framing your shot, it's quite possible for members of the group to move or even your own slight movement to throw you off your optimum sharpness.

For that reason, I would arrange the group, focus, finger off the button for a final check, then take the shot with a brief pause at the half press point confirming focus again, then take the shot - all in as smooth and quick an action as possible.
 
Hi Hacker, i see your a nikon user too. just had a squiz at your website, your wedding pics are realy clear. i only bought my d200 a couple of weeks ago. how do you find it holds up to niose?
 
It's okay, at first I thought it wasn't that good at handling noise but having seen some prints that I thought were noisy on screen it handles it okay. The only problem is if you underexpose at High ISO you do get a lot of noise when trying to recover the shot. I think Nikon's tend to underexpose anyway (the D70 was worse IMO) so I nearly always have +0.3 or +0.7 EV compensation dialled in.
 
Hacker said:
I tend to use centre weighted metering but if the bride is in a white dress on a sunny day you might be better spot metering from the dress and dialling in -2EV to compensate.
Click to expand...

I hope you mean +2EV (especially if it's a traditionally white dress) ..... :thinking:
 
chuckles said:
I hope you mean +2EV (especially if it's a traditionally white dress) ..... :thinking:
Click to expand...

That's just what I was thinking!! :thinking:

-2 for something dark!!

Don't confuse the boy Colin!! :D
 
metering off the brides face, maybe i should me using matrix??
Click to expand...

Whichever method you use, you need to be comfy interpreting what the camera is seeing and trying to tell you. Some amount of nudging is going to be required pretty often with wedding groups to try and get the best balance of shadow and highlight detail.

The best way to keep control of what's going on is to use your histogram. I find it far quicker to forget about metering all together, dial in my best guess and adjust from the readout.
 
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