These Wedding Photography Tips are shared by Guest Contributor : Rebecca Love

All Images by: Rebecca Love

Greetings from Nantucket Island! We are Rebecca and Jonathan, a wedding photography team based on Nantucket Island, 30 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, MA.  We’ve photographed every wedding together since we started back in 2010, and we’re excited for our upcoming summer with 27 weddings on the books! 

We specialize in natural light photography so we are in our element when we’re outside and the sun is still in the sky. One part of taking wedding photos that used to scare us was reception lighting! Oh, I know, it can make you cringe. We didn’t know where to start so we searched online and found countless videos and posts from photographers sharing their lighting setups. The only way we could decide what we would ultimately go with was to try them all out!

We used on-camera flash, we used the Gary Fong diffuser, we used external flashes on stands, we tried it all. After lots of trial and error, we found a system that works well for us! It may not be the way you light a reception, and that is perfectly fine, but here are a few tips that we think might help get you going in the right direction! 

Wedding Photography Tips: How to Capture Gorgeous Indoor Wedding Pictures

1. Invest in a Magmod

We’ve found it to be the BEST diffuser and looks pretty sleek! It is easy to pop on and off because it’s connected by a magnet instead of Velcro or straps. It diffuses light beautifully and we leave it on throughout our receptions.

2. Have external flash setups ready to use

You don’t always HAVE to use them, but you’ll want them there as an option. We come prepared to every wedding with 3 off-camera flash setups. This gives us the ability to use all three, just one or none at all! We leave an on-camera flash on and then sync the other flashes so when we take a photo, they all go off. I play around with our setup throughout a reception. Sometimes, I might want the couple to have that back lit look so I’ll pop a flash behind them. Sometimes I’ll just want to bounce my on-camera flash with a diffuser and sometimes I’ll want to light up the entire space with all my flashes going off together. It’s not one size fits all for lighting at a reception and wedding photos. You can mix it up and find what works best for your space. 

3. Lots of extra batteries!

This might be an obvious tip, but it’s a very important one! Let’s say you’ve found your sweet spot for lighting, your shooting away and all of a sudden things go dark because your batteries have died or are dying. You need to have very quick access to your backups so you or your assistant can pop them right in and get you going again. 

4. Practice your lighting with your assistant or a guest before a big moment!

This is another very important tip. Sometimes the couple will be cutting their cake in a separate location – perhaps it’s off to the side of the room where the lighting is different. It’s important to run over before the big moment and practice your setup before the real thing begins. That way, you know exactly what you need to adjust before they arrive and you’ll know exactly where to position them for the best shot. We never attempt a sparkler exit without practicing first! 

5. Our final tip is PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE.

Jon and I set up our lighting in our house before weddings to make sure everything is working properly. We make sure our flashes are synced. We turn on lights, then we turn them off. We move closer to the camera and then farther away. We use different lenses. If you do this, you’ll see how everything changes and you’ll be ready for those changes when the big day arrives! 

We really hope you find these tips to capture gorgeous wedding photos helpful! Reception lighting does not have to be scary! You can actually arrive to a low lit reception with a lot of confidence if you follow these tips and continue to practice. We would love to answer any reception lighting questions you might have that we didn’t answer here, or tell you the exact gear that we use for weddings, so please feel free to reach out to us any time at [email protected]. 

We want to thank Shannon Shipman for including us as a guest blogger! We love her work and we are so grateful to have met her via social media – we can’t wait to meet her in real life soon! 

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Which of these wedding photography tips did you find most helpful? Let me know in a comment below!