Dmitriy B.

I spent the last few days in New Orleans on business. Unfortunately I was too busy to explore this wonderful city and only manage to catch a bicycle tour on my first day as well as a few hours on Bourbon Street. To be completely honest, it was so hot and humid that I found it difficult to convince myself to go outside, much less to lug around a 10lb digital SLR.

QUESTION: Should I hire a videographer? ANSWER: It is surprising how many people ask me this question. When brides and grooms plan their wedding, hiring a videographer is usually the last item on their to-do list. It seems like brides and grooms want to wait and see how much money they have left in their budgets before making the decision on whether to hire a professional videographer or to ask uncle Bob to chronicle their wedding with a Flip. When asked for advice on whether or not it is worth to hire a videographer, I always answer that if you are going to hire one, hire someone amazing. When I got married, I relegated the responsibility for hiring the videographer to my mother; as a result, we got 4 hours of unedited footage on VHS. Hiring someone simply because they have a high-end camera or worked in editing or television usually leads to a final product that no one will ever watch. Like with many things in life, with videography you really get what you paid for. When hiring a videographer, ask to look at the final product, not at raw footage of a wedding. A good videographer can make your wedding story into a movie that will turn any Hollywood producer green with envy. Don’t fall for videos with a lot of flashy effects and transitions – those gimmicks are available in any low-end video-editing software such as the iMovie or Sony Vegas; adding spinning and blinking transitions between video segments are usually a good indicator of lack of editing skills. Over the years, I’ve worked with quite a few videographers – some do absolutely amazing work and create incredible memories that you and your children will cherish for years to come. Unfortunately, there are “others” who will turn your wedding day into a cheap reality show and you will be unlikely to ever watch your wedding video. If you are considering hiring a videographer for your wedding, hire someone who is really good; I’ll be happy to give you names of a couple of true professionals.

QUESTION: If you are shooting with digital cameras, why cannot I have my photos at the end of the reception? ANSWER: There is a lot of work that has to take place after the pictures are taken. I shoot in RAW format – it preserves more information than JPEG and gives me more options when it comes to editing. RAW formats are proprietary to each camera manufacturer and camera model and cannot be viewed/edited without specialized software such as Adobe Lightroom or Apple Aperture. I usually walk away from a wedding with well over 1000 photographs. When I get home, I back up all the pictures to two external hard drives – I keep one at home and another one at the office. Once the photographs are backed up, I go through them in Adobe Bridge and delete the ones that don’t quite make the cut. After that first cleanup pass, I load the RAW files into Adobe Lightroom. I color-correct the photos (adjust white balance, contrast, saturation) and fix minor exposure errors. When all photographs are color-corrected, I convert them to JPEG format and start going through them in Adobe Bridge again. From Adobe Bridge, I open photographs in Adobe Photoshop where I clean up blemishes, remove exit signs, power outlets and other distracting elements. I convert some photographs to black and white, run Photoshop actions on others. The entire process usually takes about 15-30 hours, depending on how many photographs I took at an event. Just look at the difference that little touches make. The photograph below is straight out of my camera. It is a little underexposed, there is part of a chair in the right corner and you can see cables along the edges of the floor. This is what it looks like after about 10 minutes in Photoshop:

Over the next couple of weeks I`d like to answer a some questions that my clients ask me at almost every wedding. Let`s start with the the easiest one to answer. QUESTION: Why do you have Tupperware on your flash? (By the way, I’m not kidding. Someone asks me that question at virtually every event I’ve photographed in the last couple of years.) ANSWER: Well, the Tupperware in question is called a diffuser – it softens the light from my flash and eliminates harsh shadows that are more often than not produced by point-and-shoot cameras. I have about 4 different diffusers and softboxes that go on my flashes, depending on the type of job I need to do. The one that looks like Tupperware is called the Gary Fong Lightsphere (http://www.garyfongestore.com/flash-accessories.html)

‘Ah, zis is for my experiment,’ said Otto proudly. ‘You know zat another term for an iconographer would be “photographer”? From the old word photus in Latation, vhich means—‘ ‘ “To prance around like a pillock ordering everyone about as if you owned the place”,’ said William. — Terry Pratchett, The Truth

DJ: Party Time Productions Video: TJ Clark – Video Masters Venue: Pittsburgh Airport Hyatt

It`s so rare to see a brother and sister that get along as great as Elly and Kyle Hula dancers at a Bat Mitzvah – how cool is that!!! Venue: Pittsburgh Renaissance Hotel DJ: Steve Lebo of Party Time Productions

Recently I hit a bit of an anniversary in my photography business – two weeks ago I photographed my 200th wedding. Over the years I photographed in countless churches, temples and synagogues all over the East Coast. Pittsburgh has an amazing number of beautiful churches, but my absolute favorite is the First Calvary United Methodist Church. Many people would argue that St. Paul`s Church in Oakland or the Heinz Chapel are more architecturally appealing and possess more graduer. However, the First Calvary United Methodist Church in Pittsburgh`s North Side has beauty and warmth that few churches that I`ve seen in my life possess. There is just something about it – carved wooden pews, gorgeous stained-glass windows, high stone arches. And the people who work there are so amazingly friendly; it is an absolute pleasure to photograph weddings there.

Last night I photographed a really incredible and fun wedding. We did a photoshoot at the 171st Air Refueling Wing and I could not wait to share a few photos.