Outdoor Pre Wedding Photography Tips for Newly Photographer

When you spend a good time during this pandemic to learn more about outdoor pre wedding photography tips than I hope I can share a nice one for you through this post, my name is Bima and thank you for visiting my blog.

Since I live in Asia than I shoot so many photo session for pre wedding which is belong to most favourite photo shoot before the couple is getting married. I seriously learn more about photography by doing more practice and shoot over and over again both in domestic and international location. If you just begin your photographer career than I suggest you to open mind for any request of photo session, what I mean here just help your couple no matter they want to do a pre wedding in your country or when they ask you for an overseas photo session.

Some busy couple used to get indoor photo session in the studio but there is always a new challenge if you got a couple who want to do an outdoor photo session. This business bring me travel to such beautiful location of photo session so that’s why I want to share more about outdoor pre wedding photography tips that you can personally use to serve your couple.

Not Just Shooting, Try to Create Beautiful Moments

I was shooting with a burst mode back 10 years ago and hoping that my couple will get impressed by hearing my shutter’s sound, I know it’s ridiculous but this is what I’m doing on that day. This method not only make my camera shutter number increasing but also put me into a condition where I feel so confuse to choose the best photos, in fact sometimes I also can’t find one single good photos at all till I finally told my self that this method is,

Totally wrong!

Test Your Gears and Shoot Something

If you just starting your photographer journey than I know exactly how exciting you are for holding your brand new wedding photography equipment so once you just bought that gears than I suggest you to go to some good place and sightseeing around for testing up your camera and lenses. When I want to test how good my equipment is than I always try to go to public areas where I can see a lot of things from human, animal, building, and landscape, so you can seriously do it as same as what I did. Try to capturing moment as many as you can no matter it’s a human or animals.

Shoot Some Details

When you want to stay at home for some reasons than I suggest you to shoot any kind of details that you have surrounding your self. You may shoot for your coffee beans till some accessories that you can find inside your house. I always believe that shooting for details will help you to know and figure out how your sense or art will works properly when seeing some good things.

When some other photographer only shooting for couple during pre wedding but if someone asking me about outdoor pre wedding photography tips than I always suggesting them to shoot for details such as dress, veil, shoes, and many more. It might not directly related with the pre wedding session but you will got few stocks that will inspire you and somehow you can show all your details shots to your potential couple on wedding meeting, it such great moment to show them some details images.

Than Learn to “Create” Moment

If you hired for shooting on pre wedding session than the good thing about it is, you can create the moment for sure as many as you want. If you read my previous post about how to shoot wedding for the first time than I put some note that in the real wedding you can not asking for repetition which is mean you will once the moment once!

Here in pre wedding session you can create moment and even more you can repeat the moment it self, all you need to do here is for making great moment that come in super natural till no one expect that you just creating something on that scene.

Moment #1 – Using Artificial Light

Now take a look for this above images, I always show this photo when someone asking me about outdoor pre wedding photography tips. I was in Maldives on that day and just before me and my couple get dinner I saw beautiful sunset ambiance that I surely only happen just within a minutes. So I asking my couple to sit on the sofa that located right on the edge of the wooden deck and I ask them to hold my dimmable LED light to give a continuous lighting effect on their face, on the same time I use my ultra wide Canon EF 16–35mm f/2.8L III USM Lens and fire up on f2.8 and 1/40 exposure time, it’s kind of slow speed shooting actually, you have to calm and learn to hold your camera in a steady hand.

Moment #2 – Moving Object

I was in Indonesia’s capitol city, Jakarta during the 16 hours wedding. I just get some rest for little bit before the night party and I suddenly know that my bride is walking to an outdoor space just in the front of the wedding hall. So we just have a nice idea to shoot some unique moment that will remind them for this glorious day.

I know that the bride is wearing a nice white bridal so I asked someone who belong to the wedding planner to hold on each gown and sway it carefully, I put my self on a lower angle and shoot with few times with an ultra wide angle lens Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 and set it done on f5.6 aperture and 1/250 for the exposure time. All of us are so happy with this frame because it gaves us a nice angle and moment where we can together capturing how beautiful the bride is during her wedding.

Moment #3 – Reflection on the Water

This third outdoor pre wedding photography tips is quite interesting because you can do it almost anywhere and simply using many kind of water to reflect your photographs. Couple years I ago I shoot a pre wedding in a nice resort around Central Java so after having a heavy rain and do some an off-camera flash technique to improve the situation I ask my couple to walk towards his bungalow till I found a private pool right in front of the terrace. Actually this is a nice pool that covered with natural stone so I can see green and blue colour combination inside the pool.

The main point to shoot a reflection on the water is, you have to make sure that there is no waves on the water surface, in fact we almost impossible to do it on a river or sea but we can control it as well when do this technique on a pool. What I did is asking the room assistant to turn of the water pump so I sure that there is no waves on the water surface so I can get the reflection in very clear. I saw a nice coconut tree leaves above my couple so I will put it together as a shadow or decoration on my frame and I ask my couple to stand below those trees so it looks like a shape of loving heart. Once again make sure that there is no or little water surface on the water than shoot it immediately.

You can see the result below,

Moment #4 – Using Indoor Silhouette

When you do more practice on photo shoot than your eyes will keep learning about light direction. What I gonna share now is about how to create a silhouette on your frame and let it be become of of your wow pictures. The main point to make a silhouette is really simple, put a strong light source behind your couple and keep the other side in dark. The happy thing is you can make a silhouette almost everywhere no matter you are inside the the buildings, on the beach, small room and etc. When you want to make a silhouette than try to figure our your surrounding and find some good place to take action on it.

When I shoot for Ratna and Harry’s wedding in my town than I found a nice stairs tunnel to a basement. What I did is keep my couple to stand together on the entrance of this tunnel while I walk down and stand in a lower level. Through this way I already can see the the silhouette in very clear so what I do next is just shooting as what I see and the silhouette frame will just come in very easy, now see the photo below

Moment #5 – Using Outdoor Silhouette

As I said on the part 4 of outdoor pre wedding photography tips, you can easily create a silhouette both for indoor and outdoor area as long as you can get a strong light source behind your couple. So after showing you about how to do it in an indoor space than now I will take you into my previous photoshoot in Bali for wedding anniversary.

I was in a nice hotel which has a beach front view around Seminyak so what we did is walk around the beach and find a good space where there are a lot of objects behind my couple and surely beautiful sunset view on it. If you find a situation like this than go fast because this moment will pass in very fast so set your couple right on a nice place where you can shoot the surrounding objects too than shoot it immediately. Another tips for making great silhouette is you have to set your camera for a normal setting for the background, as you can see on my below photo where I shoot my couple with a nice sunset view so what I concern for the most is how I could set my camera to get a nice sky and ambiance, go concern about capturing beautiful orange sky and make it sharp than when you able to make it as well than you gonna make a great silhouette for sure.

Moment #6 – Using Bride’s Veil

If you ever read my previous article about veil than you gonna know why I love this thing, it’s simple, cheap, and you can bring it for accessories during your photo session. Majority, every bride will bring their own veil as a hair accessories and the best thing about it is, this not only make your bride’s hair beautiful but you also can use it to create a great moment with it. If you can see for my pre wedding photo below, I try to put my couple together right under the veil and let the wind blows it, sometimes you gonna hard to shoot properly where the wind blows but just keep patience and wait for little while till you get the perfect moment to shoot.

When the wind blows the veil than there will a nice smooth movement on the veil while your couple’s face is still freeze and that’s beautiful. I shoot my couple below simply by using a cheap Nikon 50mm f1.4 fixed lens so you can definitely can see that this photo is super sharp and clear. All you need to do is get use to shoot where the wind blows and try to focusing on your couple’s face.

Don’t shoot it in a rush and just take your time for little while till you can get beautiful moment like this