Now that the time of confirmations and communions is approaching, surely more than one you have to go as a photographer for the family. Therefore, today in we bring you some tips that will be very useful if we want to take some decent photos in the church.

First of all, we have to keep in mind that since we are not authorized photographers, we will not have the privileged place that the photographer hired by the church will enjoy, so we must sharpen our ingenuity to get quality shots.

Keep in mind that our professionals in christening photography in Sydney is an excellent option to immortalise your happy family in a great picture. Here at Fuss Photography you’ll find them.

Without more, we leave you with the tips:

Use a telephoto lens

This is not going to be a big problem for most of our readers, because as the last survey shows, most of you, complement your photographic equipment with a telephoto lens as the first option. For those who do not have a telephoto lens, try renting it or borrowing it from an acquaintance who has one.

Speaking of focal points, we do not recommend anything less than 100mm if we want to take good close-ups and strain the framing between the heads of the people in front of us. On this occasion it will be useful to have enough megapixels, since if we do not have a very long telephoto lens, we can cut the picture.

The ideal would be to do with a typical 70-300mm or a good SUV up to 200mm. With my 18-105mm, in the confirmation that we had last weekend, we stayed a little short in some photographs and had to pull clippings.

Another way of putting the frame between the heads in front of us is to lift the camera and shoot in the air. For those of us who have cameras with Live View it will be quite easy to get. For those who do not, they will have to try until they get a good framing. Those who will best have it in the face of photographing from above will be those users of the Nikon D5000 or any compact with flip screen.

Arrive soon

We all know that in this type of celebration, the churches get on top of people and if we do not arrive soon, we will probably stay far behind, where then we can save the camera because we will have little to do.

So, it is best that we place ourselves in a strategic place where we can photograph as much as possible the person we love. Let’s take the opportunity to place ourselves on the sides of the front, always respecting the places reserved for the family (if we are part of the family, better) and for the children who confirm / make communion.

Check it out …

Yes, if we have no decision and settle for photographing from our site, we will only get photos with people from behind. Therefore, face it (always being respectful) and move around the church taking advantage of the moments when you have to stand.

We can even afford to approach the altar when the nephew is receiving communion, or the cousin is being confirmed. As long as we do not disturb the official photographer, in principle there will be no problem. Of course, we cannot abuse this situation and we do not recommend trying it more than a couple of times if we do not want to be noticed.

What do we do with the flash?

There are times when we cannot use the flash. However, in modern churches it is generally allowed to use the flash. Unless expressly forbid it in an ancient cathedral, let’s not be afraid of its use.

When using it in a closed place, it will enlighten us enough to get the subjects we photograph well.

Taking advantage of the fact that we talked about flash, we tell you something that made me very funny: In the church there was a guy with a brand-new Canon 5D Mark II and a Canon supermegaflash. So far nothing weird. However, he was wearing the lens hood on the lens. Of course, this would generate some vignettes in the photos difficult to correct in the post processed. So, please, the lens hood for when it is very sunny or raining, not to try to make the lens of our camera bigger.

In spite of everything, there are flashes that allow you to use a parasol without causing vignetting in the photos. We should always read the instruction manual to make sure, but if in doubt, better do without it.

Control the ISO

Although we are in a closed place in low light, the flash will help us, so it is best that we lower the ISO and thus save us from seeing noise, especially if we are going to make a cut of the photos.

Thanks to the fact that the flash will illuminate us, we can use ISO 800-1600 without problems. If we decide not to use the flash (or it is not allowed) we will have no choice but to pull ISO 3200 onwards. Here our compact will not be the best option.

Shoot in shutter priority

In these situations, people are quite still as a rule, so with a speed of 1/60 it will be more than enough. If we see that the photos are a bit shaken we can play until we get well defined photos.

The depth of field will give us a bit the same, because given the circumstances of low light, the camera will tend to open the diaphragm to the maximum and play with the ISO to establish a correct exposure from the shutter speed.

After these tricks, we hope that your photos in church improve.

Keep in mind that here at Fuss Photography you will find a team of experts ready to assist you during your child’s christening.