"Crystal Lake Beauty"

"Crystal Lake Beauty"
© David A. Ziser

This is just a simple classic wedding portrait of the bride and groom on the shores of beautiful Crystal Lake in northern Michigan.  This was the location of a second home for the bride’s family, a favorite place for the bride as she was growing up, and she decided the perfect location to have her wedding just a couple weeks ago.

My job was to capture the beauty of the location and try to bring a few of those childhood memories back for her as she viewed her wedding images.  We only had a few minutes to capture the photographs so I chose the widest optic I had in my gear bag to capture this beautiful landscape.

My plan was to keep the composition simple and symmetrical and focus primarily on Crystal lake’s beauty.  As simple and straight forward as this image is presented, I think it captures the spirit of the client’s intent.

The real challenge was getting the light on the subject’s.  I had my assistant, LaDawn, reach the strobe into the photograph so I could get enough light on the couple.  Yes, in the original photograph, you could clearly see the strobe and monopod extended into the scene.  A little Content Aware Fill CS6 magic solved the problem, thank you very much ;~)

I know the bride and groom are quite small in the composition, but that was not a big issue for me as I had several closer images of them.  This photograph was supposed to be about the lake, the view she and here family have loved for many, many years. As you can see, I certainly hope I was successful.

Camera specs: Canon 5D Mark III fitted with Sigma 12-24mm lens at 12mm, F11 @ 1/250 second,  ISO 200.  Enjoy!  -David