Wedding Dancing
Photographing the dancing at weddings is one of my favourite times of the day. There’s so much energy and abandon and the first half an hour of dancing tends to be very coordinated, less so sometimes after that!
It’s often one of the few times when guests are less self conscious and even welcome being photographed.
Joss and Jerry’s Wedding
I took this photo at Joss and Jerry’s wedding, a wonderful day with a really relaxed vibe. As a Sussex wedding photographer I’m front and centre when it comes to seeing all the emotion and fun at all the weddings I photograph. Seeing Joss and Jerry get married was such a pleasure, they are so happy around each other. Jerry is a lovely, funny guy, as Joss said in her wedding speech, sometimes he even means to be funny! Joss was radiant on the day and looked like she was having so much fun amongst her family and friends.
Why I Love This Wedding Photo
Whilst there were many photos I could have chosen from their day, and doubtless I’ll be using more of their photos as there were so many great shots to choose from, I chose this one because it really summed up the feel of this part of the day. As soon as the music started the dance floor filled instantly and everyone threw themselves into the dancing.
How I Shot This Wedding Dancing Photo
Over the years I’ve used a variety of different techniques to photograph dancing at weddings. More recently, as cameras get better and better at exposure and focusing in low light, I’ve been able to take dancing photographs without flash and just use the ambient light, capturing the real feel of the lighting and atmosphere from the wedding dancing. For me as a wedding photographer this is ideal. I use a very wide aperture, I shot this at f1.4, and a reasonably fast shutter, though not too fast as I wanted to get just a little bit of blur to capture the energy of the dancing. I find that with my fantastic Fuji XT3, I can shoot at ISO’s of around 12,800, which is incredible, though I actually shot this at 6400 ISO. I used my trusty 16mm lens for this shot, while standing on a chair to get the high viewpoint. I loved the way everyone was reaching up during this particular song and I wanted to get hands and arms in the foreground of the shot.
My Camera Settings
Camera – Fuji XT3
Lens – FUJINON XF 16mm F1.4 R WR
Shutter speed – 1/110 sec
Aperture – f/1.4
ISO – 6400
Here are links to some more weddings with great wedding dancing shots. Teri and Ben at Cissbury Barn, Annabel and Chris’s wedding at Old Finsbury Town Hall, and Caroline and Alexander’s wedding at The ICA.
