Light Painted Wedding Photograph Minneapolis Marriott Northwest
Here the story behind Griffith and Kathryn’s pretty wedding light painting photograph created during their Minneapolis Marriott Northwest wedding reception.
No Camera For Joannie This Time
Joannie had surgery to repair two torn ligaments in her ankle back in January. Since she had a non-weight bearing restriction for 6 weeks, I needed a substitute helper at Kathryn and Griffith’s wedding. So I recruited our longtime friend and 30-year professional photographer, Michelle Schmidt, as my assistant for their wedding day.
Michelle is a professional photography window light guru. Working with her at Griffith and Kathryn’s wedding was very much like working with Joannie as they both have a similar wedding photography style. Thank you very much, Michelle!
As talented as Michelle is a professional photographer, the one thing that Michelle has never done is a light painting wedding photo. I’m not sure that she’ll ever want to do another after watching the crazy man (me) running up and down the stairs while light painting an entire corner of the Minneapolis Marriott Northwest with a fifteen-foot pole.
Minneapolis Marriott Northwest Wedding Light Painting
Since it was cold and windy on this February wedding night, I had to come up with a place to create the wedding light painting. Ideally, it would be someplace kind of quiet without a lot of traffic. That took the fireplace area in the hotel lobby out of play, it was too busy. Plus as nice as it is there, it just doesn’t have enough depth and character to create a very interesting light painted wedding photograph.
The crazy three-way staircase in the convention center just kept calling my name. To get all of this huge staircase in the wedding photo it was a job for a very wide-angle lens. Our fisheye lens would have been cool, but because we were aiming downward, it would have distorted the edges of the image way too much. So our newly acquired ultra-wide Canon EF 11-24mm f/4.0L USM lens got its very first workout. That lens is crazy wide. It almost sees behind the camera!
The “before” image prior to creating Griffith and Kathryn’s light painted wedding photo at the Minneapolis Marriott Northwest.
Above is the starting wedding photo before any light painting. Kathryn and Griffith are less than ten feet from the camera. I told you it was an ultra-wide lens!
Light Painting Wedding Photography
Once their wedding dance was fully underway, Michelle and I set up by the staircase. We did a couple of practice shots to come up with the spot where we would place our newlyweds. Because of the incredible wide-angle view of the lens, placing them at any distance from the camera would make them appear pretty tiny (see above). So Michelle and I decided a more dramatic pose much closer to the camera would look the best.
This is the finished light painted wedding photograph in all of its ultra-wide splendor! Pretty cool isn’t it?
Griffith and Kathryn’s Light Painted Wedding Photograph at the Minneapolis Marriott Northwest.
I’ve also included a very short YouTube video that shows the entire light painted wedding photo from capture to creation. Thank you for watching!