Overview

Why a whats in my camera bag post? I think it’s good to know what your photographer is using, as well as what you should expect to see on your wedding day! It may just be a me thing, but I would lose sleep over worrying about what they are bringing on my wedding day.

I shoot with the Mark III (My work horse) and the 6D (my work horse light).  I love these cameras, they handle low light (receptions & poorly lit getting ready locations) like champions.  If you are a photographer, and wondering if you should go full frame or crop sensor and shoot in a lot of low light situations.  Go full frame, spend the extra money and invest in your gear!

Lens wise the 70-200mm 2.8 is a wedding must for me.  It creates dreamy portraits + lovely close up’s at the ceremony and reception!  This lens will stay on my Mark III the entire day.  On the other camera body, switch between the 35mm and the 50mm.  I love both these lenses so very much, and sometimes struggle with the one I want to use!  With my preferred shooting style of shooting in natural/available light, these lenses are fast lenses that let me work in lower light situations with ease.  Although natural light is my favorite type of light, and I will shoot as late into the day as I can with out flash – eventually the time comes and I need to add these bad boys to my camera.

Shooting Style

I have mentioned above about finding my shooting style.  This for me extends beyond just shooting in natural light.  It’s the reason I chose the lenses I have, the cameras I use all the way down to the camera bag I bring with me on a wedding!  My approach is a none invasive one, I want me gear to blend in like I try to do.  I did not want to miss moment by always changing lenses, placing cameras down and dragging a giant camera bag with me everywhere.  Once I have my camera’s strapped in, I load the other lenses into a little camera bag with my flashes and batteries + extra memory cards.  It’s a small little bag that I can tuck away, and go about capturing great moments for the couple I am working with!

With my love for natural light, it’s easy for me to find myself in a situation where the light is less than optimal.  It’s for this reason, that I shoot with fast lenses like the 50mm and the 35mm.

 

Extra Batteries + Memory Cards

At minimum I bring 4 camera batteries with me to a wedding.  I hate to point out the obvious but a wedding will not wait for you to charge a battery.  I also found that shooting in the hot summer days just love to kill my batteries.  Quite honestly I would rather have more and not need them, then have my camera die mid ceremony!  The same goes for memory cards, I never shoot an entire wedding on one card, I change quite frequently and balance it out.  It has never happened to me (yet!), but I have heard horror stories of other photographers memory cards corrupting and losing chunks of a wedding day.

Aside from having a spare camera for a wedding day, this is also the reason I shoot with two camera’s.  If that ever did happen, I have photos from the same moment on a different camera.  Although it may have a different look (with the different lenses) but, for me losing everything without having a back up is a none option!  The way I look at it, you cannot repeat a wedding, there is no redo button.  So do it right the first time!

It took me sometime to figure out my shooting style, and the gear that would work best for me with that style.  My set up works for me, its versatile and aligns with my shooting style!  It allows me to be a photographic ninja on a wedding day, and capture all those unscripted moments I love so very much!

 

Disclaimer: Gear does not make a better photographer – I have seen amazing images from iPhones (look at wedding bells recent cover that was an iPhone), Rebel cameras and Mirror-less Cameras.