Wedding Photographer Equipment — Must-Have List | Articles | Photo, video, optics

A wed­ding is a spe­cial event in the life of two peo­ple. And it is impor­tant that the pho­tos tak­en on this day be of high qual­i­ty, beau­ti­ful, and liked by young peo­ple. But it is almost impos­si­ble to take cool pic­tures with­out a good cam­era, lens and oth­er equip­ment. What equip­ment should a wed­ding pho­tog­ra­ph­er have? We have com­piled a detailed list with exam­ples. All prices are valid at the time of writ­ing.

A wed­ding pho­tog­ra­ph­er is a per­son who is ready to do any­thing for a suc­cess­ful shot. Pho­to: media.baamboozle.com

Cam­era
Top option
A bud­get option
Lens­es for wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phy
Bat­ter­ies
Top option
A bud­get option
Flash
Top option
A bud­get option
Reflec­tor
Top option
A bud­get option
Tri­pod
Top option
A bud­get option
pho­to bag
Top option
A bud­get option
Shoot­ing in the stu­dio or else­where
Top option
A bud­get option
Out­come

Camera

This is the main “weapon” of the pho­tog­ra­ph­er. You don’t have to save on it. It is bet­ter to give up a few lens­es or acces­sories, but buy a good cam­era.

Some pho­tog­ra­phers even pre­pare sev­er­al cam­eras for espe­cial­ly large-scale events. What for?

• If some­thing hap­pens to one cam­era (it falls, it rains, etc.), then there is a sec­ond one.
• You can mount dif­fer­ent lens­es on them. It’s faster to take two shots with two dif­fer­ent cam­eras than to change lens­es for this pur­pose on one.

Some­times a sec­ond cam­era is a life­saver for a pho­tog­ra­ph­er. Pho­to: telegra.ph

Top option

The Canon 1DX cam­era is a pow­er­ful cam­era for 289,000 rubles. A mod­el that has many advan­tages:

• there is a spe­cial sen­sor that reduces noise at high and low ISO;
• suit­able for evening, night shoot­ing;
• the body is made of met­al — durable, not afraid of scratch­es;
• high detail images.

A budget option

Canon EOS 5D Mark IV for 191,700 rubles. A mod­ern SLR cam­era that is suit­able for shoot­ing wed­dings, sports events, land­scapes. This is a uni­ver­sal mod­el with a con­ve­nient screen, high shoot­ing speed (7 frames per sec­ond), improved aut­o­fo­cus. Of the advan­tages: nat­ur­al col­or repro­duc­tion, good detail.

Lenses for wedding photography

A good lens is already half the bat­tle. But what lens­es to choose for wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phy? It all depends on the for­mat of the event. Some­times a wed­ding is a cham­ber buf­fet and a walk, and some­times a many-hour cel­e­bra­tion with numer­ous changes of loca­tions. Of course, the lens must fit the cam­era the pho­tog­ra­ph­er is using. There­fore, you need to imme­di­ate­ly check whether they are com­pat­i­ble.

For dif­fer­ent events tak­ing place at the wed­ding, dif­fer­ent lens­es are suit­able. Pho­to: colodu.club

Wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phers usu­al­ly use:

– stan­dard lens­es (15–65 mm). The most com­mon. Han­dle most tasks. Suit­able for love sto­ries (walks), morn­ings of the bride and groom, cer­e­monies (at the reg­istry office or away). Top stan­dard lens exam­ples: Sony FE 24–70 mm , Canon EF 24–70 mm. Exam­ples of bud­get stan­dard lens­es: Nikon 18–55 mm, Sirui 50 mm;

– wide-angle (15–30 mm). Used for artis­tic shots. This is an optic for tak­ing extra­or­di­nary pho­tos with blur­ry edges but cap­tured details. They are used both for gen­er­al shots and for a pho­to of one per­son. Exam­ples of top wide angle lens­es: Canon EF 16–35mm F2.8L III, Summaron‑M 28mm f/5.6. Exam­ples of bud­get wide-angle lens­es: Samyang 14 mm f/2.8, Sig­ma 12–24 mm;

– tele­pho­to lens­es (70–300 mm). Need­ed for reportage shoot­ing: a ban­quet, the evening part of the cel­e­bra­tion, a mar­riage cer­e­mo­ny, which is attend­ed by many peo­ple. An exam­ple of a top tele­pho­to lens is the Sony FE 135 mm. An exam­ple of a bud­get tele­pho­to lens is the Fuji­film XC 50–230 mm.

Batteries

A dead bat­tery is a night­mare for any pho­tog­ra­ph­er. Wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phy can last more than 10 hours. One bat­tery will not with­stand such a load. Espe­cial­ly if the pho­to ses­sion takes place in win­ter, and you have to spend sev­er­al hours out­side (at low tem­per­a­tures, the bat­tery dis­charges even faster).

There­fore, it is bet­ter to imme­di­ate­ly pre­pare sev­er­al bat­ter­ies for replace­ment (their num­ber depends on the hours of shoot­ing). How to choose a bat­tery for the cam­era and how to extend bat­tery life have already been dis­cussed in our blog.

It is bet­ter to have sev­er­al spare bat­ter­ies with you. Pho­to: stroy-podskazka.ru

Top option

A good solu­tion is to buy an orig­i­nal bat­tery. This is a guar­an­tee that it will fit the cam­era.

But such bat­ter­ies are usu­al­ly expen­sive. For exam­ple:

— Sony NP-FZ100 bat­tery (for Sony Alpha ILCE-7M3, Alpha ILCE-7RM3 and Alpha ILCE‑9 cam­eras) costs 8,263 rubles;

— Nikon EN-EL14a bat­tery (for Nikon D3200, D3300, D3400, D5100, D5300, D5500) costs 4,399 rubles;

— Canon LP-E17 bat­tery (for EOS 77D, 800D, 750D / 760D, 200D, M5, M6, M3, RP, M6 Mark II) costs 4,294 rubles.

A budget option

If you need to save mon­ey or there is no way to buy the orig­i­nal mod­el (for exam­ple, it was dis­con­tin­ued), you can buy a non-native bat­tery. Ray­lab, Digi­Care, King­ma are com­pa­nies that pro­duce ana­logues of orig­i­nal bat­ter­ies. Their prices are sig­nif­i­cant­ly low­er, for exam­ple:

– Ray­lab RL-LPE6N (for EOS 6D 60D, 70D, 80D, 7D, 5D mark II, mark III) costs 1,960 rubles;

– Digi­Care PLS-FW50 for Alpha NEX‑7, NEX-5N, NEX-5R, NEX‑6, NEX-3N, NEX-C3, NEX-F3, NEX‑3, NEX‑5, SLT-A37, A33, A costs 2,089 rubles;

– King­Ma Enel 15 for Nikon D7100 costs 620 rubles.

Among a large num­ber of alter­na­tive bat­ter­ies, you can find a mod­el that fits the desired cam­era.

Impor­tant: in addi­tion to replace­able bat­ter­ies, be sure to take 1–2 mem­o­ry cards. In case one fills up too quick­ly or fails.

Flash

Wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phy can be done at home, in a lim­ou­sine, and in oth­er low-light loca­tions where bulky light­ing equip­ment can­not be accom­mo­dat­ed. The way out is to use flash. It will also be need­ed out­side on a too sun­ny, clear day (to neu­tral­ize harsh shad­ows on peo­ple’s faces).

A flash is option­al, but use­ful equip­ment for wed­ding pho­tog­ra­phy. Pho­to: fotoget.net

Top option

Flash Fuji­film EF-X500 for 28,990 rubles. This is a pro­fes­sion­al, ver­sa­tile, elec­tron­ic, pow­er­ful equip­ment. It can fire at any shut­ter speed and work togeth­er with oth­er flash­es. The Fuji­film EF-X500 is water and dust resis­tant.

A budget option

Yongn­uo Speedlite YN-560 III — uni­ver­sal flash for 7,700 rubles. Pecu­liar­i­ties:

• high response and reload speed (up to three sec­onds);
• LCD dis­play, which dis­plays: the select­ed mode, posi­tion, charge lev­el, pow­er;
• auto­mat­ic pro­tec­tion against over­heat­ing;
• vari­ety of modes. Can be used as a stro­bo­scop­ic flash, sec­ondary or main flash.

We have pre­vi­ous­ly reviewed the Yongn­uo man­u­al radio sys­tem with this flash.

Reflector

Such equip­ment is not required, you can use it if you wish. But a reflec­tor can be very use­ful, espe­cial­ly when shoot­ing out­doors. It will help smooth out harsh shad­ows that are sure to appear on the faces of mod­els on a sun­ny, clear day.

A reflec­tor is equip­ment that can dras­ti­cal­ly change the image of a mod­el in a pho­to­graph. Pho­to: petapixel.com

Top option

FST RD052 for 5,617 rubles. This is a pop­u­lar mod­el of a large oval reflec­tor (150x200 cm). Can be used both in the stu­dio and out­doors. Avail­able in oth­er sizes (120x180 cm, 60x90 cm). The reflec­tor has 5 work­ing sur­faces:

• gold — warm light;
• sil­ver — con­trast­ing light;
• black — black­out;
• white — soft reflect­ed light;
• translu­cent — soft­ens the light, reduces bright­ness.

A budget option

A more eco­nom­i­cal option is the Ando­er 5 in 1 reflec­tor for 820 rubles. The size of the reflec­tor is 60 cm in diam­e­ter, it has com­fort­able anti-slip han­dles. It is con­ve­nient to work with this reflec­tor alone if there are no assis­tants who would hold the equip­ment when shoot­ing. Sur­face col­ors and their effects are iden­ti­cal to the pre­vi­ous ver­sion.

Tripod

Do you need a tri­pod for a wed­ding? It all depends on the type of shoot­ing. If it’s only a short walk, it’s eas­i­er to get it off your hands. Espe­cial­ly if there is no assis­tant who will car­ry the tri­pod behind the pho­tog­ra­ph­er. And he weighs 2 kg. But if it’s a whole day of shoot­ing, with a pho­to shoot in the reg­istry office, a restau­rant, then a tri­pod will be use­ful.

It is con­ve­nient to shoot out­door cer­e­monies, ban­quets from a tri­pod. Pho­to: malykh.blogspot.com

Top option

The Man­frot­to MT057C4 tri­pod for 92,389 rubles is a uni­ver­sal, pro­fes­sion­al device. The large four-sec­tion legs are made of car­bon fibre. As a result, they pro­vide a high lev­el of sta­bil­i­ty. The max­i­mum work­ing height with the cen­tral bar is 205 cm. The max­i­mum load is 18 kg. The weight of the tri­pod is 3.5 kg.

A budget option

Man­frot­to MT190XPRO3 for 17,839 rubles. The max­i­mum work­ing height with a cen­tral bar is 160 cm. Made of alu­minum alloy. Because of this, it is quite light (2 kg). With­stands weight up to 7 kg. The tri­pod is strong, the design is sim­ple — dis­as­sem­ble-assem­ble, you can adjust the height very quick­ly.

photo bag

You need to car­ry equip­ment in spe­cial bags, back­packs. This pro­tects them from cold, rain, dust and dam­age. It is bet­ter to pick up spe­cial bags, and not the first ones that come across. Why?

• They most often have spe­cial com­part­ments for var­i­ous equip­ment. The equip­ment will be tight­ly packed. If in an ordi­nary bag every­thing is hap­haz­ard­ly, the cam­era, lens­es can get scratched.
• If we are talk­ing about back­packs, then thanks to the thick­ened back, spe­cial fas­ten­ing of the straps, the load from the back is par­tial­ly removed. As a result, car­ry­ing a cam­era, lens­es is eas­i­er.

It is bet­ter to give pref­er­ence to a spe­cial back­pack than a reg­u­lar bag. Pho­to: oehling.cz

Top option

Lowe­pro Whistler BP 450 AW II for 31,489 rubles. This series has long been in demand among pho­tog­ra­phers. It is suit­able for trans­port­ing the cam­era and nec­es­sary acces­sories.

Advan­tages:

• you can put 3 lens­es in a row;
• par­ti­tions are cus­tomiz­able — you can equip every­thing inside for your set of equip­ment;
• there is a rain cov­er includ­ed;
• pro­tec­tion against mois­ture and shock;
• there are out­side areas for attach­ing skis or tripods;
• Rein­forced back, shoul­der straps and waist belt for extra com­fort.

A budget option

Water­proof and shock­proof mod­el for 6,760 rubles. Durable coat­ing reli­ably pro­tects the equip­ment from shock and mois­ture. The inserts are remov­able — you can change their loca­tion. A tri­pod can be attached to the side.

Shooting in the studio or elsewhere

Part of the wed­ding pho­to shoot can take place in a restau­rant, reg­istry office or even in a sep­a­rate stu­dio. It is impor­tant to make sure that such a room has the right equip­ment. We are talk­ing about light, var­i­ous types of reflec­tors (soft­box­es, beau­ty dish­es — how to work with them, we described in the blog). If the nec­es­sary equip­ment is not avail­able, you can use a per­son­al kit.

For a wed­ding pho­to ses­sion in the stu­dio, you need to pre­pare well in advance. Pho­to: alterainvest.ru

Top option

If you do not want to col­lect every­thing sep­a­rate­ly, a good solu­tion is to buy a kit right away. For exam­ple, a set of Fal­con Eyes Sprint­er stu­dio equip­ment for 69,793 rubles. It includes 3 flash­es, 2 stands, 2 soft­box­es, an umbrel­la, a reflec­tor, a radio remote con­trol.

Using the items includ­ed in the kit, you can cre­ate a light­ing scheme from three sources of pulsed light. It is enough for pro­fes­sion­al shoot­ing. Also, the set can be sup­ple­ment­ed with oth­er equip­ment (opti­cal noz­zles, soft­box­es of oth­er sizes), if nec­es­sary, to imple­ment cre­ative ideas.

A budget option

A set of stu­dio equip­ment Fal­con Eyes Key­Light for 17,934 rubles is a more eco­nom­i­cal option. The set includes 2 soft­box­es, 4 umbrel­las, 6 stands, back­ground.

4 illu­mi­na­tors will help you cre­ate dif­fer­ent light­ing schemes, make beau­ti­ful por­traits, wide shots or focus on details.

Outcome

List of equip­ment for a wed­ding pho­tog­ra­ph­er:

• cam­era;
• lens (one or more);
• sev­er­al replace­able bat­ter­ies and mem­o­ry cards;
• flash;
• tri­pod;
• reflec­tors;
• back­pack or pho­to bag.

Option­al­ly, light­ing equip­ment, fil­ters and oth­er acces­sories for cre­ative pho­tog­ra­phy can be added to the list. It all depends on the style of the wed­ding, dura­tion and ideas.

And on the blog, we have col­lect­ed 21 tips for a begin­ner wed­ding pho­tog­ra­ph­er — inter­est­ing and use­ful mate­r­i­al for begin­ners.