Shooting a Christening/Infant Baptism

Let the little children come unto Me, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 

--The Bible, Luke 18:16

Some time ago I have proposed to a good friend to take pictures during the Christening of his nephew and the following festivities. 

Easier said than done! The particular case requires a lot of knowledge about the procedure, location, family, priest, etc. This leads toward a serious preparation process because if you screw this one up there is no way to repeat the experience. Being a responsible adult devoted to the process yet not to the Religion I have started my research, just to figure out that this subject is covered in a rather flimsy way. One post was very beautiful and got me some ideas but it was about Russian Orthodox Baptism Ceremony so it wasn't of much use however very inspiring (read more about it on Je Vois Photography blog - Beautiful Infant Baptism).  After reading a few available resources and having one or two conversations with pro photographers I have compiled the following lists that have been extended post factum:

General Preparations:

1. If you're not religious - study the ritual. As usual Wikipedia is our friend - here is an article about Infant Baptism.
2. Get to know the time and location of the shoot. (usually it's going to be a Church)
3. Get to the location a few days before, preferably around the same time of day the shoot will take place. Look a the ambient light conditions and take a few shots using the lens you'll be (mostly) working with.
4. If possible talk to the priest who will be conducting the Christening. Ask him to explain the "procedure and work flow". Ask him if you can use flash or not as this will fundamentally affect your work flow. Ask if you can move around during the rite/liturgy. Generally try to get the Priest in a camera friendly mood, be passionate - this is a big deal for the Family and the Church. 
5. If the Church is closed on the day of the Infant Baptism ceremony, try to agree with the Priest that you can come at least 30 minutes before the guests start arriving. (This will help you to unpack all the gear, set up the lights and tweak the camera setting if needed).  
6. If you're a kit lens fan and/or sole owner, well there is nothing bad about it but just to give you more insight why sometimes it's not the best solution, here is an article by Ken Rockwell - Why Fixed Lenses Take Better Pictures. If you own a few skip this one... 
7. If you haven't cleaned your sensor in a while it might be a good idea to do it now. It will save you tons of unnecessary retouching work later.
8. Wear comfortable shoes! :)
9. Shoot as much as you can and expect hours of post processing work - professional photographers charge you for a very good reason.

Camera Preparations:

1. Choose and clean your lenses. My primary choice was a Nikon AF-S DX 35mm f1.8G Lens - it works without flash in low light due to a low f number of 1.8. It makes you move as it's a fixed lens and there is no "convenient" zoom. It's good for portraits at its widest aperture as it creates very pleasant bokeh.
2. Charge your camera batteries, if you don't own a Nikon MB D11 Multi Power Battery Pack - External battery pack it would be good to have a backup battery. 
3. Try to get a second DSLR camera and a second photographer. A second camera is a fail-over option and maybe a good way to gain another perspective on the scene. I had a Nikon D90 with a Sigma 70-200mm f2.8 EX DG OS HSM Lens for Nikon Digital and Conventional SLR Cameras that I planned to get on the balcony to have shot from the top. However my back-up photographer wasn't really up for running around the Church mostly out of deep respect towards the priest and the ceremony. (Note: If using a telephoto lens in low light condition it's advisable to have a mono- or a tripod - I'm using the VANGUARD Tracker AP-324 4-Section Aluminium Monopod of 167cm)
4. Have your flash-gun set up and have at least 3 sets of batteries. My Speedlight of choice is the Nikon SB-700 Speedlight Unit. An external flash is always a better option as the built in one - there is a cheaper unit Nikon Speedlight SB-400 External Flash that will still give you more power and no camera battery drain.
5. I've chosen to shoot in Aperture Priority with Spot Metering mode however some difficult lighting might require you to read the meter set aperture and Shutter manually.
6. Do not use Auto White Balance!!! When doing you test shots adjust it using different presets or set it manually. (A down to earth WB tutorial can be found here Ken Rockwell - How to Set White Balance)
7. Don't use wide lenses when shooting people, they will add distortion. 
8. If you're not allowed to shoot with a flash, crank up your ISO settings to the highest noise to quality ratio. You will need to shoot with higher shutter speeds as the baby will not be posing, thus moving around very fast. The higher shutter speed will avoid blurry shots. You can always de-noise them to a certain level in post processing.
9. Use continuous shooting and continuous auto-focus modes. Shoot in RAW so you will be able to edit the pictures (be it white balance, blown out highlights, noise, etc.) without or with minor quality loss. 
10. Have some spare memory cards. If your camera supports two cards, mirror them to prevent data loss. It happens extremely rarely, but you don't want to be that rare case - don't you?

When you're planning to compile and print a picture-book shoot a few pictures of the Church interiors and exteriors. A wide-angle lens is essential for this task, a 18-105mm kit lens might be just perfect.

Shoot portraits of guests when arriving and/or during the "party" afterwards. Be sure to focus on the family and the godfather (godparents) not leaving any of them out. It's advisable to get introduced to the family before to avoid confusing moments. If there are grandparents - be sure to take quite a few shots with the baby.

I had been very honored and also lucky to get this opportunity and the learning value from this experience. On this occasion I have shot over 1.300 images and am currently editing them to prepare prints and a photo book. This is one of the best presents to the family as it shows all the generations in one place over one happy occasion. If you accept the honor to photograph an Infant Christening, be responsible. Prepare and do your best!!!

Thanks for reading...

Pezinská Baba - shooting bikes Part I

As a friend of mine is about to start a bike portal for the Slovak Republic we needed to obtain some quality images that we can use for this project. There are a lot of possibilities for that but following my inner voice and strong passion for photography I have decided to that I might as well shoot it myself.


However it's very important to use the right type of gear for this type of photo shoots:

1. Digital SLR is highly advisable for high shutter speeds and higher number of fps.
2. Fast telephoto lens with fixed aperture of at least f/2.8 over the entire length. I have used a second hand Sigma 70-200mm f2.8 EX DG OS HSM Lens for Nikon Digital and Conventional SLR Cameras.
3. A sturdy tripod to prevent camera shake at high levels of zoom
4. A tripod head that allows you the desired level of flexibility

You can see the gear I used in the Amazon widget below, it's not the cheapest gear but you get a lot value out of it. You might try the same without the tripod and using you standard kit lens, however you might get into difficulties with image sharpness and the speed of focus (the standard 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6 AF-S DX VR ED Nikkor Lens it the f/10 is quite well described by Ken Rockwell). Of course it all depends what you want to do with these images, an iPhone might do as well.

The assignment:

Make several pictures to be used on a website. The images should be clear and dynamic in a good light showing speed and passion. Time needed: 3-5 hours. Skill level: I guess anyone can do it.

Having your assignment in mind you need a location for shooting it. Sometimes it can be a problem, however there are wast resources on the Internet where one can read about potential gatherings, races and other events in the country of your choice. Thankfully I have been shown a good location in Slovakia which is just a short ride away from Bratislava.


Pezinská Baba or Baba (527 m ) is the seat of the main ridge of the Little Carpathians, the subunit Pezinské Carpathian mountains between Horsehead (648.8 m asl) and Čmeľok (709 m).
Saddle path crosses II/503 from Malacky to Pezinok and red-marked tourist paths Štefánikova Trail (part of the international European route E8), leading to the mountain ridge from the north to the top of Devin and intersects with the blue-marked trail from Pernek to Pezinok .


I have chosen a sunny day with temperatures around 30 degrees and went out for the shoot during the early afternoon having the sun in a relatively high position to prevent long shadows from the trees around the narrow mountain road. Thankfully there had been a good space just above an S shaped curve to park the car further off the track to leave the background clear of "disturbing" objects. Both sides of the road where accessible while the side behind the crash barrier provided more safety. (Note: while shooting on the streets with live traffic it's advisable to wear a vest, so drivers can see you from a distance).


The image above was shot in aperture priority mode ISO 200, f/3.2, 1/5000 sec and at 200 mm. The result is a frozen image where you can even see the needles that have been blown of the tarmac by the wind of the passing bike. The fore- and background are blown out providing the maximum focus on the subject. While this is a crisp image it doesn't carry the dynamics and the velocity the bike is traveling at - the shutter speed was simply too high.

For this image I have moved myself a bit out of the sun to have to possibility to work with a reduced shutter speed of 1/400 sec. While having the bike and the rider still very sharp, the wheels have the spinning effect giving the image a more dynamic feel. 

Another way to give your images more dynamic feel is panning. I'm not going into describing the technique as I'm not really that far to teach other people just yet. The basic idea behind panning as a technique is that you pan your camera along in time with the moving subject and end up getting a relatively sharp subject but a blurred background. Read more: at Digital Photography School. The image above was shot in the shutter priority, continuous mode, auto-focus set to contentious and the focus area reduced one dot. Shutter speed 1/100 at f/25. Another way to achieve a good panning result in these conditions is to use an ND filter to reduce the amount of light hitting the sensor.

All in all its been a successful first day at Pezinská Baba. The lessons learned:

1. Use low ISO settings
2. Experiment with different angles (try to find elevated spots to shoot from above)
3. Shoot in RAW if you're not sure about exposure and white balance
4. Position yourself so you can see both side of the road
5. Bring a stool - being on the feet for 4 hours is not a joke
6. Use locations with less or no direct sunlight for panning
7. Shoot, shoot, shoot - you can always throw away later

With these lessons learned I hope to create more candid images next time. The next assignment will be to create some action shots with focus on panning as well as to shoot the community, parked bikes and portraits.

Finally a YouTube video of the action that can be observed while on Baba:

The full flickr set from this day is available here: Pezinská Baba

Thanks for reading. 

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