Sweet 16 Celebration!

Before COVID hit I was asked to shoot a sweet 16 birthday party for a friend of a friend. I love being referred to by people I know because I really enjoy creating great images in difficult circumstances. In this case, the birthday party was being held in a very poorly lit gym. As my photographer friends know, low levels of light are a photographer’s worst nightmare. There are basically two options - shoot using flash photography or using a lens with a really wide aperture.

Both types of photography create vastly different looks and feels in the finished product. Rarely do I like mixing the two, but in this case I made the choice to shoot certain parts of the event using natural light and a large aperture while I used flash for other parts. The natural light photography does a great job of capturing what it really is like during the event. Natural light images have a lot of ‘feel’ to them. The photo above was taken without flash. You can see the red of the in-house lights casting its color over the mom as she watches her daughter with tearful joy.

Natural light photography is good for when there isn’t much action happening in a darker environment. If any movement starts happening you either get blur happening in the photo or the photos turn out very grainy - both of which don’t cut it for professional work. Flash is great when the fast moments need to be frozen in the image. This sweet 16 party had A LOT of dancing going on. In order to get the cleanest and best captures of action, I had to use flash. If you know how to properly use flash, you can capture moments like the father-daughter dance above without any issue.

The reason why it is important to hire a professional photographer for events is that they have equipment that can produce the best quality images. Everyone has a cell-phone nowadays, but a cell-phone could not capture the images I was able to get with professional gear. The cell-phone is a great tool to get quick snapshots here and there, but to get really great images, you need something that can do the heavy lifting with someone who knows what they’re doing… i.e. … ME!

If you have an important event coming up, please consider having me come out to capture it the right way! I’ve shot many events and have the experience needed to product images that you’ll love looking at for years to come!