Kyle Carnes Photography

More insight into another tricky exposure and edit. During Nicole and Camden’s wedding at , it was super cloudy where we were but only partial cloudy with the sun breaking through in the background. I really wanted to capture the gorge in their portraits but the exposure ratio between foreground and background was drastic, and I wanted to avoid flash to balance the exposure if I could for a more natural look. If I were to expose for the couple, then the background would surely blow out and the detail in the background would be unrecoverable for the most part. I opted to severely underexpose it as a silhouette instead to retain sky detail with the hopes of lifting the exposure later. Worst case scenario would be leaving it as a dramatic silhouette if the lifted exposure didn’t work out, which I was tempted to do anyway. With a fair amount of masking, selective brushing, and some noise reduction I was able to pull out the image here, trying to keep things as subtly natural as possible without verging into a weird HDR territory. The before image is the second image in the carousel.

During our first meeting, I discussed the possibility of snow with Katie and Nick, and we were all in agreement that it would be a pretty slim possibility for mid-October. Well, got slammed with 7 inches of snow the day of their wedding over the weekend and it was a complete whiteout out up at Silcox with blustery flurries of snow swirling around the hut. Luckily, I checked the forecast in advance and got my snow tires on the day before, which ended up being a smart move because several cars got stuck on the way up. But despite the curveball the wedding went off without a hitch.

While shooting Nicole and Cam’s portraits last weekend at Skamania Lodge, there was a soccer ball laying out on the lawn, and because Nicole played soccer we hyped her up to show off her juggling skills, and then as the last sunset light grazed the gorge mountaintops, the moon made a brief appearance before dipping behind some clouds, a fun little series of events for a beautiful fall wedding. Thanks to for snagging the moon shots.