Congratulations to Matilda on Her First Holy Communion

This week I had the great honour of photographing Matilda, a little angel, on the occasion of her First Holy Communion. This is a big occasion for a little girl (or boy). Traditionally girls wear a white dress and veil and boys wear their school uniform or blazer - we didn't have a uniform when I made mine, but we did have a blazer. And if I am being honest, I don't remember wearing it other than on that day. The idea here was for Matilda's Mum and Dad to hand out photographs to their guests on the day as a souvenir that could be treasured for ever.

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Matilda #1

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A First Holy Communion day is a very special day; a modern rite of passage, in a small way maybe, but nevertheless, an extremely important one.

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Matilda #2

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To capture the actual moment of receiving the Host and Matilda making her First Holy Communion is not practical, and anyway photographs are not allowed during the ceremony. Knowing this, I didn't want to rush taking photographs on the day afterwards when everyone is lavishing attention on Matilda and trying to snap a photo and it's like a paparazzi maul. I wanted this to be a calm and thought out shoot. So we did it four days beforehand. This allowed me to think of the photograph I wanted to achieve and execute it with plenty of time.

On an occasion like this the photographer has two photographs to take; the serene one and the smiling happy one. The day is a special holy day, but it is also a happy one.

Both of these photographs were taken with the same lighting set up; an SB800 at about half power in a shoot through umbrella to camera left. the camera was in manual mode, set to ISO 100 at 1/200 at about f5.6 (which is generally my starting point - I just tweak the setting from there). I did a test shot to check the ambient light level. But I had hit it spot on first time. This allowed me to just keep shooting; if the ambient didn't change. The evening was overcast and the light levels really good for this type of shot, and then all of a sudden the sun came out from behind, fortunately we had the shots I wanted by then. The technique used here is the same one in my previous post The White Dress... One flash, one umbrella.

A big thank you to Matilda for being wonderful  a big congratulations on making your First Holy Communion (and don't worry about the secret password...) Thanks also to Mum and Dad for allowing me to be part of this in some small way.