While smartphones can deliver great images in controlled environments, they are not considered as versatile as a dedicated camera. Wedding photographer Jason Vinson decided to see how the Sony Xperia Pro-i would perform in a setting where he had no control: an all-day wedding.
Vinson says he’s always wanted to challenge himself to see if he can manage the entire wedding with nothing but a smartphone, from wedding preparation to the end of the night. But he couldn’t expect a paying customer to go for the experiment when he wanted to, let alone get these photos. To make it work, he coordinated with co-workers and took a second shot for another photographer. The customers were also aware of what he was doing throughout the event.
What surprised Vinson was that during the wedding no one gave him any weird looks or asked questions about his camera, which most creatives would consider if he acted like a professional shooter, but Do not have a dedicated camera.
“It just goes to show that you don’t need a big lens and a state-of-the-art camera body to be considered a professional,” he says.
The Xperia Pro-i is equipped with a one-inch sensor (though it cannot use the full size of that sensor due to space constraints) coupled to a 24mm Zeiss lens with an adjustable mechanical aperture between f/2 and f/ may differ. Can shoot in 4 and 12-bit RAW. These on-paper specs are impressive for a smartphone and provide a solid system in which to shoot the event.
Earlier in the day, Vinson used both available and continuous lighting to experiment with the scenes to capture some of his signature looks and was very pleased with the results.
Once he went on to cover the ceremony, the images he shot were captured with only available light and he says he spent most of the time looking for interesting compositions and angles.
Vinson explains that the phone’s screen itself is bright and vibrant enough to be used in full daylight, however, when he tilted the phone to an off-angle, the glossy screen ended up letting in a lot of light. exhibits which made it a lot more difficult to work with.
They also noticed that it was much easier to capture decent images when the sun was out, but once the light began to fade, the smartphone’s ISO rose faster than the default, forcing him to adjust the ISO as much as manually. Was forced to do as little as possible. Lots of noise in the images.
Once the sun went down completely and she had to rely on lights from the venue, videographers and DJs, things got a little tricky. Vinson says he had to work out when the lights would properly illuminate the subjects, which made it very difficult for him to capture the images he wanted. He says that while some of the most interesting moments happened, unfortunately, the lights were pointed directly at the ceiling and not at his subjects, forcing him to miss shots.
Even with some deeply missed moments, Vinson says he’s still quite proud of the images he was able to capture and add to the gallery for the bride and groom. While they would have captured more reception and portraits with their proper camera kit, the Xperia Pro-i managed to deliver some quality images given the shooting conditions, proving at least for Vinson, the experiment was a success.
While he says he believes he has proven wedding shoots can now be done with nothing more than a smartphone, he’s never going to give up professional camera gear to shoot full-time on one. Will not suggest. That said, their testing shows that in an emergency, it’s possible to capture gallery-worthy images on one.
More of Jason Vinson’s work can be found on his website, YouTube, and Instagram
image credit: All photos by Jason Vinson
