I had been anticipating this moment all day and so much wanted to use this image to tell the story of the long standing relationship between the best man and the groom. First order of business was to make sure the best man was prominent in the image, so I got down low and shot from just below the table top. I also wanted bokeh to again give him prominence but not so much that the faces of the bride and groom became unreadable as they reacted to his speech. So I shot my rented Sigma 85mm at f2.5 and not wide open. I also did not know what to expect in terms of motion so I had to shoot as fast as the lighting would let me. The decorative lighting draped from the ceiling around the room made for a nice soft ambiance that I didn't want to ruin with flash. But it did not give much light to work with. So I dialed up my ISO to 3200, which is about as high as I feel comfortable with on my Nikon D750 and that let me shoot at 1/340 sec. Which seemed to stop things well enough. Of course you (I) over shoot a scene like this because the funny moments are fleeting. But I felt like I got what I was after. I post, I desaturated completely as I felt that the uninspiring colors of the scene did not add to the image and the BW nature gave a look of classic, time honored tradition taking place.
They say, an artist is successful if they accomplish what they set out to do. In this instance, on a very personal level, I felt like I did in fact accomplish just that. From anticipation, set up, execution and post processing. Therefore one of my favorite images from the day.