Hi - so I'm filming the speeches when I leave my main camera running on a tripod and go out front to get some guest reaction shots (I film alone) when the sun comes out, and half of the groom's speech is now horribly backlit.

Anyone know of a good fix for this? I use Premiere Pro/Matrox RTX setup. I have tweaked the levels to little effect but the shadow/highlight filter does at least bring some detail out in the light. But what i really want to do is tone the backlight down and stop the groom looking like he's talking in the doorway to an alien spaceship!

Thanks in advance

You need to post a clip of before and after with changing light.

about the only thing I can think of is to mask out the background, then adjust the levels of the subject to get it as acceptable as possible, knowing that you will never get it 100%, then bring the clip back in on another track under that, sync them and now mask out the subject and adjust the background as best you can. It will be a PITA especially if the subject is moving around while talking.
Other than that, it sounds like you've done about all you can.

Hi Guys - I haven't access to my footage at the moment but I'll try and post a couple of frames tomorrow - lesson learned here. I nearly always have an unmanned camera tucked away in a corner filming reaction footage, but in this case there was no room so I hade to leave my main camera to get some B-Roll - never again

Pete

Magic bullet looks has a spot exposure tool, or, mask as said above.

How about inserting those reaction shots you were shooting? If your inserts are too short, slo mo them.