If I didn’t know any better and I wasn’t a wedding photographer, and if a “photographer” promised me that they would come to my wedding and just walk around the crowd taking photographs of me and the guests and we would not even have to pose for any pictures and that Iwouldn’t even notice the photographer and they would capture those “reportage” moments to “cherish forever” then would I be tempted to book that photographer? Well it is tempting isn’t it, because its the easy way out, but no not for me. It sounds great but in my opinion it rarely works.
One of the reasons for this, is that as a photographer, it takes skill to get the best out of the couple and the guests and usually the photographer that pronounces that he or she is going to be “invisible” does not possess these skills. Why do I say that ? Well it is far more likely that a “amateur” photographer is going to say something along those lines because he or she has not got the necessary experience to create a moment or deal with over a hundred guests or work to a timetable under tremendous pressure that a professional photographer can. Let me ask you a question. Would you please photograph my wedding, I dont want anything too fancy, just get those pictures of people enjoying themselves and snap away at the guests whilst you walk around the crowd but we want some of the family oh and a group shot of everyone would be great and some nice ones of us in front of the wedding reception would be great and before I forget, some pictures at night would be fantastic like I saw in a bridal magazine but we only got an hour to do it in oh and it looks like rain. I could go on. Some “photographers” I have met, have not even known which members of the wedding guests make up the “Bridal Party”
Right some of you now might get the impression that I shoot old fashioned pictures and that we are very traditional and lets say it ….boring! Well no we are not. We still shoot the “group” pictures but we have a system and we rattle through these pictures at a fair old pace so everyone’s not stood around getting bored. We also have two photographers at the wedding to capture those “off guard” moments and we also cheat and we’ll make moments happen.
Look at these pictures we took yesterday, the one with the purple background has been taken in front of a refuse skip, the one of the Bride and Groom under the light is in a Car Park and the one against a Brick wall is (even if I do say so myself) fantasic and I love it.
Okay so why am I stood on my”soap box” telling you all this? Last night after the slideshow presentation that we produce at most of , a number of guests approached Andrea Barrett (my second shooter on this occasion) and myself, to thank us for a brilliant “show” One guest spoke at length on how he had been to lots of weddings in the last two years and we were the best he had seen, which for us was lovely, everyone likes good feedback, but what came across was that there is a lot “rubbish” out there too which is so annoying. One guy call “Mike” went to a wedding last Saturday and said the photographer was…”sh*t” So my advice to any bride or Groom reading this is, do you homework always go on recomendation and if someone does recomend a photographer ask to have a look at their album because their idea of great wedding photography might not be the same as yours. Always look carefully at websites and look for qualified photographers from the Master Photographers Assoiciation. Members of the MPA are full time working photographers who have submitted work to be judged worthy of a professional wedding photographer.
Okay I step off the box now and wish you all a Happy New Year to all our clients who have booked with us for 2010 and 2011.
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