Wedding Photography
Hello hello and welcome back to another late installment on this blog page. By late I mean, it’s been 3 months since the last one Christian, what were you doing? Well, I was out in the field doing research on today’s subject. Almost every Saturday I’ve been shooting a wedding, and yes, this ‘research’ is really me just doing my job. Aside from the legal obligation that binds me to photography every Saturday, it really is a learning experience. As the Saturdays pass, my knowledge on the topic seems to grow. I started off as a timid, conservative photographer. But have grown into the confidence and knowledge this role demands. As the writer, I hope to give insight as a behind-the-scenes for the average person. More so, giving knowledge to any photographer interested in this field of work. Let’s analyze wedding photography and highlight the tools you need for this field.
I’m sure the first tool you thought of was a camera, frankly, the tools I’ll be going over are mostly developmental, and just as important as your camera. The assessment of these fundamentals will be made as soon as you enter the bride’s/groom’s house. As long as you have a camera, please tell me you have your camera, the bride’s going to assume you’re a seasoned photographer. To distinguish between being average and being a God-sent angel forged from bridezillas of the past, we’ll present our fundamentals immediately through the first impression and throughout the day. The traits we can present are organization, interpersonal-skills, knowledge, and experience. These are the qualities any employer would hope resides in their employee, but as each job differs, so does how these skills apply. Let’s dissect each:
Organization – This superpower needs to be activated the day before the wedding. Your schedule should be prepared, all batteries should be charged, gear should be cleaned and tested, and backups for anything & everything that could go wrong, should be accounted for. Any bride will tell you that chaos on a wedding day is inevitable, but you need to be the eye of the storm. Showing up in professional attire, well groomed, with appropriate (not all) camera equipment is exactly what every couple wants to see on their wedding morning.
Fumbling through your equipment looks bad, so try and form a system once you have experience. I would also confirm your schedule and continue to be that angel guiding your couple throughout their day. I promise they’ll be thankful for it. During the day, you should have a checklist of all the shots you need. Moments happen so fast, being in the right place at the right time is simply not the standard our couples want. You need to be early first thing in the morning, to every destination, and to every moment. I can’t outline everything you need, so make a checklist for yourself and make sure you got it all. Don’t forget to think about snacks, gas, and things that don’t directly correlate to the wedding, but can still affect your performance.
Inter-personal Skills – You can take this at face value as we continue to use chaos as our example. Remain positive throughout the day no matter what goes wrong, keep everyone on schedule respectfully, and try to be more than just a photographer on this special day. Being outgoing, charismatic, and confident puts trust in your subjects while posing, re-assuring they look good every time you snap that shutter. Radiating these traits will affect others, generating a wedding party that’s confident and attentive makes your day a lot smoother. If you’re well organized, the only hiccups you should encounter will be timing. There’s usually delays at the venue, and wedding parties may get distracted or caught up in fun. Being assertive especially to easily distracted parties will keep the day on track. But no matter how frustrating this may be, always be assertive respectfully. Knowing that the master of weddings has everything under control will prevent your couple from panicking. Lastly, don’t forget to capture any shots the couple may ask for, even if you know it won’t work, remain positive. If you are a freelancer, giving the best experience you can is the most optimal marketing. With the number of guests at a wedding, you better hope they’re talking about you, and for the right reasons.
Knowledge – Not to be confused with our next topic, experience: your knowledge of (specifically) wedding photography. This trait measures the Ying & Yang of our camera world, photography & lighting. Whether you went to school and learned or are self-taught, this is undoubtably the most important skill. If I wasn’t educated, I would throw every bridal party in full sunlight and ruin every shot. Alas, if full sunlight was the only lighting faced throughout the day, things would be pretty easy. As a wedding photographer you will encounter more lighting situations than you can count. These include different posing, different numbers of people, and of course different camera settings. Organization can put you in the places you need to be on time, but if you’re stuck in a spot testing out lighting or fumbling with your camera before a moment happens, it can be detrimental to the shot. I haven’t met a photographer yet who doesn’t use flash, so understanding this piece of equipment as well will completely enhance the quality of your images. People that have a passion for art, who venture into photography, will find themselves limited by their knowledge. The more you understand your equipment and environment, the more creative freedom you’ll have. Practice, practice, practice.
Experience – This trait alone has assured me I’m even in a position to be typing this blog post. When I first got into this field, I didn’t have the confidence I needed, nor did I understand which aspect of this field would be the most important. This is the exact reason why most photographers shoot under one category. Of course, having a strong grasp of the fundamentals will make you good in any field, but respective skills differ. In sports photography for example, utilizing high shutter speeds and being able to track your subject while framing correctly, takes immense skill at the highest levels. The product of this is capturing the peak of a moment: a basketball player dunking, a baseball player sliding to base, etc. That word moment is exactly what we’re shooting for, but the skills you must master are different. For weddings, I believe the most successful photographers will master composition and creativity. Composition is broad yet so important, it’s simply not enough to capture a moment, but how will you isolate it? It’s essential to capture your couples first kiss as newlyweds but if the priest is your background, then your shot isn’t as magical. Creativity goes hand-in-hand with composition benefiting from your use of fore/middle/back-ground, framing, and other variables pertaining. With experience, you will have mastered everything previously talked about. Organization, interpersonal-skills, and knowledge. You’ve worked to ensure a happy couple, and you’re in a position to capture a moment you knew was coming, with the ideal camera settings based on the environment you’re in. Now you can focus on your artistry and compose a picture your couple will admire for ages.
That’s it! Now you are officially ready to shoot weddings once you’ve grasped the first three skills. So the last question for you is how you’ll start your wedding photography journey and start building on experience and becoming a master. With all this talk about the tools you need for this job, I’m sure it still sounds overwhelming. I mean, I haven’t really tried to minimize the responsibility of capturing some of the most important moments in a person’s life. But like any job, the anxiety comes before you actually start performing. But again, like any job, once you develop experience you look back and wonder why you were so worried. I wonder that now, but when I started shooting weddings, I took measures to prevent failure. The best/safest way to get comfortable is to shoot with someone experienced. I applied for a wedding company that streamlines everything for me, and took the hassle out of getting clients, and organized everything ahead of time. Not only this, but like any company, they acknowledged I was new, and started me off in an entry level position (tertiary photographer). With multiple photographers, I got superb advice and experience, and found comfort with 2 other photographers there to capture anything I may have missed. I highly encourage you to try this field of work if you’re a photographer. The rewards outweigh the risk, especially if you take the right precautions to make yourself comfortable. I hope you take that leap, and if this article helped you at all, send me a message via Instagram or email.