Weddings.

I've only shot one wedding for a friend under duress and a short notice. When I arrived at the venue I found I had forgot to pack film 😱😱😱 Fortunately this was in the early days of digital so I managed to scrounge some rolls from other friends who were there are guests. The pics were just OK but not great. As luck would have it the couple are now divorced and probably never want to look at my photos again.

So my tip is double check you have everything before you leave for the venue.

David
 
Mr_Flibble said:
I've got my first wedding shoot coming up in May for two good friends. Lots of good hints&tips in this topic that make me feel a little more confident.

Another mutual friend/shutterbug will be there to help out as well. He will handle the DSLR business, while I take care of the vintage/classic film camera shots (with an R-D1 on standby).

The entire wedding will be in 1940s style, which should add a great feel to the classic photos.
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1940`s style sounds really good.....are your using your "stepper" for anything?

My Brother`s getting Married this Saturday near Clearwater Beach
(evening Beach Wedding)
so I`m doing the whole "uncoated" vintage lens deal ~ while my female assistant shoots digital and also films the wedding, I`ll be using my M6, a 45' IIIC K and a "backup" digital, I`m concentrating on using a pre-war Elmar f3.5 50mm and my pre-war Xenon f1.5 50mm in Black and White film, and maybe my Canon f1.2 50mm and a Nikkor HC f2 50mm for the color ~ seems though that most American`s are crazy for Black and White film at weddings, so I`ll base most of my work using that film, this time.

Seems that the Wedding Biz is selling better at the moment than my PinUp`s, so I`ve gone back to doing Weddings, I don`t see it as stressful, you just need to have enough cameras and lenses to get by, also having an assistant with two or more cameras also helps, better to get all aspects of the wedding captured on film, so there`s more to look at when it`s all over...the bride and groom only end up liking/wanting a handfull of photos anyway, but it`s best to have more shot in the can then you`d expect too.....better safe then sorry, you can`t repeat a Wedding shoot! 😉

Tom
 
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drewbarb said:
My god, this cracks me up no end! I honestly laughed out loud when I read this! And of course it's quite true.
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me too, he is the ultimate pessimist LOL, i imagine if we were talking about which shoes were the most comfortable he would say something like. 'why bother, you will still trip over and break your nose' 😛
 
antistatic said:
I've only shot one wedding for a friend under duress and a short notice. When I arrived at the venue I found I had forgot to pack film 😱😱😱 Fortunately this was in the early days of digital so I managed to scrounge some rolls from other friends who were there are guests. The pics were just OK but not great. As luck would have it the couple are now divorced and probably never want to look at my photos again.

So my tip is double check you have everything before you leave for the venue.

David
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WOW, what a monumental stuff up! i bet that sent ripples of concern around the wedding party and family. a pretty frank and honest thing to admit to as well, it really does highlight how bad things can go and that planning is one of the key things to do.

so much talk on wedding photography here just recently and plenty of good advice it difficult to add too but in the interest of adding something, i always had a note book with me that i could refer to if needed with all details of the people, schedule, places, asked for shots, a few creative ideas that would come to me before, leading up to the weekend i would jot down incase i woke up in a non creative mood--planning is key, but i notice some people like to shoot from the hip..

i think AL might of said ..he doesnt like wedding photography, i can relate to that, i did heaps of it and i am not sure i liked it that much. routine at times, sometimes just a job, can be boring even after a while, having to get certain shots..the part i liked most was the B&G and to a lesser extent when the bridal party went to a location, often a particular place chosen by the couple but sometimes they needed help choosing a good photo location before...its there that i always enjoyed it, usually i got to have my own way with creative shots and in almost all cases the clients were usually very happy and most excited afterwards about the pictures from this section. (if possible always scout the area first, at least that works for me)

i imagine this is partly why some folk on here seem to like the 'reporter style' of wedding photography that seems to be more popular now. i dont think it has taken off here in Australia yet though in any big way...most i have seen recently still are adaptions of the traditional layout, a bunch more pictures with a lot of overworked PS presented...cant say i like a lot of it...i reckon i carried less than 6 filters and used them sparingly--less is more
 
chippy said:
me too, he is the ultimate pessimist LOL, i imagine if we were talking about which shoes were the most comfortable he would say something like. 'why bother, you will still trip over and break your nose' 😛
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Would think folks from "Down Under" antipodal parts would understand the importance of the "Fig Leaf" parts. ;-)
 
JohnTF said:
Would think folks from "Down Under" antipodal parts would understand the importance of the "Fig Leaf" parts. ;-)
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well i had to look at this upside down, but us down under folk have fig leaf parts as hard as rocks so its our nose's we are worried about hehe 🙄
 
chippy said:
well i had to look at this upside down, but us down under folk have fig leaf parts as hard as rocks so its our nose's we are worried about hehe 🙄
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Well, all real images are upside down. ;-) Assume inseams are adjusted accordingly? Is that an Elmar in your pocket?
Might not want a Hektor?
 
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chippy said:
WOW, what a monumental stuff up! i bet that sent ripples of concern around the wedding party and family. a pretty frank and honest thing to admit to as well, it really does highlight how bad things can go and that planning is one of the key things to do.
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Monumental stuff ups are my speciality. I can still recall the feeling of sheer terror when I opened my bag and saw an empty pouch where the film should be. Fortunately the wedding party never knew and they seemed pleased with the end results.

Maybe this stuff up was an omen for the couple.🙁
 
sheer terror; i bet! holy mother of god Batman what will we do, comes to mind LOL

great that it worked out and heaps funny too that you say 'stuff ups are my specialty', funny people should do weddings, i think some people have mentioned personable skills, and having a sense of humour is invaluable
 
I once forgot that I'd agreed to take pictures at a friend's wedding, and when I turned up, it turned out that I was the only photographer. I didn't even have a camera with me.

Fortunately a nearby camera store lent me one. This was in Bristol in the 70s and I was on good terms with most of the camera shop owners.

We were all in our 20s and extremely casual about a lot of things. But we're still friends and she's still married. They were rotten pictures, though.

Cheers,

R.
 
Roger Hicks said:
I once forgot that I'd agreed to take pictures at a friend's wedding, and when I turned up, it turned out that I was the only photographer. I didn't even have a camera with me.

Fortunately a nearby camera store lent me one. This was in Bristol in the 70s and I was on good terms with most of the camera shop owners.



Cheers,

R.
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What a quaint idea, a camera shop where people know their customers. ;-) We still have one shop here where that would happen.

I remember upgrading to a Mamiya C330f, and I had not read the part about the secret buttons to push to open the back, now that is embarrassing, except I made a quick call to the shop.

I always check the sync before I shoot, so I was at home, but felt rather silly that I could not open the back. Was like a secret handshake. I always did this and loaded film before I left, plus had film in a "debit left, credit right" pocket system.

Switched to the day before after that. I had a social life then and was sometimes out the night before. Heck, I scoped out the bridesmaids, gave a few a ride home, just part of the package. Now, might give the custodian a ride, if they are not too picky about who they ride with. ;-)

Had a sync cord break on two occasions when the bride had started down the aisle, swapped it with the spare in my jacket pocket. May not have known right away if I had been using an SLR. Reposed the two shots I missed.

Had some cameras and new backs that would, on occasion, roll an entire new roll through non stop on loading. I only had a few spare rolls of 220, so I had them serviced and sold them. Switched to back up equipment on the days it happened. Medium format film was hard to find outside of a photo shop, and I shot all the same lot then to help the lab out. They would review the film and let you know how consistent you were that day.

Should have packed Valium in the bag. ;-)

"Chance favors the prepared mind", but it sure messes with the unprepared one as well.


Regards, John
 
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Oh, I like the idea of shooting them with their families, so if/when they do decide they want to strrangle each other your work wasn't in vain. 🙂
 
Peoples' expectations of what their album will look like are usually too high. The photographer puts together a portfolio of his or her BEST work to show to prospectve clients. In real life every shot isn't your "best".
 
antistatic said:
Monumental stuff ups are my speciality. I can still recall the feeling of sheer terror when I opened my bag and saw an empty pouch where the film should be. Fortunately the wedding party never knew and they seemed pleased with the end results.

Maybe this stuff up was an omen for the couple.🙁
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I take it you were not shooting MF or LF. ;-)
 
Al Kaplan said:
Peoples' expectations of what their album will look like are usually too high. The photographer puts together a portfolio of his or her BEST work to show to prospective clients. In real life every shot isn't your "best".
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Al, a better yardstick would be to see a copy of a package you delivered, but you are right, my old sample album was a mixture of my best stuff, and some old stuff to show I had done this for awhile, now they just look at my gimpy leg and gray hair. ;-)

Used to be if you did not have a high percentage of keepers, word would get around. I also had the photos shipped COD, those packages do not get delivered to the wrong street.

I used to not look forward to explaining to the artistic ones that if I shoot well cropped for a 4x5 ratio they might have trouble changing to 5x7's in the neat frames they found at an antique shop after the wedding, without cutting off something in the image.

A large camera was also a sign of a good photographer. ;-)

Regards, John
 
Guys
one of the few things I've learned on a forum:

Make the bride and bride's mother happy and all the rest will be easy.

If you're able to amaze them, then they will be the first to defend you even if case you fail at a objective eye. If you can get a very few special shot of them and they say "wow", you have already done half way. Of course this doesn't mean not to care for the rest, but a lot of "space" for credit if you miss something obvious.

Later - when I have more time - I'll try to tell you also my opinion on gear.
 
xayraa33 said:
people managing skills are of the utmost importance.
you are limited in the time you have to do your job.

rushing is a good way to have bad things happen.
have a list in your mind or on paper, of the essential must have shots.
A lot of the time the bride is very nervous when you first meet on the day of the wedding, your job is to reassure and smooth the way, bridesmaids are mostly useless to help make your job easier, so don't count on them.

the at ease feeling comes over everyone once the church/temple or registrar phase is over and done with.
good people skills makes the job easier on every one.

I never found an assistant to be necessary, and 95% of the job can be done with the normal lens of the camera.
learn good fill in flash techniques and use an incident light meter often.
your three most useful f stops are, f5.6, f8 and f11 with the standard lens on a medium format camera.
the Zeiss Softar Filter is one of your best friends on most jobs.
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i tend to agree with much of this as well as plenty of other stuff talked about recently, but some things ring very true, rushing stuff , good people skills, cant say i would dismiss having an assistant, they are great to have but only if you have worked together a few times, can be a hinderance otherwise.

one thing that doesn't seem to have come up much so far is flash, i guess many RF people like to work with available light but good use of flash and weddings often go hand in hand
 
Arrive early, ask questions about who's who and memorize faces.

About the worst thing that can happen is to have dozens of pictures of attractive people whom the bride didn't care about and none of those whom she did.

And, we can romanticize shooting available light only... until the time to make an album 🙂

So unless you have a second shooter who will take all of the necessary shots, leaving you free to experiment, an off-camera lighting is essential, then you can make your own available light by bouncing it off-... really, anything.

I use non-expensive Cactus triggers, works with modern flashes and kept working when I need it to.
 
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