Part time wedding photographers

I met up with a couple last night who are looking for a photographer for their wedding later in the summer. So over coffee we had a chat about their plans and a browse through some sample wedding albums. During our discussion the bride told me how her sister had recently been married and was very unhappy with the final results of their photography. It seems the photographer they had booked provided less than half the photographs originally promised, and of these, the pictures were very disappointing. When expression her disappointment to him his answer was that there was nothing he could do as it had rained on the day making photography virtually impossible! I could hardly contain my incredulity! Anyway, the couple had a few prints from the sisters wedding and as soon as I saw them I knew straight away that the problem was they had booked a part timer.

In the UK it is alarmingly estimated that over 60% of puported wedding photographers are Weekend Warriors (part time Saturday photographers). I recently attended the SWPP (Society for Wedding and Portrait Photographers) Convention a fortnight ago which had close to 10,000 delegates, and the percentage of part timers was probably closer to 75%. When I first started out in wedding photography I could never understand why people would book a part timer for such an important occasion as their wedding. After all, surely it's obvious who is going to provide a better set of photographs...someone who shoots photographs day in day out, or someone who sits in an office or factory all week long and then dusts off their camera on a Saturday? However, with fancy ads and marketing, unless you ask in advance, you may well not find this out until it's too late!

Now it is, of course, possible for a part timer to shoot a nice set of photographs of a wedding if everything comes together perfectly and goes off according to plan. But, in my experience most weddings will find that many things dont go perfectly according to plan or something unexpected happens. For most professionals this is just part of the course as it happens pretty much every day and we are getting paid to provide a set of stunning images no matter what happens. In fact, for most creative people its the unexpected that fires our imagination and motivates us to work even harder. Let's take the above situation as an example...

It rains on a wedding day. The above photographer actually thought the bride and groom would understand why they couldn't have the original standard of photography, because it unexpectedly rained it off. Now this is actually quite a common complaint from part timers, along with it being too dark and their camera's developing faults, etc. To be frank, it is one of the most incredible comments I have heard! All good photographers know that the essential element of photography is light. For any kind of portraiture, wedding or otherwise, the best light is soft light. It is the most flattering and complimentary and ensures the subject will look at their best. Now let me ask you...what kind of light do you get when it rains? That's right - soft light! So how can anyone possibly say the photography's off because unfortunatley its raining? The light is so perfect when it rains it's a godsend! Have a look at this photograph of Maggie...

It was pouring down when Maggie arrived at the church. With the help of white wedding umberella's and outdoor rain covers on my camera's we got her from the car into the church still looking pristine and perfect. This shot was taken about half an hour after the ceremony back at her reception venue. If you look hard enough you will always find a few suitable places where you can make the most of the light whilst keeping the bride and groom dry. Archways, overhangs, doorways, canopies, entranceways, windows, etc. Of course, the photographer has to know how to utilise and manipulate this light to the best possible advantage, but at the end of the day its this kind of expertise you are paying for. Notice how the soft light creates such a beautiful portrait. It is nice and even and smooth and therefore flatters the five main planes of the face. There are no harsh shadows or features. I shot around 100 images within 20 minutes and they were all as stunning as this!



What about darkness? Isn't that every photographer's nightmare?

Ally and Kevin got married last October. Their venue was The Caves in Edinburgh. As the name implies it is entirley underground...so it's pretty dark! So dark in fact many wedding photographers wont work there. Being near Holyrood Park the plan was for the mainstay of the photography to be carried out in the Park and then returning to The Caves for the wedding breakfast. But the day dawned wet and windy and steadily got worse! Going outside was just not an option so it simply meant working within the low light levels. To be sure, low light is a challenge for photography, but it's this type of challenge that makes the job so enjoyable and it draws upon your creativity.

I knew there was a small cellar behind the bar area and dragged in a sofa and some weird and funky lights and we simply did the formal group shots in here. Generally, it takes me less than 20 minutes to get through all the group shots and then my wife (my assistant and 2nd shooter) and I took Ally and Kevin into some of the nooks and crannies of The Caves for the bride and groom sets.

I must point out that all this doesn't happen by accident. Obviously a lot of creativity comes on the day but in advance of every wedding I visit the venue so I can check out the lighting and locations and plan the options for differing and changing circumstances. This is all part of the job. Basically, aside from pre-wedding meetings and discussions, every wedding is at least a weeks work. Not only will I visit the venues in prepping for the day but I'll have several discussions with the venues wedding co-ordinator and run through things like timings, etc, so we can ensure the day runs smoothly. After the wedding day I'll spend a day editing the pictures and uploading them to their online gallery followed by two or three days of album design and printing. Again, you will not get this level of service and quality from a part timer as they have to be back at work Monday morning hence only getting perhaps a couple of hours on an evening to work on your wedding images.

Anyway, I'm sorry if this has been a bit of a rant, lol. I'm afraid it's something that kind of irks me whenever I hear stories from disappointed brides. Fortunatley, the couple I met with decided to book me on the spot so I'm looking forward to being at their wedding in the summer.

Gallery Prints

The start of 2009 see's the launch of my Gallery Prints. These are the latest generation display prints set to replace Canvas Wraps and Acryllics. Our ProLab has just installed the first Chromira printer in the country which produces the highest standard image resolution in the industry. So we're pretty excited about being able to supply our clients with the highest quality display prints available. So the first few days of January saw me selecting images to make up as samples. There is basically going to be two categories...landscapes which will sell from my website, and Gallery Prints for my wedding clients.

For the landscape sample I decided to use my Skye Cuillins from Strome Castle image.

This is my biggest selling image and is quite well known throughout Scotland for its numerous magazine appearances and gallery sales. It was first produced and distributed by the publishers Edinburgh Art who wanted to produce a range of twelve of my photographs as fine art prints. Over the years this picture has out sold all the other eleven, and a couple of new ones that have been added along the way, by four times.

For the launch of my Gallery Prints, however, I decided to tweak the picture and use a unique black and white conversion process I've recently been experimenting with. As you can see the result is pretty cool!

For the wedding sample I decided to use a great shot from the wedding of Liz and Bruce a few months ago at Melville Castle. The old historical castle provides a superb backdrop for bride and grooms getting married there, but to create the dramatic background of this image I needed to get in fairly close to Liz and Bruce with a wide angle lens and lie prone on the floor looking up at them so the character of the castle would be exagerrated as it loomed behind them. I then colour touched Liz and Bruce and turned the background to black and white.

We printed this one off at 30" x 20", which is fairly large, and looks spectacular when hung! Gallery Prints are laminated, lacquered then mounted to foamex and heat sealed, making them incredibly light weight yet with solid, rigid protection. Hence, they can be hung without a frame giving the effect they are floating just off the surface of the wall.

Anyway, all the samples and mailings are finally ready. All I have to do now is update all the prints and prices on my website. Yikes! I better cracking!