A day in the life...Wedding Photographer.

2:30 p.m. arrived at the church so as to get there when the bride did. Hoped to get some great candid shots of her getting ready. The weather was completely horrible that day. Cloudy, misty looked like they were to be married in Scotland amid the marsh. Greeted their primary wedding photographer John. I was suprised to see him shooting with a Rebel (not even an XT) we exchanged questions 'how long have you been shooting,' 'how do you like shooting weddings?' etc...He thought my two years shooting experience was pretty impressive and my d70 was a nice piece of gear.

The bride and bridesmaids were getting ready in this super small room behund the alter. It was a trick fitting in there and being able to maneuver among 6 girls. I often found myself standing on the arm of the small couch or propped up on top of a chair. I found out very quickly that there was little to no use for my long lens. Any close up's could easily be achieved by cropping or just moving in closer. I used my 18-70mm f3.5-4.5 Nikkor and my Sigma EF-500 DG ST flash. Having three mirrors along the wall presented a challenge as the only 'getting ready' photos I could achieve were in the mirror. While these were interesting, I was hoping to get moore diverse shots. Many things went wrong during this time and I often found the bride looking pensive. I really had to photographically stalk her, having my camera aimed at her during the entire time to be able to capture genuine emotion on her face. I was pleased with how this section of the wedding came out...

From here their primary photographer led them outside for formal photos for each gender. This was a surprising move as it had been 'misting' for some time and in addition to the ground being muddy the props he required for the shot were completely wet. He made the bride sit on a wet park bench...offering a towel for her to sit on but still...He seems to take a lot of variations on the same shot. There was very little attention paid to composition and the placement of arms, bouquets etc...I am sure the shots will turn out beautifully however because the girls were so beautiful. During the time I kept my camera on the bride hoping to catch a candid moment of her laughing or mid though. These are my favorites from this section...

The ceremony was extremely tricky. I was following advice posted on DPReview by Sam J. Stern. Under this advice when shooting indoors I was using M Mode, 1/80, f6.3-8 with my flash on TTL and up one click. This advice seems to rely on the bouncing of light from the ceiling. While this worked perfectly for the shots of the bride getting ready the vaulted ceilings of the church just did not cooperate. I found myself having to aim the flash almost directly at the couple and was dismally disappointed when post processing my pictures and finding gaping shadows looming behind the figures. This was also a time that I was surprised at the bahavior of their primary photographer. Upon asking him where he was going to shoot from during the wedding (trying not to get in his way) he told me he planned to shoot from the back of the church about 5 rows from the door so as not to disrupt the guests. He also was shooting with a 70mm lens which was why I thought this a surprising move. At no time did he center himself in such a way as to get a decent shot of the bride and groom at the alter. From some 20 ft away in a dimly lit church with a 70mm lens and a 6mp camera it will be interesting to see his results. Feeling a sense of personal responsibility to the couple since we are friends I just let my photojournalistic instincts kick in. After all they are paying me to get the shot right? And the first rows are family who also have a vested interest in my capturing their most precious moments right? I sat on the floor directly in front of the first pew very close to the aisle. At first I was worried someone would think it was tacky but when the grooms mother (who I was sitting in front of) bent down and asked me to get her a good photo of the couple praying after lighting their unity candle I knew I was fine. Looming shadows and all I think I did a good job for my first time. Here are some photos shot during this section...

After the wedding formal photos with the entire wedding party and family were posed and shot by the primary photographer. It was a really big group and the primary seemed to last a bit of interest when it came to making the composition pleasing as far as weighting and symmetry. An uncle who was very shot was placed in the back and I actually watched him standing on his tip toes as he was aware his head was going to be completely lost in the shot. Once again he headed out to the wet park benches...(importance of having a back up plan!) ONce again I just focused on getting the candid shots in between his formal takes...Here are a couple from this section...

***I am still going through my photos and this is about as far as I got last night, I will be adding the rest of this walk through as well as photos later this week. To view the complete set of photos thus far go here http://stephaniewilliams.smugmug.com/gallery/1854948/1.