So it’s been a while since I’ve discussed a picture, and I thought this would be a good one to talk about. I shot this image at a recent November wedding with it’s bride only counterpart. I enjoyed creating this image in an empty lot next to Christina’s (the bride’s) parent’s home where she prepared for the wedding. The enjoyment came from being able to create mood and style easily in the early evening that comes in November. The frame above was made at 5:03:22PM between the ceremony and reception. The early sunset gave me the chance to control the lighting in the image by using my strobes instead of relying on the mood of the natural light.
Well I spent half the day today at Letchworth with Dee and Bill, reminded me again of this Letchworth wedding. There’s always a struggle to get something unique, vs. doing something our clients have seen us do before…..
We like pleasing you and all, but there’s something that can’t be repeated in every shot. In this one, Erica and Josh just stopped on the steps to do a little kissing before they broke out into plain sight again, and as they picked a perfect spot with the light streaming down through the leaves - I was able to capture it. And then I enhanced the feeling a little with some magical additions in post-production. I like the hidden feeling in this shot — not the clear big subjects that I am usually shooting.
Such is the fun of not repeating yourself, because the double whammy from the photographer’s perspective is that I judge myself on all the previous images I’ve shot at a given location too. When a client asks me to repeat this or that shot - I’m tempted to ask them ‘can you match that romantic gesture’ or that dramatic air that the previous couple created. Is that unfair to ask of you my subjects, if you ask me to do a similar shot you’ve seen before?
I’m tired of the long blog posts that are really just exacerbated slide shows, and to gratify my own introspective urges and hopefully let you in on my own thought’s I’m going to blog single images for a while.
What does it mean to be a bride…..well for one I’ll never know….so it’s interesting in a curious way to me, to continuously be looking for what each girl’s expectations and responses are to their bridehood. Erica was great from my point of view as I need client’s who feel as deeply, in order to photograph as deeply as I am capable. I believe this photograph to fully capture Erica’s first response to ‘becoming’ a bride as her veil is draped over her face for the first time.
So if you’re reading this and your wedding is in the future, remember to plan enough time for yourself to get ready and live these moments to their fullest!
The publishers of the Light Source Podcast found me and were inspired by my use of light in wedding and portrait images and wanted to speak with me about my techniques and inspiration. When the phonecall was scheduled, I happened to have a sore throat but we made it through. I thought you might enjoy listening just to get to know me a little.
