I’m very flattered to have been asked twice this year to photograph the weddings of friends, although it has been causing me some worry and fret because I’ve not actually done this before. Both of my brides are very well aware of this and are completely happy with the situation. I’ve been given this ultimate vote of confidence because of the portraits I have taken of other people and I suspect it is the biggest honour anyone could bestow on me – they are asking me to provide the long-term record of the most important day in their lives. I am enormously excited to have been asked and feel just about a million dollars because of it.
Life as a worry-guts means I am constantly fearful of letting my friends down though. I was just about to melt-down with the worry of letting Sally down for the flower show but it was fine as soon as I opened my mouth for the first sentence. I need to make sure that these weddings don’t turn me to a gibbering wreck so I need to do a lot of pre-event work to keep my equilibrium in balance.
In order to prep properly for making sure I capture their big days in such a way that they will be happy with the results and pleased they chose to put their faith in me, I have been swotting up on how to make sure the day is captured well.
What to do if it rains, how to cope with bright sunlight, making sure the things that the couple will expect to see in their album are there and general tips on composition and the current ‘vogues’ in terms of styling and feel. I’ve bought a book that has lots of helpful advice on how to martial us (DM is going to help me out and I’m going to help him out at another wedding of a close friend he has been asked to shoot in a few weeks time) so we know who is filling what role (the photographer whose advice we are taking has an assistant so I’m filling that role for DM and he is filling it for me). It also gives advice about how to ensure the help and support of the guests and family. I think it was money well spent!
It’s funny, when I was young, I really wanted to become a photographer but was put off by two things – the first being the endless hours in the darkroom printing photos and every trainee or apprentice photographer will end up spending hours doing this if they work at a studio. The second was weddings. It seemed like a huge responsibility and yet here I am, thirty years on, preparing to take my first wedding. I suppose my confidence has grown enough to believe I can do it and I know I have become a better photographer in recent times. One thing I’m jolly glad of is that the darkroom has, for me, ‘metamorphosised’ into sitting in front of my PC.
My two friends will, I hope, each have the best day of their life and my photos will be what they look back on and remember in years to come. I fully intend to make sure that their faith in me is justified.
This photo has caused me pain on two counts – firstly I broke a glass in the making of it – not just broke, smashed to smithereens!!! The ‘ice’ is actually glass and was sent to me by the very kind Gordon La Vere in a parcel with some soaps. I had my image in my mind of the ‘ice’ breaking the surface of the sparkling water and gloops of water in the air. I set it all up really carefully – composition, exposure, amount of flash. I knew it would take me a few goes – just like my egg shot, there is an art to getting the thing you visualise. So, I’m ready, with my finger on the shutter release and I drop the ice……in the wrong place!!! It hits the side of the glass, shattering shard of glass all over the floor, sparkling water was tumbling everywhere. Then I noticed this shot – so I let the water run while I got my shot. The second pain was that I have great problems with cloning tools in photoshop – why is it that I manage to try to take out a couple of water splashes and make it look like it’s been handled by a small child? Ham-fistedness I suspect on my part is responsible for both bits of pain.
I was trudging round a cold car park in Princeton this time last year and musing on the patriotism of the Americans.
