Any wedding photographers, past or present?

[frank]

Decades ago, I used to shoot weddings on the side for extra cash used mainly to buy photo gear. Over 5 or 7 years I shot a couple dozen weddings. I first practiced on a friend's wedding as a non-official photographer and on my 2 siblings when they got married. It was exciting and demanding work and for a while it gave me a thrill to test my metal. Thankfully the couples were always happy with the results and I never screwed anything up. It felt like an honour to be included/accepted in an important family event.

I used a Nikon F4 with 50/28 lenses, SB24 flash, and 400 speed colour neg film. I also took pictures with a medium format camera with B+W film. The couples would get the (edited) 4x6 prints and contact sheets of the B+W film from which they could order hand made enlargements (by me.) I went through an interesting succession of different MF cameras: Hasselblad 500cm, Mamiya 6 (new), Rolleiflex TLR, Rolleiflex 6006, Bronica RF645 (in random order.)

Anyone else shoot weddings? I'd love to hear your stories!

 

[frank]

bump for the daytime crowd.

 

[MattKing]

In the 1970s and early 1980s - lots.

Still use my main camera - a Mamiya C330 - and my Metz 60CT flashes.

And still have in storage virtually all my negatives (mostly Vericolour II and III I think).

I actually came across my demo/display wedding album the other day. The colour prints have held up well, but those hair styles and light blue tuxes - not so much.

I also used to print colour proofs and wedding reprints for other wedding photographers.

 

[frank]

In the 1970s and early 1980s - lots.
Still use my main camera - a Mamiya C330 - and my Metz 60CT flashes.
And still have in storage virtually all my negatives (mostly Vericolour II and III I think).
I actually came across my demo/display wedding album the other day. The colour prints have held up well, but those hair styles and light blue tuxes - not so much.
I also used to print colour proofs and wedding reprints for other wedding photographers.

Cool. Any bridezilla horror stories?

I worked for this one family multiple times: family portraits, engagement, wedding, pregnancy pics of multiple siblings.

 

[MattKing]

Cool. Any bridezilla horror stories?

Mostly really good experiences. Although there was this one couple ...

I was still doing it a bit for friends/acquaintances after I started practicing law. One Spring (I think) I argued a difficult chambers application before a Supreme Court Justice in Vancouver. The application ended up with a written and reported decision that made some new law (on a small but important point). Later that same year, I ended up photographing the wedding for a good friend of a friend whose wedding I also photographed. For the latter wedding, the groom was one of the sons of the Supreme Court Justice who I argued the case before.

Throughout the wedding, I could see the father of the groom keep looking toward me with one of those "where do I know him from?" looks.

At the reception, which was actually at the groom's family home, I got a chance to talk to the grooms father. He is a quiet, generous and extremely intelligent man. He was greatly relieved when I revealed why I was familiar.

 

[Patrick Robert James]

I used to shoot weddings back in SoCal. Some of the things I experienced are difficult to put into words. I shot the wedding of a congresswoman which was strange since the reception was full of DC types. I never realized most senators and congresspeople were so short, but in hindsight it makes perfect Napoleonic sense. that was an odd day. I have been asked for feminine products (not kidding) by the mother of the bride 'cause the bride had a delicate situation. Seriously? Lol. I witnessed a groomsman get cold knocked out in Mexico during a wedding that I shot for a Hollyweird producer. That was an interesting trip...

Yeah, I have a lot of stories, I just can't talk about them on the interwebs. Buy me a beer and you will laugh for an hour straight....

 

[MattKing]

Come to think of it, I do have one bridezilla story, although it wasn't really my wedding.

While I was at university I did a bit of work for John - an owner of a busy wedding and portrait studio in Vancouver. One Saturday I dropped by his studio after working a shift at the camera store I also worked at. He was in a bit of a bother, because one of his part time photographers had been booked for an evening wedding that day, and shouldn't have because he was out of town.

So John decided to have the young assistant he was in the process of training shoot the first part of the wedding, and he roped me in to help that young assistant, because I was much more experienced.

The whole wedding party was grumpy. The bride was in an antique dress that had been handed down by a (great)grandmother but ought not to have been, because it was extremely ugly. The groom announced at the first opportunity that he didn't intend to pose for any pictures. Mother and bride quarreled. The reception was at an old hall which had horrible lighting - which may have been good, because every potential background was better if you couldn't see it easily.

John was shooting a couple of weddings that day, but he showed up part way through the reception to finish "our" wedding. He dealt with the difficult clients, and shot some formals to help satisfy them.

The postscript? I talked to John a couple of weeks later. The photos that his young assistant took were quite serviceable. But the clients were unhappy because, for the first and only time in John's experience, the films he shot went missing, and were nowhere to be found.

On another occasion, I was at Queen Elizabeth Park in Vancouver with my father and my Mamiya C330 and, as luck would have it, some colour film. The grotto at Queen Elizabeth Park has been used for so many wedding photographs that they actually have a system of traffic control in place for the wedding parties and photographers who use it.

We were approached by a couple who were dressed as bride and groom. They had apparently just been married in an extremely small civil ceremony, and had booked a photographer to meet them at the park to take a small number of wedding photos. The photographer failed to show and they were clearly very disappointed. They asked if I could take a few photos of them and offered to pay me. I did it for free, and gave them the negatives.

 

[John51]

I only did a few weddings for friends in the 70s as the official photographer. I did shoot pics when a guest at other weddings though. What surprised me was how many guests never got to see the official wedding pics. I did a good trade in reprints where I knew the guests well enough to visit and show them what I'd shot.

It never happened but what I wanted to do was find a good lab that could process and print to 5x7 that Saturday, with 2 extra sets of prints. Rubber stamp 'NOT FOR SALE' on everything then make up 3 albums to take to the reception. One for the bride and groom to take on honeymoon with them and two to be hawked around the guests by myself and partner, looking for 10% deposits on print orders.

Couldn't find a local lab willing to accommodate me. Shame, I reckon it could have been a good earner.

 

[frank]

The last wedding I attended was as a guest at a co-worker's wedding. It was very cool because it was the first Hindu wedding I've been to and I brought my Leica M2 with collapsible Summicron to record some of it. As a former official wedding photographer I made sure not to interfere with the paid pro, but he was very deferential to me because of my camera, which he drooled over. He was shooting digital but knew about film. Group pictures were done in a grand foyer. I stayed out of the way at the top of a staircase on the other side of the room. The problem was, there was a large mirror over the fireplace that the groups were placed in front of, which was discovered later to include a reflection of me across the room at the top of the stairs. The pro didn't notice, and I didn't know, but now I'm a permanent record in some of my friend's group wedding shots as a small reflected figure in the mirror. I printed up several B+W 8x10's to gift to the couple.

 

[Mick Fagan]

I did quite a lot of weddings for someone who was not a wedding photographer, I wished to keep it as a hobby, you know, have fun. I printed some wedding photographers stuff in my own darkroom after I bought a Durst Printo, which was in the 90’s.

The so called disadvantage of running 35mm cameras, as opposed to 120 cameras, was turned into an advantage mainly because I could do my own colour printing. I started at the bottom end, and stayed at the bottom end, I became pretty good for a bottom end photographer.

One of the funniest weddings I ever shot, was one I undertook the evening before the wedding. The official photographer had taken their money and absconded, never to be seen until eventually the authorities caught up with him. Making front page on the newspapers and astounding many people, myself included, on just how much he charged up front and literally walked away with their monies.

Back to the wedding in question. The Bride was from Chile, the groom was from Italy, she spoke Spanish, he, spoke Italian. Neither seemed to have a grasp of English, which is the language of this country. My Spanish and Italian was pretty much non-existent, the bridesmaids, all from Chile with their wonderful hats, somehow acted as interpreters for everyone.

There were some interesting happenings in the church, especially when the officiating priest gave the couple some directions. Generally they looked at each other to see if either knew what was said or instructed, then they turned to one or more of the bridesmaids for a translation. It was a wonderful wedding and reception, I always hoped that they were able to get past that critical stage of their marriage when the “lust in the dust” bit wore off.

I ran two Nikon F3 bodies, a Metz CT32 with the hammerhead configuration, and the correct SCA adaptor for TTL when I was needing TTL for flash; generally I shot fully manual. I mostly used a 28 f/2.8 for group shots, a 35 f/2.8 for the couple and parents shots. 50 f/1.8 for quick grab shots, 85 f/1.4 for detail couple shots and the 105 f/2.5 for bust shots of various people, or a ¾ detail shot of someone or a couple.

Depending upon the location and more so if I had advance knowledge, I sometimes used my 180 f/2.8. This was particularly effective, for detail of the sometimes intricate hair-do a bride may be sporting.

One bride, a Canadian lass getting married in Australia to an Australian, then flying back together to Canada to live happily ever after, had the most incredible hair-do I have personally seen. She too was enamoured of it, during the reception she offhandedly remarked it was a pity I couldn’t take a really great isolated shot of her hair. The upshot was, the next day we were in the middle of a cricket ground. She was seated on a chair on the concrete cricket pitch, me with the 180 on a tripod a short distance away, brilliant sunshine with the old wooden grandstand dark interior as the backdrop. If I do say so myself, stunning outcome.

Mick.

 

[BMbikerider]

I suppose I have done about 15-20 weddingssince 1999, I didn't keep count. I didn't mess up on any of them and the prints were always accepted as perfectly satisfactory. However I noticed that the stress made itself present because I would always be soaked with sweat whilst I was 'in action' so to speak. There was one time I under developed the colour negatives, but managed to salvage the results. Mostly I used medium format, Mamiya 645 and the C330s twin lens.

I haven't done a wedding for a number of years and that was using a Nikon F100. It was for a family member as their wedding present and I was asked to put all the images on a memory stick and they would print off what they wanted for friends and family. That suited me just fine.

I have another wedding booked next year for another family member with the same arrangements as the last one. This time it will be with a Bronica!

 

[removed account4]

i've shot weddings and mitzvahs ( bar and bat )... not on a regular basis
they were ok, people i knew, which didn't make it any easier ..
and i won't do them again. while i didn't mind doing them i'd rather do other things.
i have a childhood friend who shot a wedding or 2 every weekend for IDK 10years
he hated doing them, but the money was good so he did it. i've another friend who is a film maker
who started shooting movies of weddings ( like regular 8 and super 8 ) and then switched to more modern
methods and i believe he is back to shooting 8mm ( super? ) again ... he loved shooting weddings until he got sick
and then stopped. the last one he shot i think the couple loved it, but someone in the wedding party saw it and said
something like it looked like the quality of a home movie .. finally, he thought, someone got it ! although they were
saying it as a dig, not a compliment. that was the aesthetic he was going for the whole time

 

[sepiareverb]

I assisted on many weddings in the mid 80s. Did one wedding with the 8x10, about twenty years ago, which was something of a nightmare. On a beach on a sunny day, both color and B&W. But the pay was irresistible.

 

[bsdunek]

I did weddings on the side from 1967 to 1990. Use my Mamiya Super 23 with 100mm & 50mm lenses and an old Heiland flash. I liked that flash because it used three C cells. Never worried about recharging - just carried lots of C cells. Also had two 6X7 backs.
My first wedding was for my now Wife. We grew up together, but, as she five years younger than me, never were romantically attracted. She eventually divorced, and my first Wife died of brain cancer. We got together in 2002 and God told us we were meant for each other. Five years means nothing when you're in your 60's
Anyway, that first wedding - I had a Retina Reflex III and a little AG1 flash gun. I used PlusX. Really worked hard to get all the necessary shots. Got home that night and was putting my equipment away and noticed the flash sync was on "X"! Couldn't sleep all night! Here was an old family friend and I blew the wedding photos! The next day I took the last roll of film - just some final shots of the reception, and souped the heck out of it. I had no idea what was needed, but really left it in the developer a long them. The negatives weren't too bad. I developed the rest of the film the same way. Printing was difficult, but I got some pretty good prints. I made up a nice wedding book and gave it to her. She was thrilled! She still comments on what a wonderful job I did for my first wedding. Whew!
One other wedding in the 80's, the whole wedding party left for the reception at the VFW. By the time I got done with the bride and groom photos, no one was left at the church. We went to the VFW - it's pretty amazing how fast some people can be in the bag. I did the family photos anyway. The background was terrible and every one looked drunk. The bride was in tears. She took the albums I made up and thanked me for trying so hard.
Lots of other stories but those are two that stand out in my mind.

 

[frank]

Thanks for the stories, guys! One aspect of weddings/working for clients is the external validation. Anyone can be a good, even great photographer in their head, but satisfying a paying customer is validating.

 

[timmct]

Only, did ONE wedding...my brother's.

I had been working at Sprint Systems of Photography for a number of years; mixing the chemicals and testing films. I believe I was also the "tech guy" at that time.

My brother lives out in Nelson, British Columbia so I was taking the show on the road.

I felt confident but also picked up on the pressure of maybe screwing up...no wedding pictures from the know-it-all photographer?!?

I had a Hasselblad 500CM with a 60mmm lens (figured that would get me anywhere I wanted to go) and I think I had Ilford B&W film. I wasn't worried about grain so it may have been Delta 400.

I also had a 35mm reflex for casual, colour, shots around the before and after events.

The square format made me a bit apprehensive but I had experience with composition on a 6 x 6 format.

I worked on testing the light meter, film and camera together to ascertain all was in harmony before the trip.

I sweated the film onto the development reels but all came out really well...good , printable negatives...my brother and his new wife were highly appreciative of the prints I gave them.

WHAT A RELIEF.

 

[dugrant153]

I'm actually a wedding photographer at the moment (mostly a part time thing but hoping to make it full time - yes yes, hard to make it in this digital era and all that jazz). I guess I'm a part of the newer crowd of wedding photogs. Most of my fellow colleagues are entirely digital and life is on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, wedding blogs, etc.

As I did a lot of second shooting this year, I used mainly digital as it made a lot more sense economically (shooting film as a second shooter would've cost me more than my getting paid). When I did my own assignments, it was always film + digital. I appreciate the benefits of digital but there's just something about film that keeps me wanting to use it. Look, feel, negatives, dynamic range... you name it.

Despite some of the craziness that happens during a wedding day, I really enjoy being able to do wedding photography. I enjoy the intimacy that comes with being the main guy to be with the bride and groom and being able to document the different parts of the day. Capturing the emotions and getting to know people in this way is something else. When I'm not doing weddings, I'm usually doing a form of street or documentary photography (sometimes a project). I actually see weddings as form of "street photography", albeit without being yelled at for taking photos

Stories... stories... hmm... Not too many thus far that I can think of, although I'm always surprised at the amount of drinking that happen just before a wedding day starts (guess it calms the nerves and loosens you up?). Some people get loud but thankfully no falls or utter craziness yet.

HOWEVER, I have three main pet peeves that occur at most of the weddings I attend:

1) Cellphones and ipad screens. I do use these creatively as part of my shots if the lighting is right. However, if it's a critical shot, I expect Aunt Sandy to stay in her seat and not wielding her large iPad into the ceremony line while I'm trying to take a photograph.
2) Video teams when there's limited space. I usually shoot solo and prefer it as there's less bodies and less commotion for my couples. I appreciate the work that video teams do but sometimes there's just tooo many of them. When space is super crammed, then we're all in each other's shot and I have to be a bit of a jerk and get in there way because frankly... I need to get my shot. Video teams, we love working with you but there sure are a lot of us in that 4 foot aisle!
3) Uncle Bob's and Auntie May's: I totally understand that guests are an important part of a day. Being a documentary photographer, I will sometimes include people taking photos with their own cameras. When I attend weddings, I too like to take photographs. However, there are times when relatives of the bride and groom tend to make it their personal mission to be the main photographer and they'll get in the way of the photoshoot (onboard flash pops up and I'm like.... oh dear). At the distances I'm operating in (and especially if the space is really tight), the only way to blur them out if with a F0.11 lens or something..... Occasionally I have literally bumped shoulders with them (hockey-mode starts turning on). I'm polite about it (I apologize for the bump) but I have a job to do.

One last point: Film photography allows a certain creativity that I can't get with digital. I'm so glad we still have film.

 

[MattKing]

dugrant153:
Your new RB67 will be perfect for weddings !.
When I was starting out we had a family friend who owned a neighbourhood studio, and shot lots of weddings. He eventually sold it to John, who I referred to earlier.
The only time I was at a wedding he photographed, he was using an RB67 for the formals, and a Koni-Omega for casual shots. He referred to them as his new small cameras, because he had transitioned from a studio view camera and a Speed Graphic!

 

[frank]

I used a 4x5 Speed Graphic for just a couple of shots for one wedding, because the groom (older guy, second marriage) worked as a young assistant to a wedding photographer back in the day, and that's what was used then.

 

[Nokton48]

I used to enjoy doing Weddings. I suppose nearly a hundred or so. I used Mamiya C's when I started out, then transitioned to Hasselblads. Digital does not interest me and I have no desire to build websites, so I shifted out of the business. Plus at the time a lot of my friends were finding people not wanting to spend money and experiencing economic hard times. Now my evenings and weekends are free and that is very important to me at this time in my life.

Still have the Hasselblads, although I don't use them much

001 by Nokton48, on Flickr

 

[Julian Ribinik]

Mostly really good experiences.