Which system for weddings?

[RobC]

Which medium format system would you recommend for doing weddings and why.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

The classic wedding camera is the Hasselblad. Outstanding optics, bulletproof reliability, and relative light weight make it hand-holdable for even the longest ceremonies. Plus, the square means you don't have to keep flipping the camera to switch from vertical to horizontal composition, so you can set your flash on a bracket and not have to rotate it for each shot. Just frame loose and crop at printing.

 

[dpurdy]

I would and do use 35 mm for everything but formal portraits. You are crazy not to do digital but I am crazy and I use a Nikon F100 with it set on Program Auto and TTL flash matrix metering. The thing with weddings is to reduce stress and complicated decisions. The auto functions on the Nikon are like my best friend.

For portraits though I would suggest you don't do what I do which is use a Pentax 67 and Rollei TLR. The Pentax only synchs at low speeds unless you use the leaf shutter lens and the Rollei TLR is slow to work with and limited to the one lens. If I was going to gear up again I think I would get a hasselblad because for one thing you can shoot a polaroid in difficult lighting. But probably an auto everything 645 would make more sense. I find the MF wedding camera is mostly for show. At wedding print size a 35mm camera is enough. IMO

 

[Gary Holliday]

Hasselblad for formal wedding portraits and interior/ exterior church shots, but 35mm for the documentary shots.

MF is far too slow for running about with. I would not attempt large group shots with 35mm unless you are happy with tiny low resolution people.

 

[RobC]

thing is I have a hasselblad 501cm which is almost new but it jammed and I tried to fix it. Big mistake because it jammed again and then I really broke it.
So I had it in mind to sell it off and get a Mamiya 7II but I could get a new 503cw body for not much more than fixing the body I have currently and have ttl metering on the blad. I just think that the mamiya would be an easier camera to use for weddings and much quicker to operate but no ttl metering. I don't think ttl metering is a major requirement though as one spot meter is all thats required unless lighting is constantly changing. My meter is a minolta spot F so its good for flash. So what do you think, go for the 503CW or a Mamiya 7II.

 

[blaze-on]

Unless your doing all b&w it's almost pointless to not use digital anymore since most labs scan & print digitally.
They may process C41, but few are printing. Almost negates the film benefits.

 

[Gary Holliday]

I'd go with the 503CW, since you have the lenses. The TTL is great, take an ambient light reading and slide the TTL/ ISO switch on the 503CW down 2 stops and you have perfect fill flash.

Haven't you read the "Is that a Hasselblad?" thread.

 

[dpurdy]

Actually assuming you prefer film, I think the Mamiya 7 is a pretty good choice if you can afford it. It is very light, shoots 220, is very sharp and as long as you have everybody standing there waiting for you to take their picture the focus is great. Personally I have a bit of trouble focusing a range finder quickly because you only have a little area in the middle to focus with and matching the two images is sometime confusing with multiple vertical lines in the picture. And to make matters worse the view in the range finder tends to look completely in focus except in that small focus area so you can easily shoot with the camera way out of focus and not notice. At least that is my problem
Dennis

 

[RobC]

Unless your doing all b&w it's almost pointless to not use digital anymore since most labs scan & print digitally.
They may process C41, but few are printing. Almost negates the film benefits.

The plan is to offer only B+W prints.

 

[j4425]

Which medium format system would you recommend for doing weddings and why.

As a wedding videographer I obviously see a ton of wedding photographers and those that are NOT shooting digital are using either 35mm exclusively or a 35mm ¬ 645 combination. Note: Most sought after photographers I work with shoot film, not only for the extra latitude color negative offers but more importantly, the workflow . It is simply impossible for the single digital wedding photographer to shoot a serious amount of weddings every year working in the digital darkroom. I know a couple photographers making the switch BACK to film just for that reason.

 

[Christopher Walrath]

I have done weddings with a Minolta XG-M, a Canon Elan-7 and a Mamiya M645j. I would say use a system that you are familiar with and be sure to be meticulous with every shot. Don't let the customer rush you. Mistakes can be made if harried. Be sure of your equipment. Be sure of yourself.

 

[MattKing]

Mamiya C330, but I'm old fashioned .

Matt

 

[dsullivan]

It is simply impossible for the single digital wedding photographer to shoot a serious amount of weddings every year working in the digital darkroom. I know a couple photographers making the switch BACK to film just for that reason.

Playing devil's advocate for a moment the two places I use for developing and printing our colour stuff have services* where you upload the images to their servers and have a branded website where you set the prices and the customers order prints, they do the printing and send your cut of the prints as a cheque periodically, in this situation surely there's a reduction in admin overhead and the ability to maybe sell a few more prints? This is all assuming no tweaking each shot to the nth degree in Photoshop, but surely Traditional Wedding photographers aren't doing huge volumes of finely tuned hand-printing either?

David

*
http://www.peak-professional.com/htmls/digital.htm#polo
http://www.rgb-tech.co.uk/lab/26

 

[Gary Holliday]

As a wedding videographer....... It is simply impossible for the single digital wedding photographer to shoot a serious amount of weddings every year working in the digital darkroom. I know a couple photographers making the switch BACK to film just for that reason.

I was at a trade fair for wedding albums in Cambridge and speaking to another photographer who was surprised that I still did the whole medium format hand printed photographs... She asked,
"How do you have the time?"

Quality over profit.

 

[RobC]

Am I nuts thinking that I can offer hand printed fine black and white prints as a premium quality wedding service. Do you think customers in UK would appreciate that kind of service and understand what it is I'm offering?

on a another note,
I was looking at photo albums for weddings and found that there is one particular company which offers a service whereby you download their album layout software, load your digital files direct to the software, crop, size and position the images and then send the file and they do everything else. It's ideal for the digital workflow but could also be used for my black and white prints. Only one problem, I asked them if the mounts and papers in the finished albums were acid free/archival. Their response was: we won't guarantee it which basically means no. Or to put it another way, these albums will probably start to eat your clients photos in a few years. Considering what they are producing and the kind of money they charge I would expect all papers and mounts should be of at least conservation quality.

 

[Gary Holliday]

Rob, the wedding market is junk. People ask if they can have their photos on CD so that they can print it themselves cheaply. There are plenty of 'photographers' who are willing to take their money. People have it in their heads that they can go to Boots and get their photos done on the cheap.

Trying to re-educate these people will be down to your own marketing.

I'm lucky that my area is affluent and will hopefully seek out photographers like myself.

My belief is that if I stay true to top quality, this will separate me from the digital cowboys.

edit* I've been to wedding fairs and seen out of focus shots in albums and been gobsmacked that these people have careers. People still shop in Lidl/ Aldi even though M&S has better food. So stick to your guns!

 

[JohnArs]

Hi Rob
I just did my last film wedding I switch now fully to digital, because all labs have gone digital in my era and even if they get film they just scann them in and the prints are terrible bad thad way!
So with my last one I did a test and the picture from the digital are better as a print then the analog ones!
I would not work in 6x6 i would work with 4,5x6 and 35mm as backup and for fast changing scenes!
There are some B/W fans but not so much as you may think!
I did meanwhile about 70 weddings and I did with one exeption all weddings with 1-2 B/W films as an adition to the color, but newer could do one only in B/W but this is in little Switzerland maybe its not the same in your country!
Cheers Armin

 

[dpurdy]

I have done a few weddings in black and white and printed the whole thing on my enlarger in my darkroom. I had two of them that way this year. The thing is that if you do the whole job that way off contact sheets and you shoot 10 or 12 or more rolls black and white film and you try to print pretty much everything except duplicates and out of focus or completely stupid shots lthen you end up with needing to print something like 150 to 200 photos. For me that is nearly 2 weeks work. It looks great with full frame prints with black edges and big borders with prints on 5x7 paper. It is killer and the clients absolutely love it. But it will kill you to try to do that. you have to charge a couple of thousand dollars just for the prints and even if someone is willing to pay that much it is so time consuming that you have to limit the number of weddings you can do that for to just a couple a year. Black and white printed at a lab is horrible in my opinion. It is embarrassingly bad. But sloshing for two weeks per wedding in the darkroom is madness. If you want to be a high end hand made print photographer, you have to limit the prints you make to a reasonable number.
dennis

 

[RobC]

I wasn't thinking of doing anywhere near that amount of images. I would concentrate on formal and a few semi formal / posed images.

The last wedding I went to, there must have been 50 people with digital cameras and at least 4 people with videos. Why would anyone want to pay a photographer for documentary / reportage style photographs when all they have to do is request any guests who bring a camera should send a cd of images to the bride? Two or three of the guests will usually be able to take some reasonably good images.

 

[dpurdy]

I do a lot better job than their guests.

 

[Jeffrey A. Steinberg]

Contax 645AF. Wonderful camera, great optics. Also fast loading. I have the Mamiya 7 and can't imagine changing it out quickly.

The Mamiya C330 is also nice (slow loading) because you can see if people blinked at exposure because of the TLR.

 

[DanielOB]

Hasselblad if you make around 20 photographs for the whole wedding. And this is actually enough. This is also good if you like "high quality" photographs.
If you go to make hundred or two go digital sh**. One that is not selective and want that many different pictures, dig is good enough. Just to make money.
Wide angle is important to have (around half of "standard" focal length). Distagon 50 mm is nice. Mamiya 67RZ also has very good 50 mm (take care ULD one). This one is actually might be ahead of Zeiss 50 mm.
Daniel OB

 

[copake_ham]

Hasselblad if you make around 20 photographs for the whole wedding. And this is actually enough. This is also good if you like "high quality" photographs.
If you go to make hundred or two go digital sh**. One that is not selective and want that many different pictures, dig is good enough. Just to make money.
Wide angle is important to have (around half of "standard" focal length). Distagon 50 mm is nice. Mamiya 67RZ also has very good 50 mm (take care ULD one). This one is actually might be ahead of Zeiss 50 mm.
Daniel OB

I think this is extreme - but it does offer a "strategy" for those of us who know that film is superior.

Take the "special shots" in MF film.

"Shadow" them with digis.

Also take digis for the "side shots".

Present your product in a two-tier format.

 

[JBrunner]

Am I nuts thinking that I can offer hand printed fine black and white prints as a premium quality wedding service. Do you think customers in UK would appreciate that kind of service and understand what it is I'm offering?

on a another note,
I was looking at photo albums for weddings and found that there is one particular company which offers a service whereby you download their album layout software, load your digital files direct to the software, crop, size and position the images and then send the file and they do everything else. It's ideal for the digital workflow but could also be used for my black and white prints. Only one problem, I asked them if the mounts and papers in the finished albums were acid free/archival. Their response was: we won't guarantee it which basically means no. Or to put it another way, these albums will probably start to eat your clients photos in a few years. Considering what they are producing and the kind of money they charge I would expect all papers and mounts should be of at least conservation quality.

No, you are not nuts. What you are doing is offering a niche service. The trick is finding the people who want it, and will pay for it. Specialty services can be very lucrative, but they take longer to get off the ground. The bridal portrait part of your portfolio is what will get you the work.

 

[Akki14]

B&W seems quite popular for weddings at the moment. Nearly everyone (except my recent "clients" eg my brother-in-law) I know prefers B&W for wedding pictures. I have a few from my own wedding but it was c-41 B&W to keep costs down. REAL B&W would have cost much more than we could afford.