Back to Basics with Traditional Formals
Wednesday May 3, 2006 by Bambi Cantrell
I spent a lot of time at WPPI last month as a speaker, a judge and as just myself, a photographer looking for new ideas and talking to other professionals. Out of the week in Las Vegas and all the photographers I met there seemed to be a trend when it came to formal wedding photography…very few people out there know how to do it! I’ll even go out on a limb and bet that if you’ve been in business less than 5 years as a wedding photographer the majority of you hate doing any traditional sort of wedding portrait. Furthermore, many of you have little or no idea how to get the job done!
My youngest, most contemporary couples, while most of their wedding album will have a high fashion, illustrative photojournalistic look, still want at least one great portrait of themselves as bride and groom. The parents want at least one great family grouping. And, forget about just the wedding, I have dozens of clients who want a nice engagement shot, a traditional portrait of them as a couple.
When talking to photographers at WPPI there actually seemed to be a stigma attached to creating a decent formal wedding portrait, as if it was a violation of the principles of being a photographer!
Come on people, it’s time to get back to basics. This is about being a success and being able to cover all the bases, not just be a one-hit-wonder and get the wedding photojournalism shots down. It’s about understanding exposure, composition and most of all lighting. I think I’ve been hanging out too much with Joe Buissink…did you read his article this month yet? It’s about meeting the perception of your client and helping them to see themselves the way they do and you can’t fix a bad portrait in Photoshop.
So, here’s my plea…pick up Tony Corbell’s book on Lighting, or get yourself a copy of Don Blair’s book on Posing and Lighting Body Parts (Rangefinder has it in their bookstore)…let’s get back to basics. Whether you’re digital or film won’t matter if you can’t grow your business and be a success. You can’t do either if you haven’t taken the time to really study photography!
Next month we’ll get into some really easy posing techniques to help you create a few painless formal wedding images and you’ll learn how to do them fast! They’re an important part of the album, but they don’t have to take up a lot of your time. Even more critical, they don’t have to take time away from the bride and groom!
