Cameras-n- Stuff

When I meet a stranger and tell them that I am a professional wedding photographer near Brighton Sussex, I can often see in their eyes that they imagine “that’s an easy job – anybody can just take a photograph!” – if they only knew …

For a start the job the wedding photographer is a very responsible one. In a way we are entrusted with the preservation of people’s most treasured memories. And sometimes it can be a huge responsibility, especially on days and in places where the light is very challenging.

Weddings in winter and in dark churches are the two main problem areas. The lighting in the winter time can be very gloomy even outside and as professional wedding photographers we sometimes struggle even with sophisticated lighting rigs, fast lenses and sensitive cameras.

Frequently the photographs are improved to high level using photo manipulation software in the post photo shoot phase. But that still doesn’t mean you can be lax in collecting as many photos as possible. Dark churches, unhelpful and unsympathetic priests and vicars are a problem all year round.

Unfortunately though it’s easy to blame the clerics, it is probably overly noisy and demanding photographers who caused most of the problems. I can well sympathise with the church vicar who having had an abrasive and uncompromising wedding photographer decides that in future he will not allow any photography during the ceremony itself. Sadly this makes it very difficult for photographers like myself who believe in minimising the impact on the ceremony and general atmosphere in the church.

Even more common than not being allowed to take photographs at all, is being restricted in our use of flash photograhy. It is sometimes all right if the church is reasonably lit and the ceremony takes place in a part of the church where natural daylight illuminates the scene. But unfortunately as I found at Lewes, Sussex, church last year, quite often especially if the church is having any renovations it can be unbelievably dark. This was made even worse by the fact that the ceremony was held in the centre of the church away from the large window above the altar. The fact that we couldn’t use flash in this situation made taking quality photographs almost impossible!

And worse still the customer was unsympathetic to our plight and try as we may we couldn’t make them see the difficulties. So my tip of the day is: if you are getting married in church particularly in the winter, check first that the vicar presiding will allow at least some form of flash photography during the ceremony. And if you particularly need photographs of the ceremony check your vicar will allow you to take them at all.

by Patrick Gold of i-Clic photographers, Brighton, Sussex.