Every Saturday we wake up to a new wedding … well I wish it was every Saturday.

Every time I know that I must do my best.

That is what my clients expect and what I would expect also.

How do you make each day your best?

I started writing this thinking that there was an answer. There is, but it is personal to each photographer.

Having great assistants makes the best more achievable.

Do your homework, have a safety net, have the skills to stay out of danger, underpromise and always overdeliver.

Be stimulated by your work and by your clients.

Have fun.

There was a time when I would have told people the real answer was, ‘Drink more coffee and eat more chocolate.’ It worked for me. In truth it was a front for the excitement of shooting a wedding, ‘being in the zone’.

An undeniable truth is, ‘Look after yourself’ in body and mind.

Some days it’s harder to turn it on than others, but as professionals that is what is expected … your absolute best, and nothing less.

Cheers
Johannes

People who like this post would also like:

When a bride comes to you and says, “Can you make me look slimmer on my wedding day?” we say “Yes”.

We say “Yes… but we need to work on this together.”

Often the dream comes with an expectation. Anything that is not ideal will somehow miraculously correct itself on the day … or at least we, as the recorders of the day, will create the truth that they, the happy couple, hoped for.

So when the bride says, “I want to look thinner on my wedding day” we tell them they need to help us out. (Sometimes this is the not so subtle difference between our roles as dream keepers and miracle workers – Photoshop jockeys).

We say to them that they need to “think thin” in the build up to their day. We say they need to have the right dressmaker making the right dress for them. We say that we will help them stand in ways that look great, but we never promise them that the magic of Photoshop will be the answer to their prayers.

We want them to be a part of the process and make the effort to get it right. It certainly makes our job more realistic.

Cheers

Johannes

People who like this post would also like:

You, the photographer, are entrusted with telling the story of a couple’s day … not any old day … it’s the BIG one.

The bride and groom

They want it told with beauty and creativity. They chose you because they saw your work and figured that you would be the best person to tell their story. Or was it that they fell in love with your prices, and assumed that all photographers were equal (except for pricing)?

Ultimately we are telling a story … we need to know whether we are the authors or the observers, and apply those principles to our album designs. BUT then in spite of all of our creativity and hard work THEY want to change our creation! How dare they!

We were employed as the trusted story teller … so what happened to trust! The truth is we were possibly employed as an image maker over being the story teller. You own the images, because they are your vision, but in truth the story is theirs.

If we do our homework right we know this from the beginning. We remind ourselves that the story being told is theirs, and we try to build the trust that lets us tell it our way. But every now and then we need to concede that, in 10 years time this story is what paid for a new camera for us: for them, the bride and groom, it is a memory of something big that happened long enough ago to be easily forgotten, if it were not for the story in their album. For that reason the story is truly theirs.

Cheers, Johannes

People who like this post would also like:

I had the privilege of being the photographer when Queensberry’s pinup boy/metrosexual, Nigel, tied the knot with Kayla a few months ago, and I learnt a lesson.

Pretty much at the beginning of the day I unintentionally upset the bride’s parents. They had organised that I would shoot photographs outside their neighbour’s property. I took half a dozen images and ticked the box for family pics at home.

But I also wanted to do a quick family photograph in their own garden, in a spot that from my point of view, between rain showers, would do the job well.

The bride’s mother was able to conceal, through good manners, her horror at my photographing in their unweeded garden, but managed to mention it to some of the guests as a potential photographic catastrophe.

I regret not realising her concern at the time so that I could put her mind at ease and nip any damage in the bud. Too late I was. The opinions had been expressed.

The lesson is about heightened awareness. Sometimes people are so polite.

Cheers, Johannes

People who like this post would also like:

I recently held a small workshop in the UK at the studio of Zoe Richards just out of Liverpool.

It was intimate (there were only nine of us).

We discussed album design and particularly spoke about the Musée. One of the ideas of that album is to create a feeling of intimacy.

The resounding lesson from our discussion was about that and simplicity. Too often people cram images into albums to the point where there is no room to rest your eyes. The Musée design uses space to reinforce the luxury and quality feel of the product. There is something exciting about an intimate moment in a cupboard but it does not really compare to a moment of intimacy out in an open space.

What I am trying to say is that cupboard sex is not the stuff of long term relationships, and that building intimacy into your designs creates longevity. Even though busy designs might suggest a sense of energy they seldom create a sense of occasion and have less impact than fewer but stronger images.

People who like this post would also like: