Wedding photography for fun and profit?

Well, the wedding season is in full swing with the bridal hordes flocking to the altar in massive numbers. I've been privileged to attend a few weddings this year and I'm happy for all of my friends who tied the knot. It's indeed a joyful time. Now I've been experimenting with wedding photography this year and I've learned quite a few things. I felt I should share them with my regular readers (the both of you).

1. Being successful with a wedding shoot requires complete competance with photographic technique, equipment, and most of all, people skills. That means I'll never do wedding photography as a full time job, since I'm rather lacking in these skills - especially those involving fellow human beings. "Hey you, in the white dress! Move over there! Now smile, and look happy!"


2. You need to pick out a good location beforehand. For instance, Parliament Hill in 35 degree weather during a protest march is a good example of bad location. So is a park infested with mosquitos.


3. Poses are very important during formal shots. Watch out for wierd hand positioning and 'unbalanced' placement of subjects. Be careful to avoid situations where a tree in the background appears to stick out of the grooms head. Most of all, be very, very careful when the bride wears a strapless dress. They look very nice, but when the bride is posed behind a bush or a low wall, only the shoulders and head will be visible. This in turn makes it look like she's wearing nothing. Unless the bride is an exhibitionist, she won't be pleased.


4. Techie tip: If you're using a DSLR, shoot RAW. During the fast-pace of weddings, I guarantee that YOU WILL SCREW UP. There will be times that you will mess up the metering mode or the exposure compensation. Or you may have set the wrong ISO. Or even worse, you left your camera at the wrong white balance setting. In these cases, RAW can save your butt. It's hard to recover from these mistakes when shooting JPEG, especially white balance errors, but RAW allows you to easily correct these mistakes. RAW files are big, so you'll need lots of memory card capacity. Don't have 2 Gigs? Well, beg, steal or borrow more cards. You'll be glad you did.


5. Storing wedding photos on cheap CD-Rs is not a good idea. Wedding photos are supposed to be memories that last a lifetime. CD-Rs only last for 2-5 years. If there are any pictures you want to keep, PRINT THEM OUT. I don't mean on a photo printer either, but at your favourite film processing lab. Those prints will last for decades. CD-Rs won't.

This isn't an exhaustive list, but it's the best I can do at 12 midnight! Feel free to suggest more tips.