婚礼摄像师看待婚礼照片

What aspects of wedding photography appeal to you as a photographer?

Weddings are this melting pot of emotions and reality, happiness and sadness. Everything that I could find in many other different projects was all here in one place. And then when you add alcohol to that -- it becomes something else, you know? I learned more about photography and myself shooting weddings than I did any other time in my life. And continue to do so.

In your view, how has the lucrative wedding industry evolved for photographers?

The wedding industry is driven by trends and fads, whatever's popular at the moment. So, the most popular photographers within wedding photography (are) able to take what's popular and produce a really high-quality product. That's a great thing; there's nothing wrong with that. But for me, that's just commercial photography, it's not really a document of the day. And when we're applying a template to every wedding, and every wedding looks the same, then I don't really feel that the couple is getting anything special from that.


Do you have a favorite photo from the series?

There's the one with the young girl pulling a funny face. Her little teeth are just coming in, and she has a missing tooth. I really liked the irreverent nature of (her) attitude. There's another one of the bride who's sitting down and behind (her) there's a couple just really going for it. Those two photographs were shot at the same wedding. That was one of the first weddings that I shot where I realized that I could be shooting stuff other than the standard, expected wedding shots. I was slightly unsure about presenting those images to the couple, but they loved them. I thought, there are other people who are on the same wavelength, who don't want traditional standard wedding photography.

How do you find your clients, and what kind of relationship do you form with them before and during the wedding?

I think they find me. The people who are willing for me to come along and just do what I do are few and far between. So if they "get" me, and what I'm doing, I'm gonna get them. I think what any artist hopes to achieve is that their art is a reflection of them. I like to get involved, talk to people, be a part of the day. I mean, sometimes I'm dancing on the table in the evening with everyone else.

How do your clients react to seeing your photos?

Somebody mentioned the other day that they were excited to see the photographs of their wedding because they didn't know what they were going to get. And I think that's a really important aspect of what I do. I like it when people get back to me and say that I've captured the personalities of the people.