“for little girls.”
Maurice Chevalier, the actor, singer, vaudeville performer and dangerously charming Frenchman made that song famous. Or at least it was his version from the movie “Gigi” that I’ll always remember. He was talking about love at the time but we photographers think more in terms of perfect subjects.
Let me introduce you to Andrianna, flower girl, future supermodel and/or rocket scientist, she hasn’t decided yet.
Lead photograph in the Boston area listing
I’ve just started advertising on “the Knot”. It’s a first for me and, while I don’t do much advertising, The Knot seems like a very reputable and visible publication and site. If you are here, you probably don’t need to go there but you could send your friends!
I’ve heard from couples and other photographers that while they love their photographs, they rarely put them up around their homes. Or at least, not many of them. Seems a shame to have great memories gathering dust in a closet, if that’s the case. So, while I am mostly about photographs, lately I’ve been experimenting graphically to create – on a limited basis, more artful versions of favorite images. Using a photography as a starting point, I’ve been working through a series of alternative methods for creating a final image, someting more “frame-able”. Click the photo for a brief slideshow of some of the experiments. Let me know (off line), what you think.
There is a hot new concept called “crowd sourcing” that’s actually a pretty old idea. Originally, it was said that if you had an infinite number of monkeys typing on an infinite number of typewriters, they’d eventually write all of Shakespeare’s sonnets.
This new “crowd sourcing” concept suggests that instead of having a few of professionals doing something (writing stories, answering questions, or taking pictures), you use lots of amateurs doing whatever you want. In theory the latter will should produce as many good things as their professional counterparts but at almost no cost. So how about applying it to your wedding?
Here’s the deal, every wedding I go to, every one brings their camera. Whether it’s cell phones, point & shoots or $2000 SLRs, lots and lots of pictures get taken by invited guests. We’re a nation of image addicts these days and weddings are no exception. I often find myself competing with everyone else for position to capture the cake cutting or the first dance.
Most of these pictures are enjoyed the moment they are take and then long forgotten. However, a goodly number are worth keeping. So take advantage of this for your own wedding.
Here’s the plan: have cards printed up with instructions, an email address and words to the affect that your guests should email their favorite photos of your special day to you. I call the ones I do my “Give Me Your Best Shot” cards.
You could end up with lots of very cute pictures for your Facebook page. If you are lucky and have a professional photographer who is willing, send your favorites on to her or him for inclusion in your album or your webpage.
A word of caution, don’t tell your guests to send the pictures to your pro photographer. People tend to be intimidated about sending their ‘snap shots’ to a professional. So if you pro is willing to work with the idea, have the photos sent to you and then you send them on for inclusion in your album or website. That will also give you a chance to edit the embarrassing ones out before anyone else sees them.
Many pro photographers will not be happy with this idea – it flies in the face of their focus on excellence. It’s also more work. It can be a trying to work with someone else’s really bad photographs but we pros can’t be everywhere during a wedding. Also, sometimes, the right amateur cell phone shot can make an album page. If your photographer is uncomfortable with the idea, get them anyway and put them on your Facebook page.
Which leads me to a final suggestion to make this work…follow up! People’s lives move on. While your wedding was one of your life’s hallmark events, remember that everyone else has their own life to live. Send out reminder emails. Post the early ones you get on your Facebook page and encourage your friends to send theirs. Give a prize. Tweet about it. So don’t let them off the hook and enjoy the fruits of crowd sourcing!
A neighbor asked me to photograph her two daughters with their new babies (two in one season!). We did with great results but the light in their back yard was so wonderful, I cajoled the whole crowd into getting in the act. They said they weren’t ‘dressed’ for a portrait but when the light’s right, I just can’t help myself. Aren’t they great looking?
Why do you like certain photographs? Subject, emotional content, memories that are evoked…lots of things I suppose.
It’s interesting to think why any picture interests you.
So back to the question, why a particular photo? Often, it’s simply the light. The way the light makes it’s own statement. The way it makes you see something differently than you did yesterday, when the light was different.
Below is one which is part of a series I’ve been doing called “unfamiliar light”. The subjects are varied but common place. The light is always, well, unfamiliar. Strange. Beautiful.
This one was taken with my cell phone at Lake Waccamaw, North Carolina. I’ve always loved this tree. It sits right across the street from my sister-in-law’s home. I’ve shot it several times over the years but one evening we arrived at dusk and it was a whole new scene.
I’ve been trying to train myself to look less at the objects around me and more at the light. Jeff Ascough (the amazing wedding shooter) says he walks into a room and looks for interesting light, sets up and waits for something interesting to happen in that light. He’s won so many awards I think they may have to retire his number. I was shocked to hear him say that. But, it seems, sometimes you have to stop and think about just the light and, sometimes, it just wacks you over the head with it’s beauty.
So, watch for the light.
I recently got a great question from a bride-to-be. She asked what touch up, or retouching or something of that nature meant. Why didn’t I think of that? Anyway, here’s my answer:
Touch up can be a variety of things but, for me, it is the practice of making good photos better.
Basically, I use software (Photoshop or a product called Lightroom) to make sure that the pictures are straight, cropped correctly, lighten or darken, color corrected (light is funny, inside lights are often very green or orange, that can be partially corrected) or many other things that a photographer can’t always get perfect in the heat of the wedding.
That’s particularly true for photojournalistic style photography where you are not directing people to the perfect light and position. Most of us (photographers) prefer to get it right “in the camera” but, sometimes some wonderful is happening and you just have to take the shot.
Beyond that type of retouching, there is another whole realm of ‘beauty’ retouching where the photographer can de-emphasize physical features (a blemish) or hide an ugly feature (stain on a dress) using the same tools.
Typically, the latter costs extra due to the time involved . . . I do it for a select number of photos that are important – like your portrait.
Here’s some “before” and “afters” examples:
Anna & Noah – a quick snapshot that Council (aka Dad) requested – cropped tighter, lighten, straighten slightly & a tiny bit of ‘smoothing’…
Emily & Skip – shot just as the ceremony started and I was being ushered to the back of the church (“no photography allowed!”). However, Emily looked so great, I had to grab a shot. It’s cropped tighter and color balanced…see anything else? Well the boutineer on Brian’s jacket just had to go….
Generally, these kinds of touch-ups are to be avoided but when the picture is more important than perfection, it’s worth the effort.
Recently, I’ve heard of couples asking for their photographer’s RAW files as part of wedding packages. If you know all about the RAW files 7 JPG files & TIFF files, etc…then now is a good time to tune out. If not, read on.
Most people don’t know what a RAW file is. It isn’t something you cook…well actually you do but more of that later. For the most part, most people put their wedding CD in a closet to be lost sometime in the future.
If you thinking of asking for these files be sure you know what you are asking for. So here’s where I give you a bit of a definition:
RAW files are un-processed data from an image sensor of a digital camera. They are called RAW because they haven’t been transformed by post processing software and can’t be printed. For that matter, in many cases they can’t even be viewed on most computers without special software. In order to do much useful with them, you need to cook them.
So why do couples ask for RAW files? I think that RAW files, often called DIGITAL NEGATIVES (they really aren’t), sound like something really useful. Most of us have computers, so it seems perfectly logical to presume that with a computer and these files, you can do something useful. For the most part, you can but you probably shouldn’t.
To expand, photography these days goes beyond taking the picture. Often, today’s photography is a process where a good original image is transformed into a great image, something beautiful and moving. That post processing can be part and parcel of the ‘photographer’s eye’, his/her artistic ability. When you purchase his/her photography talents, you are also paying for these after-the-shot skills. So ironically, someone asking for the RAW files can be asking the photographer NOT TO FINISH his/her artistic process. Sound like a bad idea?
There’s a great debate going on in the photographic community about digital files, whether they should be released and under what circumstances. I’m unsure what the right answer on this is but I have observed that many of the most talented photographers – the gifted ones that we all admire and probably can’t afford – do not give their files away. Not because they are trying to maintain snobbish exclusivity or are stingy. The reason, I suspect, is that they are so committed to the high quality of their final photograph – that amazing, stunning imagery – that they refuse to allow someone else alter it.
Many fine photographers don’t just create a product, they create something they love. One does not let the things one loves be tampered with.
Jennie & Mike are getting married at the Castle In The Clouds on July 4th . . . the fireworks display will be awsome. We did some informal engagement shots on a cold day in downtown Portsmouth. They were great sports and it was a fun shoot. While we had talked about going to the beach or down by the wharfs – did I mention that it was way cold? – we decided to just shoot around town and concentrate on them, not the scenery. Mike’s not a great fan of being photographed but – as you can see – he was terrific. Jennie, of course, was way easy to capture.
Available light?
I had never been to Courtney & Nick’s reception venue, even though it’s only a couple miles away…The Pearl on – yes – Pearl Street in Portsmouth, NH. It’s a very traditional New England hall and that day it owned the setting sun. Somebody very perceptive put the cake right where the sun would catch it, or maybe that was just luck. And when Courtney & Nick did their ‘first dance’ it was just perfect. No flash, no telling anyone where to stand, just waiting a moment for it to happen. Twenty minutes later, we got a repeat of the same great light in the father-daughter dance. Available light? No, fabulous light, you just have to see it.