Sorry. This is what the last post was supposed to be about. I got distracted before I even began.
I am something of an accidental photographer. I take photographs, rather than construct images. I have great, great admiration for those who can construct, not least because it takes a great deal of imagination and dedication to do so. But I’m lazy, so I look for images that appear, rather than try to build them up from an idea in my head.
This is both an advantage and a disadvantage. In my line of work I’m pretty good, if I do say so myself, at capturing the moments of a day, and knowing my craft well enough that I can take a photograph when the light and timing is right. What I am not so good at is the posed photograph. I’m not bad at it by any means, but it’s not my forte. This is fine; my clients tend to come to me because they don’t like being posed themselves, nor do they like the pictures that result of their posing. As a result, my process normally consists of the couple spending a few quiet moments chatting to each other, walking around, and generally joking and laughing. It’s as fun as I can make it, which involves as little rigmarole as possible.
That does not mean that I am not occasionally jealous of those photographers who do have the persistence and ability to pull of beautiful posed photographs. I suspect that they spend a little more time on this part of the day than I would be willing to spend, but the results can be spectacular, and I suspect that their clients are willing to spend that time in order to get those fantastic images.
I do, however have a compromise, an ace up the sleeve. The one part of the day where I go to great lengths to produce something that looks like it may have been posed, and certainly looks spectacular, but is almost certainly the part of the day when the couple care little that they are even being photographed, let alone what the final image will look like. And for this, I can’t just use the light that’s available.
I never used to use flash. I shunned it. Mainly because I didn’t understand it, to be honest. Then I met Strobist. If you have any interest at all in using flash, then dear God you need to visit this blog. It’s incredible. My problem was this; how does one get a reliably good first dance photograph? My previous method, taking a lot of shots with an on-camera flash, then a lot using ambient light, would produce at least one decentish photograph. But rarely many more than that. And when I say decent, I mean no better than that. Just ok. Passable. Not the sort of thing with which to round off a photo album.
So I did something different. I realised that the first dance was the one part of the day where the couple could be relied upon to be in one place at a set time, with no-one around them. If only I could rely on the light. So I started bring the light with me.
A single remote strobe (you know – the sort of thing you see permanently stuck on top of an average wedding photographer’s camera) placed on the opposite side of the dance floor. (I now use two of them, which widens my options still further). A small amount of know how to ensure that you’re not capturing any of the ambient light, and the strobe becomes a spot light. All that remains is to change your position relative to the couple dancing, and you have a range of effects to play with. I personally love a silhouetted shot, but interestingly couples prefer something a little less abstract. Nevertheless, I’ll always get one shot that I would consider putting in my portfolio.
And that’s the sort of hit rate I’m aiming for. I’m going to start playing around with off-camera lighting a bit more. I’ll let you know if anything interesting develops.