My First Wedding

birdfish · May 19, 2013

Robin
1. I will have a second and third body.
2. Definitely not!! Wouldn't insurance purchased through the lens rental company cover something like this though?? Still, I get your point.
3. Yes, we aren't that close anyway. (J/K)
4. No. I know everyone in my position always says, "they would NEVER sue me," but my cousin would never sue me

5. No. But I am an Xray/CT Tech so I could hook her up with a free cat scan, LOL.

I kid, but I understand what you mean. I'm not so much concerned about those type of things as I am with not being able to keep up with the pace, or being out of position for critical shots. Oh I just saw your post about bad wedding photos from your wedding, and I do not want to be THAT guy.

Light Guru · May 19, 2013

birdfish said:
Light Guru
Trust me I keep going back and forth for some of the reasons you mentioned. I haven't had the chance to talk to her in person yet, only through messages online. I've let her know that I'm anxious/nervous about accepting because if things do go badly I don't want her to resent me and make things awkward between us. I would draw up a very detailed contract before accepting though to cover everything I could think of.

No contract can keep things from going awkward if things go bad. Your cousin may say she won't be upset at you if the photos don't turn out good but that's a big fat lie.

Again you can offer to do some bridals or engagement photos as if those get messed up they can always be redone. Those images will help you get on as a second shooter.

birdfish said:
I work at a hospital nights and weekends and every Saturday I work a 16 hour shift. So being a second shooter for practice really isn't an option for me.

I don't buy that as an excuse. Weddings are NOT a last minute thing, and wedding photographers are booked well in advance. You can obviously take a day off work to go to your cousins wedding so you can also take off a day here and there to be a second shooter for someone who is an established wedding photographer.

Light Guru · May 19, 2013

birdfish said:
I know everyone in my position always says, "they would NEVER sue me," but my cousin would never sue me

Your cousin is not marrying themselves there is obviously going to be another person involved and that person also has a family. Your cousin may not sue you but the cousin in law just might.

DGMPhotography · May 19, 2013

Light Guru said:
No contract can keep things from going awkward if things go bad. Your cousin may say she won't be upset at you if the photos don't turn out good but that's a big fat lie.

Again you can offer to do some bridals or engagement photos as if those get messed up they can always be redone. Those images will help you get on as a second shooter.

I don't buy that as an excuse. Weddings are NOT a last minute thing, and wedding photographers are booked well in advance. You can obviously take a day off work to go to your cousins wedding so you can also take off a day here and there to be a second shooter for someone who is an established wedding photographer.

WHY IS THERE NO LIKE BUTTON ON MOBILE!!!!?

Listen to this guy, forreal though.

birdfish · May 19, 2013

kathy
Just my FB page Brandon Bass and Brandon Bass Photography, which is a must right?

SCraig
No, but my cousin might. Depends on the procedure. Because my cousin asked me if I would consider it. Yes, that's what I'm debating now.

birdfish · May 19, 2013

Not making excuses, just not practical for me to take off on Saturdays because it's actually 2 days of my vacation time, not just one. Obviously I dont mind taking off for my cousin's wedding but 2 days here and there add up, plus its hard to find someone to cover that shift. And I was just joking around with Robin about my cousin not suing me.

birdfish · May 19, 2013

Great advice tirediron, definitely makes sense.

manaheim · May 19, 2013

Ok, so I've shot probably twelve weddings as secondary and a couple as primary. I'm going to tell you what I've learned...

You must know your gear inside and out, and it has to be ROTE. I don't just mean you know to know how to work the controls, I mean that you have to know EXACTLY what setting you're going to need for every possible situation. High movement, low light, both, etc. You need to understand the quirks of your gear when put in extreme situations and how to compensate quickly.
Your gear must be able to handle the situation. You're going to hit very low light situations and your camera and lenses need to be pretty much the best you can get to compensate. You're also going to need multiple focal lengths, and unless you are VERY fast on your feet and have multiple bodies, primes are not going to handle it.
You must pre-screen your locations. Visit them, get a sense of their lighting situations, search the web for examples that other wedding photographers have to get ideas or spark some of your own. Have some shots planned before you arrive on scene. Talk to the proprietors to understand any requirements or restrictions they have. Ask them about suggestions. Lean on their experience. Be super nice. Relationships here can make the difference between same ol' shots and "Oh hey... you know I always thought it would be cool to get one of these weddings from that balcony over there... would you like me to let you up there?"
You must be good at moving quickly without breaking your gear, yourself, or anyone else. Imagine trying to do an obstacle course at top speed with about 30 people within arms length at all times with cameras and bags and all sorts of things hanging off various parts of your body.
You need to have backup gear. Camera should be writing to two cards at all times, you need to have multiple cards and switch often (particularly if your camera can't dual write). You need to have multiple bodies, multiple flashes, backups of at least the critical lenses, etc. If you shoot a wedding with only one camera available, you're insaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaane.
Have all your locations mapped out ahead. Print paper maps/directions as a BACKUP but USE A GPS. Don't have one? BUY ONE. 10 minutes late to any part of a wedding=death. Review your directions and locations the night before. Make absolutely certain you have all locations.
Have plenty of shots planned. Understand the must-have shots and be ready for them. Bride with bride's family, bride with grooms family, bride with whole family, yadda yadda yadda. Have a roster in your head you want to go through.
Try to get at least one solid shot of every guest at the affair. You can do "table shots" where you get the groups of people at their tables, but try to get candid as well.
Ask the bride and groom if they have any particular shots they want for the event- sometimes there is an aging grandmother or something and she wants to be super sure to get pictures with her or something. Just ask. Write these down and STUDY them. Bring the list with you, but try to have them rote before you go. Be ready to try to minimize the list gently if the bride creates a list of 8,000 pictures she wants. You may just remind her that it's her big day and the last thing she wants is to spend all of it smiling for a camera. Be ready to lose this argument and do what she wants anyway.
Be mindful of sensitivities. This is a big family event and people will be drinking. Carefully watch the flow of the people around the room and how they are interacting. Sometimes something can blow up, and while generally as the photographer you want to be where the action is, this is pretty much the LAST place you want to be.
You must be able to be a diplomat under fire. The priest has told you that you can't shoot where you expected to. The priest has informed you that you cannot use flash and the church is darker than you ever imagined and it's cloudy outside. The mother wants pictures and the bride is trying to enjoy her day. The uncle is drunk. There are kids in the wedding party dressed in AF shirts and sneakers. The bride wigged out last night and took downers and today is drunk to boot. Etc.
You must be an urban survivalist. You are going to be on your feet for at least 10-12 hours, and possibly more. You will get probably two and MAYBE three breaks. Most of those will be five minutes. You'll get to sit and wolf down dinner for fifteen or so. The rest... on your feet and moving. No lunch. Bring protein bars, peanuts, and two medium sized bottles of Gatorade. Drink and eat constantly. This may sound gross, but I will tell you I have gone a 16 hour day and drank THREE of those bottles of Gatorade and didn't go to the bathroom ONCE.
You must be MacGuyver. Bring duct tape, masking tape, clear tape. Bring a multi-screwdriver. Bring all purpose glue. Bring a black marker and a pen. Put anything potentially destructive (black marker- glue) in TWO sealed zip loc bags. Ever seen a bride with a smear from a black marker from the photographer's hand on her dress? You don't want to.
You must have appropriate clothing. YOU NEED TO WEAR A SUIT... or AT LEAST dress pants, white shirt and tie. You need to look respectable. No green pants and SpongeBob ties. NO SNEAKERS. You will need clothing that is conservative, moves well with you when you crouch and such, is comfortable enough temperature wise that you won't die (expect to be VERY hot during this because you're going to be moving), and can withstand the abuse. For example... standard wingtip shoes are going to pretty much end your feet and knees after a long day. You need shoes made to be dressy but withstand 12 hours+ on your feet.
You need to be healthy. I know this sounds odd, but if you're out of shape, this will kill you. I did my first wedding pretty overweight and being pretty much a couch potato, and I was literally so beat that I still felt it four days later. After a summer of biking aggressively and losing 30 lbs I was a little worn the next day, but overall fine.
You need to understand portrait photography rules pretty well. Posing, lighting, etc. You're going to be taking pictures of people here, so you want them to look their best.
You need to get pictures of the scene and the day as well as the people. The bride and groom put great effort into picking and arranging this... flowers, the church, the reception site, the favors, the centerpieces, etc. You need to capture the character of the day as well as the activities in it.

There's probably more... I'll add as I think of it, but this was off the top of my head.

Now... one final thing... you pretty much have to have all this DOWN. If you DON'T... you WILL BE SCREWED. This, by the way, is why everyone says the one thing I DIDN'T say here, but I still very much agree with, which is that ... you need to turn this down.

This is their day. Their ONLY day. They've spent a great deal of money and time on this and it's VERY important to them. In the end ALL they will have to remember this day by is their pictures. Possibly a year or more of prep... thousands of dollars... more fights between bride and mom, bride and bride, mom and dad, bride and groom, groom and mom, etc. than you can possibly imagine... and it all hinges pretty much on YOU not screwing up the pictures.

manaheim · May 19, 2013

Wow. This thread hit a wall of text and died. :lol:

texkam · May 19, 2013

Reviewed.com: Photography dilemma - a friend's wedding

birdfish · May 20, 2013

Tons of great advice manaheim. Thanks! Gonna make my decision soon.

Robin_Usagani · May 20, 2013

No guts no glory.

Juga · May 21, 2013

Robin_Usagani said:
No guts no glory.

I like this. I just did my first wedding with no prior wedding experience. I just did A TON of research, met with the couple multiple times before the wedding and went over what they like and don't like, visited the location SEVERAL times, practiced different situations, LOOKED AND LOOKED AND LOOKED at TONS AND TONS AND TONS of wedding photos, went over the schedule of events, well written contract that spelled out my experience level and made sure my clients knew what I was capable of...just a ton of preparation but I jumped two feet in. I loved it, my clients loved it. My shots came out pretty good, not great but they made my client happy. I loved the pace and flow of everything but I would say that it isn't for everyone but it was a good feeling seeing everyone get together for what is a very exciting day for the couple.

PS - I did try to 'latch' on to second shoot but wedding photography in my area seems to be SUPER competitive and no one was willing to take me on.

sscarmack · May 21, 2013

If your confident in your work, do it. If your not, then keep shooting until your ready. Only you will know if your ready or not.

I do weddings, and they are spur of the moment on the fly. If you do not know your camera and how everything operates, you will be in serious trouble. One second your settings will be 1/250 f5.6 and the next they might be 1/30 f2.8.

My first wedding was a extremely small wedding (25 ppl) and the ceremony and reception were at the same location, only lasted four hours. It was great experience and helped me out a ton. The only way you'll ever know is if you just do it.

I say shoot it.

12sndsgood · May 21, 2013

Manaheim hit on a lot of great points. i'll add a little bit because I have shot two weddings now as lead. First as everyone else has said, turn it down. now that its out of the way. second shooting is your best option. if you really wanna do weddings you will find the time to shoot. as far as when do to a wedding. you need to be confident in your photography skills. you have to be confident that you can handle posing groups, dealing with angry bridses/grooms/family memebers. confident you can give them a good product, and if you dont have some of those skills you have to have the drive to learn those things before the wedding. my first wedding was with a friend. at the time I hadnt planned on doing weddings. but they couldn't find one they could afford and said the ones they could afford were way worse then me. so I thought about it for a week. shot some engagement photos for them and spent an hour or two talking to them about it and took the job.

reasons why I took the job. I knew i was comfortable in my photography skills. I new I had a second phtographer to go along, I new I had 6 months to prepare. I red probalby 5 books on wedding photography, i ready on the internet everything I could. I made lists of everything to ask when i talked with the bride, we talked for a few hours so I could find out everything i needed to know well ahead of time. i had shooting lists of families. I new which family memebers were the trouble makers and scheduled them accordingly, i scouted the venue and parks ahead of time and had backup plans in case of rain (it did rain)just going over everything forwards and backwards so you can have a halfway decent shot at doing a good job. even though its a family member you still need to treat it like a business and your there to do a job. your not there to pal around and drink and hang out., your there to do a job. you have to plan going in for success. you have to have the equipment for it. I did a $700 wedding and I bought $1600 in lenses to prepare. Your first few wedddings arn't going to be money makers. You will find your going to spend more money making sure you have what you need to get the job done properly. I could have just rented glass but I new I would use it down the line so i dropped the cash on it. Just like after the wedding I realised my backup camera was worthless in a wedding. so I sold it and bought a better backup. You need to just sit down and ask yourself if your really prepared and able to put in the time nessicary to do the job right.