Woman sued, shot wedding on Rebel XTi

[bennielou]

Derrel,

I went to your website and I see you do studio and sports. If I could ask, how many times have you rushed on the footbal field to correct a player's jock strap?

Yes, I know that is an exaggeration, but that is what you are asking wedding photographers to do.

Believe me, I know many wire service photojournalists who wouldn't touch a wedding with a ten foot pole because there is "too much going on".

Weddings aren't a studio situation, like you show, with ENDLESS amounts of time to make everything perfect perfect. You adjust what you see in the 15 minutes you are aloted to shoot 20 setups, but you aren't always going to get every hair in place. End of story.

I've shot sports as a wire service photojournalist, and I can tell you that weddings are so much harder. You have all this wacky lighting to deal with, crazy stressed out people, who don't have any time to stand around and take formals for hours on end because they want to get to the party and get drunk.

Oh holy cow, if I was standing around brushing off dandruff and fixing cuffs on pants all during this time, I would have these really ANGRY people, all pissed off, having no fun, and totally dissing me.

I can tell by your post that your wedding experience is very limited. Not a diss. But it's just not in accordance with reality of a wedding day.

I think that is a bit of a stretch to compare a football players junk to a crooked tie; I think you are exaggerating his advice into something more than a quick adjustment to the bride and groom that will be noticeable in the picture. I highly doubt he was suggesting you groom each and every individual at the reception.

That last statement just gets me... You are getting right back up onto that little high-horse of yours.

Call it a high horse if you like, but to me, it's real world experience from a Gal who works weddings every single weekend.

So I have to ask you, if you don't mind, how many weddings do you shoot a year? You are advising us all how to do them, so I just wonder.

I didn't see any on your website. Maybe there is something out there that I didn't see.

And if that is being on a "high horse" so be it. Don't advise about what you know nothing about.

 

[bennielou]

Derrel,

I went to your website and I see you do studio and sports. If I could ask, how many times have you rushed on the footbal field to correct a player's jock strap?

Yes, I know that is an exaggeration, but that is what you are asking wedding photographers to do.

Believe me, I know many wire service photojournalists who wouldn't touch a wedding with a ten foot pole because there is "too much going on".

Weddings aren't a studio situation, like you show, with ENDLESS amounts of time to make everything perfect perfect. You adjust what you see in the 15 minutes you are aloted to shoot 20 setups, but you aren't always going to get every hair in place. End of story.

I've shot sports as a wire service photojournalist, and I can tell you that weddings are so much harder. You have all this wacky lighting to deal with, crazy stressed out people, who don't have any time to stand around and take formals for hours on end because they want to get to the party and get drunk.

Oh holy cow, if I was standing around brushing off dandruff and fixing cuffs on pants all during this time, I would have these really ANGRY people, all pissed off, having no fun, and totally dissing me.

I can tell by your post that your wedding experience is very limited. Not a diss. But it's just not in accordance with reality of a wedding day.

I think that is a bit of a stretch to compare a football players junk to a crooked tie; I think you are exaggerating his advice into something more than a quick adjustment to the bride and groom that will be noticeable in the picture. I highly doubt he was suggesting you groom each and every individual at the reception.

That last statement just gets me... You are getting right back up onto that little high-horse of yours.

All I know is that my photographer did a wrist check, which I greatly appreciated, because I was still wearing my ugly black hair tie around mine I didn't notice because I wear it on a daily basis just in case I need to pull my hair up.

NO! You did NOT wear a black band in your hair. Bad you! How was the photog to know that you didn't want a big freaking black band in your hair?

 

[Overread]

However on a more serious note, I'd like to know who's work the bride had seen when they originally met with the "photographer".

Haha, that was *also* my thought when the bride expressed how happy she was with the examples she saw.

You just know she was shown other people's work, or the Graphi sample or something like that.

No one in their right mind is going to shell out $1700 bucks for a basic package when someone is using Rebel/kit lens, and printing off crap at Walmart. And who.....doesn't know what AP means. Hell, I would have loved to seen the metadata on that disaster.

But we don't actually know - we can guess and assume all we want but its horrifically unfair and incorrect to brand one person as something without evidence to back it up. That is my main beef with this "court" show - at no point did we see those early proofs so we have no idea if the wedding photographer failed or if she indeed did deliver work to her own standard (at that point its the brides fault for having hightended expectations).

As for correcting jockstraps and the like - if its a posed shot of the team at the end of a match - yes a pro would. Whilst if its an in game heated shot n they wouldn't. The same I would expect is true of weddings - a staged shot would be checked and small details corrected to ensure a perfect shot - whilst more impulsive shots would be taken without such attention because its no practical.

 

[bennielou]

Oh, dear Lord. Another person who has never, ever done a pro wedding in their life giving us ALL the word how to do things.

Yes. I am a biatch when it comes to stupid stuff.

I fluff the dress. I remove the flower petals. I make sure every one is hanky spanky. But do you have any idea about the time I have to do all this? Of course not. You don't shoot weddings.

I have less than 2 minutes to pull this off.

I'm sure you could do better.

That is.....if you actually shot weddings.

 

[Josh220]

Derrel,

I went to your website and I see you do studio and sports. If I could ask, how many times have you rushed on the footbal field to correct a player's jock strap?

Yes, I know that is an exaggeration, but that is what you are asking wedding photographers to do.

Believe me, I know many wire service photojournalists who wouldn't touch a wedding with a ten foot pole because there is "too much going on".
:hug::
Weddings aren't a studio situation, like you show, with ENDLESS amounts of time to make everything perfect perfect. You adjust what you see in the 15 minutes you are aloted to shoot 20 setups, but you aren't always going to get every hair in place. End of story.

I've shot sports as a wire service photojournalist, and I can tell you that weddings are so much harder. You have all this wacky lighting to deal with, crazy stressed out people, who don't have any time to stand around and take formals for hours on end because they want to get to the party and get drunk.

Oh holy cow, if I was standing around brushing off dandruff and fixing cuffs on pants all during this time, I would have these really ANGRY people, all pissed off, having no fun, and totally dissing me.

I can tell by your post that your wedding experience is very limited. Not a diss. But it's just not in accordance with reality of a wedding day.

I think that is a bit of a stretch to compare a football players junk to a crooked tie; I think you are exaggerating his advice into something more than a quick adjustment to the bride and groom that will be noticeable in the picture. I highly doubt he was suggesting you groom each and every individual at the reception.

That last statement just gets me... You are getting right back up onto that little high-horse of yours.

Call it a high horse if you like, but to me, it's real world experience from a Gal who works weddings every single weekend.

So I have to ask you, if you don't mind, how many weddings do you shoot a year? You are advising us all how to do them, so I just wonder.

I didn't see any on your website. Maybe there is something out there that I didn't see.

And if that is being on a "high horse" so be it. Don't advise about what you know nothing about.

We get it, you think you're amazing at everything. Personally, I would rather have the photographer do their job and remove anything that will noticeably degrade the final image. Like erose said, something as simple as a hair tie can improve the distractions in the image. It makes no nevermind to me if you cut corners on your work.

It's funny that you bring up my website considering I have never posted it on any online forum? May I ask how you got it or is that just more warrgarbl?

 

[bennielou]

All I know is that my photographer did a wrist check, which I greatly appreciated, because I was still wearing my ugly black hair tie around mine I didn't notice because I wear it on a daily basis just in case I need to pull my hair up.

NO! You did NOT wear a black band in your hair. Bad you! How was the photog to know that you didn't want a big freaking black band in your hair?

Excuse me?

I said nothing of the sort...

I said:

All I know is that my photographer did a WRIST check, which I greatly appreciated, because I was still wearing my ugly black hair tie around [edited for clarity:] *my wrist* I didn't notice because I wear it [edited for clarity:] *on my wrist* on a daily basis just in case I need to pull my hair up.

:meh:

Opps sorry. Just further evidence of my bad "scanning" abilities.

 

[bennielou]

However on a more serious note, I'd like to know who's work the bride had seen when they originally met with the "photographer".

Haha, that was *also* my thought when the bride expressed how happy she was with the examples she saw.

You just know she was shown other people's work, or the Graphi sample or something like that.

No one in their right mind is going to shell out $1700 bucks for a basic package when someone is using Rebel/kit lens, and printing off crap at Walmart. And who.....doesn't know what AP means. Hell, I would have loved to seen the metadata on that disaster.

But we don't actually know - we can guess and assume all we want but its horrifically unfair and incorrect to brand one person as something without evidence to back it up. That is my main beef with this "court" show - at no point did we see those early proofs so we have no idea if the wedding photographer failed or if she indeed did deliver work to her own standard (at that point its the brides fault for having hightended expectations).

As for correcting jockstraps and the like - if its a posed shot of the team at the end of a match - yes a pro would. Whilst if its an in game heated shot n they wouldn't. The same I would expect is true of weddings - a staged shot would be checked and small details corrected to ensure a perfect shot - whilst more impulsive shots would be taken without such attention because its no practical.

Bingo!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Exactly right!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Overread]

Well I don't shoot them but I've been on the reciving end of being shot
And yes for the staged shots (bride groom and family at the end and such) yes there was multiple shots taken and slight adjustments made - not a massive amount of time, but enough to ensure that there were not glaring errors, problems, trees coming out of peoples heads and the like.

As I said it depends on the shot itself and the situation - you are not going to stop teh first dance to get them to reposition better (though I know some who will do staged shots before/after the wedding to capture better "liknesses of the" "first dance" and such)

furthermore there is always more than one way to approach a task and one should always be willing to hear and consider other viewpoints and working practice in ones own work - rather than to take each suggestion or concept as a direct attack upon ones own working current practice

 

[bennielou]

I think that is a bit of a stretch to compare a football players junk to a crooked tie; I think you are exaggerating his advice into something more than a quick adjustment to the bride and groom that will be noticeable in the picture. I highly doubt he was suggesting you groom each and every individual at the reception.

That last statement just gets me... You are getting right back up onto that little high-horse of yours.

Call it a high horse if you like, but to me, it's real world experience from a Gal who works weddings every single weekend.

So I have to ask you, if you don't mind, how many weddings do you shoot a year? You are advising us all how to do them, so I just wonder.

I didn't see any on your website. Maybe there is something out there that I didn't see.

And if that is being on a "high horse" so be it. Don't advise about what you know nothing about.

We get it, you think you're amazing at everything. Personally, I would rather have the photographer do their job and remove anything that will noticeably degrade the final image. Like erose said, something as simple as a hair tie can improve the distractions in the image. It makes no nevermind to me if you cut corners on your work.

It's funny that you bring up my website considering I have never posted yours on any online forum? May I ask how you got it or is that just more warrgarbl?

Oh good lord with the I think I'm all the end all be all. I mean really dude. I am here to
help you, no detract from you. I earn a good amount of money doing what I'm doing. (oooow,that is bragging and bullcrap, and grandstanding!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!). What you don't get is that I am trying to help. Not you neccesarily, because you thing you know everything, but people reading along, who Do care and aren't all freaked out about who helps them with what. I assume they know enough to figure it out.

So carry on and let us all see your really AWESOME wedding shots. I trust by your post your have hundreds.

 

[Josh220]

I'm sorry I must have missed all of your intellectually stimulating posts. I think you should just be mindful of your posts and the content within them. I've seen two posting styles from you; putting people down, and using the forum like an instant messenger. I have received a surprising large volume of PM's from older, respectable members regarding how you present yourself to others.

Offering "help" as you put it, should not go hand and hand with a degrading comment.

 

[max3k]

So it's a bad idea to shoot a wedding with my iPhone?

 

[Overread]

So it's a bad idea to shoot a wedding with my iPhone?

Depends - I would not shoot your first with an iPhone and I would say shoot second to get a portfolio together. You can then by all means use that portfolio of shots to market your iPhone wedding business and if you get clients you're away.

 

[bennielou]

I'm sorry I must have missed all of your intellectually stimulating posts. I think you should just be mindful of your posts and the content within them. I've seen two posting styles from you; putting people down, and using the forum like an instant messenger. I have received a surprising large volume of PM's from older, respectable members regarding how you present yourself to others.

Offering "help" as you put it, should not go hand and hand with a degrading comment.

I guess you did miss them. I have done tutes on WB, lighting, and textures. I assume, in your vaste sharing you have done the same.

I speak my mind. Hopefully I am helping the poster grow. I didn't see your answers. Maybe I missed them.

I don't always present myself in the best way. But I do try to be honest and not hide behind screen names. Can you do the same.

 

[bennielou]

Josh, I would share your major bigtime wedding photos with everyone, but you don't have any examples. Feel free to share them.

I went to your website, and there was not the things we do, But if you have them, definately post them up.

 

[Rosshole]

Bennielou, please stop posting in this thread. Your condescending tone is really pissing people off.