Photographer Question Number 1
How would you describe your photography style?
If you have never hired a professional photographer before, chances are you have tons of questions — how do I choose a photographer, how much will it cost, and so on. Your first option may be to search online for answers. Oddly, you will find out that almost every information, from blogs to Wedding sites like the Knot or Here Comes The Guide, sound very identical to each other. You may see articles or guides like “10 main questions to ask a photographer” and the like. These are helpful but do you know what answers you are looking for? In this Blog series, we are going to look into the elements of wedding photography and tackle the advantages and disadvantages of each element so that you can better equip yourself with the answers that best suit your needs.
the styles…
Here is a quick list of the most commonly named photography styles, ranging from the photographer’s shooting personality to how they compose and edit: Classic/Traditional/Posed, Documentary/Photojournalistic, Vintage, Dramatic, Fine-Art, Artistic, Modern, Natural Light/Light n Airy, and Sentimental.
Classic vs. Photojournalism
Classic or Traditional approach tends to focus on the traditional moments of a wedding such as the bridal portrait of getting ready, the portraits after the ceremony which are traditionally posed with the subjects looking at the camera, or the “stop what you’re doing, and look here” picture. This is what I refer to as 3rd person photography. When you take a picture of a couple looking at the camera, you are very aware there is a 3rd person there taking the picture. Where Photojournalistic may capture the couple looking at each other and seem completely unaware their photo is being taken. Because of these very basic definitions, it is no surprise that most couples today want a Photojournalistic style photographer, but there can be a real disadvantage to only having this approach. If the photographer is only comfortable with photojournalism, this may also be a strong indication of their personality infused approach to shooting photography which is more described as “hands off” or “not in control”. This approach is better suited for a 2nd photographer but not your lead. Yes, you will want a photographer to have a photojournalistic approach during your ceremony and reception. To capture the moments unobtrusively, be there but be unseen, capture the candid moments rather than stop everything for a shot and lose the moment. But what about that important portrait hour taking place during your cocktail hour? This is the time you will want a photographer that is in control and has a plan. Who can comfortably navigate and compose your family into portraits without you having to call out what each shot should be. They make sure the wedding party you’ve so carefully selected from your closest friends enjoy the picture taking process rather than wondering when will it end. Who can help you feel natural and comfortable in front of the lens rather than you asking them what you should do. This short amount of time sets the tone for your reception. It doesn’t mean that you need to go with all Traditional, just make sure your photographer can do more than hide in the shadows.
1- Light and Airy. Focused on using Prime Lenses open wide under 2.0. Gives a creamy look to the photos, but highlights are bright.
2- Natural Light. Using Prime or Zoom lenses with higher apertures and ISO settings. Highlights more controlled.
3- Off Cameral lighting, controls highlights allowing details like the dress pattern or background to be discernible.
Lighting styles
If you are looking for a natural Light photographer, or want a light and airy feel
It’s important to also understand the limitations of each style as well. The first picture is an example of Light and Airy. So how does the photographer get this effect? We’ll have to get a little technical for a minute, but it starts with a Prime Lens with a wide open aperture which gives you a velvety, soft look to your image. Part of what you like of this style is also its biggest disadvantage. The “creamy” texture is a result of the very narrow depth of field. Your in focus point is super small. Meaning if I focused on the tip of the nose, there is no forgiveness, the eyes will be out of focus. So the soft edges you see is a result of most of the various distances in the picture being out of focus except the razor thin line that is in focus. Because of this razor thin focus line, a good number of the pictures taken will most likely not be in focus where it was intended. You might not notice this, but you may not receive as many images based on focus. The light part of the “light and airy” style is coming from all that extra light let in from the wide open aperture, so the background has bright highlights making your scenery nicely blurred but sometimes unrecognizable which is why most of the photos from a light and airy shoot are close ups of the subject. The wedding dress being white also will be overly bright from the highlights and you will lose most of the detail in the dress. The last thing you should know about light and airy, you are very limited where you can be for your photos. To achieve this effect, you as the subject are almost always in the shadows, and in post edit, the editor increases light in the shadows so you can be seen, and decreases the highlights as much as possible. If you do decide to choose a photographer that shoots mainly with this style, first know the time of day your photos will be taken. Second, make sure to request to view a few entire wedding galleries so you can decide if the number of photos during the session is to your satisfaction and be sure to zoom in to see how many of them have the eyes in focus. Third, make sure you see photos of a wedding they had to do indoors because of rain. You choose your photographer long before you know the weather on your wedding day.
Number 2- Natural light is similar to light and airy, but usually your aperture is set to 2.8-4 or possibly higher. With a high quality zoom, you can achieve a nice bokeh background with a little deeper color and have more of your subject in focus. You lose some of the softness you may like in the Light and Airy, but you increase the chances of better in focus images from your session. Similar to shooting Light and Airy, you are still keeping the subject in the shade. Natural light has fewer disadvantages than Light and Airy. But if a photographer labels themselves as a Natural Light photographer, this is usually them holding up a banner telling you they really don’t know how to use lighting. Every photographer, amateur, and novice has always started out learning photography in natural light. To actually learn how to use lighting is a skill very few decide to embark on. And I’m not referring to the built in flash or speed-light, but the ability to use off camera lighting. Otherwise your photos may lose any feel of ambient lighting. In addition to the 3 things to look for listed above for the Light and Airy photographer, you should pay close attention to getting ready pictures. What if your getting ready location has very limited light source? Or does the subject always look like they are near a window? This could mean an inconvenience for you on your wedding day that for every picture, everyone has to move near the window, and countless candid moments lost because they aren’t near the light. Also look for an unbalanced number of black and white photos which is more forgiving for poor lighting. I personally like a few black and whites that draw attention to the emotion of a moment but too many is usually a sign of poorly exposed photos that can’t be fixed with the normal adjustments to highlights and shadows. (Yep, a little secret, when you can’t fix it, make it black and white). When reviewing photos from any potential photographer, never limit yourself to their social media portfolio. These are the best of the best, and the photos are in low resolution, so when you zoom in, the image is pixelated making it hard to tell if the image is partly out of focus or just the effect of smaller size image.
Number 3- Off Camera lighting can be done well or not so well. It’s not an end all be all solution for sure, but a skilled photographer will open up so many more options for you from low lighting situations during getting ready locations, great portrait photos, amazing landscape photos, and interesting lighting during your reception. As noted with Natural Light, your photographer should be able to take natural light photos well in the first place, so their portfolio should show a combination of natural light photos with artificial light photos. When I’m personally shooting a couples portrait session, I want to give them different moods to their photos, and it really starts with placing the sun in different angles to the subject requiring me to make adjustments to how I use or add light. With artificial light, I can have the subject stand wherever I want for a great back ground, or dramatic feel. I can switch the light off for a natural light shot as well. You may have already noticed that picture 2 and 3 are the same couple taken seconds apart with two totally different vibes. The most important thing with all three styles is that you like the photos you see in a full wedding gallery. But if you want to know some technical information to look for when discussing equipment, knowing whether they use speed lights or strobes can give you some additional insight. Knowing how to use speed lights off camera is useful for those neat lighting tricks but are not strong enough to over power the sun in a way to take great portraits out in full sunlight. Strobes offer power up to 10x’s that of a speed light and can meet the demands of lighting needed to keep your eye sockets from looking like a raccoon in your full sun portraits, or with an added soft box to the strobe, softening the light making it difficult to tell whether it was natural light or artificial. Using off camera lighting strobes is already hard enough to do with just the photographer in a studio setting making it almost impossible to do solo on a wedding shoot, so you’ll want to make sure if your photographer uses this type of equipment, will they have help. The reception is another area to look at lighting as the majority of receptions happen at night or indoors with low lighting. Most photographers will use a speed light in these situations and fewer still will opt to use strobe lights. Below, photo 1 taken with a speed light will capture the image but the lighting looks a little flat, photo 2- taken with strobe lights located in the corners of the reception room capture the image with cleaner light, and adds interesting texture with shadows.
1-Taken with top of camera speed light, foreground well lit but background is dark and shadowed, even more so if lights get dimmer. Can offset with high ISO but image will be grainy.
2-Taken with strobe lights. Background well exposed along with subject. Directional lighting creates contrast shadows on subject adding depth and texture.
Artistic/Dramatic/Fine-Art/Modern
Knowing one really isn’t knowing them all,
You may find different definitions out there, but I think many label it incorrectly. You may see descriptions of Fine-Art as these two photos, but these are better described as Artistic. Tomato Tamato… The key component that all of these share is Composition. I’ll cover Modern first, because the correct use of Modern composition is the use of Composition rules, like the rule of thirds. Knowing that will help understand that Artistic/Dramatic/Fine-Art are using the rules of Modern Composition. Artistic is the use of different angles creating interesting focal points or using the foreground objects to enhance the subject.
Dramatic and Fine-Art, is using various composition and lighting that creates an image that not only will be on your wall for years to come, but can belong comfortably on the wall of an art gallery. My general rule of thumb, if you can remove the people subject and still want to hang the picture on the wall, you might have that Fine-Art shot. Composition of the couple and back ground can be hard enough, adding directional light in a way that will create shadows in the right area, and light in another along with a background that can be a piece of work by itself isn’t easily created without planning and foresight before hand. Your photographer is not going to shoot every photo this way, but will seize the opportunity when it presents itself. If you are looking to have photos like this in your final set of photos, you’ll not only need to select your photographer carefully, but consult with them before hand. Time of day, available lighting, type of lens, back ground, etc. You may find that your venue or timing won’t work as well for the outcome you desire, and might need to find an alternate time.
Sentimental vs posed
being on the same page as your photographer about these two styles is key
The reason I point this out, my definition of posed is at times different than a clients. I remember a few years ago one of my couples mentioned to me during the selection phase that they didn’t want posed pictures. I was like perfect, that’s not really how I work anyway. As you can see from all the pictures in this post, very few have the couple looking directly at the lens. Now I think it’s also important to note that I do a few variations of pictures with the couple looking at the lens because those are the ones parents usually want to frame. Come to find out the day of their wedding, their definition of posed was what most of us might refer to as sentimental. They preferred “posed” composition and looking at the camera. Luckily we figured this out quickly and made the adjustment on the fly. But the couple wasn’t necessarily wrong either. It depends on how your photographer moves you into those sentimental shots. If they just put you together and tell you to touch foreheads, well you are technically posed and the look you're going for is sentimental. Years from now, when you look back on those pictures, will they look awkward to you because of your memory of being posed into that composition or will it be a fond memory that has feeling you recall from that moment? I prefer to used directions to help guide the couple to a sentimental composition while giving them cues to interact with each other that helps these sentimental photos to feel natural and giving the couple a memory of that moment more than just the picture but remembering a feeling they had when it was taken. Not every couple is a warm and fuzzy sentimental type, some naturally enjoy making each other laugh and being able to capture that with the same cues captures a sentimental moment for them then what you might have expected. So the definition of these styles don’t necessarily need to be the same for all of us.
Vintage-
The last one to cover I would say is the easiest. Vintage style photos isn’t how you shoot them, it’s how they are edited. Most of the work is how you planned your wedding in terms of design, and details that will give the wedding a vintage feel. So choose your photographer based on the photos you love, and then ask if they can show you several types of vintage settings they use.
I hope you have gathered some insight to the different styles and whichever style you choose, your better option may be to find a photographer that has the ability to shoot a few different styles. Depending on venue, windows, time of day, and weather, you may want someone that has the ability to easily adapt and still deliver amazing results.
About the Author;
Mark McConnell is based in the DC Metro market and available for travel. Capturing over 150 weddings with a style that fits each individual couple has made him a highly sought after wedding photographer not only for couples but aspiring photographers as well. Developing and mentoring photographers to help them meet their own goals has grown his team of lighting assistants, 2nd photographers, and associate photographers. Mark also makes time for family portrait photography and more when not actively shooting a wedding. If you find Mark out from behind his camera or computer, you’re probably likely to see him working out with his son at USTMA or trying to cook a fancy meal in the kitchen. Find out more about Mark or Contact if you would like to learn how his team can capture your memories.