Different Wedding Photography Styles

Typically, your wedding day is one of the most important milestones in your life. You spend a fortune on flowers, stationery, dresses, a makeup artist, hotels and so much more. Your personality and style goes into those details. Whoever you are and what ever you like there is a wedding photographer out there for you.

Photographers come in many different personalities, sizes and styles. Some shoot in only one specific style and there are photographers who shoot in a variety of different styles. Then we have the real innovators who create their own style.

The most popular styles of wedding photography in today's market are as follows:
- Photojournalistic
- Traditional
- Illustrative

Lets take a look at each of these...

Photojournalistic
Wedding photojournalism is said to appeal to the bride and groom that require a series of unique photographs designed to "tell a story" or narrate their wedding day. Wedding photojournalism has become a very popular style of wedding photography and is the art of capturing moments unobtrusively. Normally you barely know that the photographer is there. Normally the photographer covers the wedding with a large telephoto lens (although not always) and tries not to get in the way of the story as it unfolds.

Wedding photojournalist's respond to events as they unfold, they do not manipulate or create events. The resulting images therefore can be unpredictable (as is life unpredictable), some consider this unpredictability as a drawback with this particular style. Personally I feel its not a drawback it's the beautiful aspect of this style, it really is a record of your day. The goal of Wedding Photojournalism is to tell the unique story of your wedding day. Wedding Photojournalism captures moments rather than poses, documenting the emotions and energy around the entire occasion. The images convey genuine emotion and capture the story of your day as it unfolds naturally.

Best in the world: Well for me its Jeff Ascough but many photographers will say Dennis Reggie. Dennis is the father of this style.

Read about Dennis here.
See some images from Jeff Ascough here.

Traditional
Traditional wedding photography is a photographic style that is a series of contrived posed or 'set up' photographs, usually of the wedding party and the couples' families. Traditional wedding photographers tend to follow a 'shot list'. Lighting and backgrounds are tightly controlled by the photographer resulting in well exposed images. The disadvantages of Traditional wedding photography could be issues like, the amount of time the Bride and Groom spend getting their photograph taken. Images can look visually pleasing but stiff due to their static and contrived nature and predictable.

The upside of traditional photography is that you end up a set of professional photographs of your family and loved ones.

Although Traditional wedding photography still has it's place in the modern photography world it is being pushed aside by more illustrative and photojournalist styles of shooting. You see more traditional photographers that are older and have been in the industry a long time and have not changed their ways or you will see it in the lower end beginners as it is any easy style of shooting that does not take much creative input. But be aware it still takes skill so don't be thinking anyone can do it well.

You probably don't want to rely too heavily on formal portraiture, however, or you will miss out on a lot of the energy, passion, and raw emotion surrounding your wedding. Most couples want to make sure to include some candid, photojournalistic photography in their wedding albums alongside the formal shots.

Best in the world: Well for me its Monte Zucker.
See some of his images here.

Illustrative
Wedding Photographers who shoot weddings in the Illustrative style, think in terms of design elements by placing their subjects in settings of interesting composition and backgrounds. This photography is usually a creative person who loves design and elements of color and texture. The photographer provides direction to their subject but they are also encouraged to interact. This results in a more spontaneous feel. Illustrative wedding photography is said to bring out the photographer's 'artistic' creative and compositional skills rather than simply capturing a series of moments.

Its influenced by fashion, editorial and lifestyle photography.

Illustrative Wedding Photography is the newest style to break into the wedding scene. Its a modern and fun way to photograph a wedding resulting in artistic and edgy wedding images. Photographers who shoot in this style are skilled both artistically and technically.

If I was to pigeon-hole myself into one particular style it would be the category of photography best suited to me.

Best in the world: Australian photographer Yervant his website simply says "Fashion meets Wedding".
See it here.
OR
San Francisco based photographer Bambi Cantrell.
See her website here.

Article including images copyright of Gerard Foy Photography.
www.gerardfoy.com

Natural Light Portraits in the kitchen

My wife ran out to the shop Saturday lunchtime and left us the task of setting the table. At around the same time I noticed some really harsh sunlight pouring into our kitchen. So what do you reckon I did as soon as she left?

I ran upstairs and grabbed my camera and a reflector of course. This shot took about 30 seconds and shows how easy it can be to capture a good quality image if you understand basic camera operation and you can visualise the final image.

Essentially all that was required was moving Alana far enough away from the glass doors with the sun pouring through them and meter for Alana's face (which started out darker than the sunlight and became darker the deeper she came into the room). As I'm metering for her face and as she moves into the room the darker her face gets and the greater the light intensity difference between her face and the sunlight.

I then added a hand held reflector (yes, I shot this with one hand and yes I was shaking) to fill some of the shadows on the face.

Below another edit.





Article including images copyright of Gerard Foy Photography.
www.gerardfoy.com