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The Documenting Eye - part 3 of 1 2 3

by Kevin Mullins Published 01/11/2011

The next set of images are all from the same wedding shot this April in Cambridge. They are all traditional wedding images, but I have purposefully waited for the right moment (in my mind) and tried to relay a little bit of the atmosphere during the ceremony. Shooting the bride walking down the aisle from behind her gives a great perspective, especially of the groom looking back up the aisle. Shooting the ceremony from very low on the ground not only gives the image a bit more depth, but it shows off more of the church. Shooting the signing of he register from a wide angle, in natural light, in real time gives the moment much more credence in my book.

My images are not technically perfect, they often don't conform to the compositional rules we all read about and I purposefully edit my work to resemble film frames of yesteryear. I shoot happily at 12800 ISO and I add noise to nearly every image I edit.

My workflow is very precise now and I use a combination of Photo Mechanic, Lightroom and Photoshop to produce my images. I can edit a complete wedding in six hours using these tools (assuming there is no rugby on the telly). I will be going more into my processes and workflow in two Masterclasses at the 2012 Convention.

Just as Jane Bown said - I don't consider myself an artist really, more a finder and keeper of moments. By far the hardest part of a wedding for me is spotting the moments - the camera work is irrelevant really. It's just the tool used to take that moment from that instant and store it in a can for eternity. I use my ears a lot and move around the wedding following any action I can find. I shoot with both eyes open, which allows me to see events unfolding outside of the frame. This is a technique that sports photographers use and, with a bit of adjustment and getting used to, is a great aid to photographing moments as they unfold. This final shot would never have been taken if I wasn't shooting with both eyes open. I was actually concentrating on something to the right of these two little children. I could see in my peripheral vision that the children were on the dance floor and playing with the instruments. Because of that, I decided to concentrate on them for a little while, and got the image.

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1st Published 01/11/2011
last update 09/12/2022 14:53:24

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