Also by Spencer Lum:    For Saturdays: 5 West Studios  |   For photographers: Ground Glass

Real Weddings: Megan and Chris

location: New York City, NY
ceremony: Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton
reception: Bayard’s, NY

 

Wanted to share a few polaroids as a sneak preview to a wedding we shot earlier this month. I recently snagged some film for my old instant camera and decided to bring it along. In a world of digital photography, there’s just so something special and honest about a moment captured on film.

Congratulations again to Megan and Chris! Such a sweet and down to earth couple!






How To: DIY Wedding Photo Processing

One of the biggest costs to any wedding photographer is the time spent processing an event after it happens. Hours needed to sort through images, adjust lighting and color, crop, retouch and upload can add up quickly and drag on for weeks when juggling several clients. This means higher costs and longer wait times, even for a basic wedding package.

In the past, the tools used to edit images were proprietary, and the skill it took to use them was worth the premium you paid. Now, with new online photo services and apps popping up daily, the ability to process and edit your own photos has never been more accessible. We just LOVE that this has gotten easier (and cheaper!) for our DIY-savvy couples who are enterprising enough to take control.

We spent some time today with the Picnik site. Picnik is a free online imaging app from Google that allows you an extraordinary amount of freedom to tweak your pics and add fun extras like vintage filters and polaroid frames. And it’s user-friendly too! Think Instagram for hi-res photos, with even more flexibility. We always upload our personal photos to Picasa or Flickr, and both sites conveniently allow you to edit the contents of your albums with Picnik in just a few clicks.

In the future, we plan to put up some in-depth tutorials and share custom filters for free tools like Picnik and the more advanced Photoshop-copycat Pixlr. We want our couples to have complete freedom with editing and printing their images, and we want to help you learn how! Check out a few quickies below and play around on the site to see more of what’s possible.

Before & After: applied 1960′s filter, selected polaroid frame


Before & After: converted to black and white, applied rounded corner frame


Before & After: adjusted exposure for higher contrast, selected “Lomo-ish” filter

How to Get Ready for Your Wedding: Nervous Energy

In part one and part two of this little mini-series, we talked about some big wedding day offenders: tight schedules and unrealistic expectations. The third and final problem that we encounter most often when shooting portraits of our wedding parties are visible doubt and discomfort.

This is for all you guys out there. It’s a little for you gals, too. Everything you do reads when you’re on camera. If you’re worried, anxious, or pre-occupied, it comes through. We’ll try to make you forget. More times than not, you even will. But brace yourself ahead of time. Being ready makes it all pass that much faster.

For girls, it’s usually the dress. Having a fly get stuck in the dress, seeing your train touch a dirty New York sidewalk, or seeing your loving, but slightly clumsy groom step on it is about as discomfiting as watching a brand new Ferrari get rear-ended. But if you do your portraits ahead of time, it’s also going to hit hardest right before you take those pictures, because that’s the time you first step out. And it’s the worst possible time for pictures. The solution? Just know that it’s coming. It makes a difference. And don’t let it ruin the mood. Enjoy the portraits. It’s one of the few times the two of you have alone during the day.

Now for the harder part. Guys, we get it, but, well, get over it. Being grumpy does not make the portrait session go faster. It just means you’ll be stuck with pictures that you don’t like. It might feel lame, but you won’t look lame. We promise you that. It’s paradoxical, but this much is true. If you feel stupid, there’s a good chance you look cool. If you try too hard to avoid feeling stupid, you’ll probably look schmaltzy. You’ll be holding back too much instead of looking natural. It’s just how it is. There’s no way you’ll know what’s going on behind the camera, but you can guess that schmaltzy and embarrassing sure isn’t what we’re going for. So as unnatural as it might feel, don’t worry about it. You’re covered.

When it comes down to it, the very best of moments happen on their own. They are bolts from the blue that come out of nowhere. And they happen whether you have a wedding on a beach with a few drunk friends, in a barn, a courthouse, or the middle of a forest. If you let it happen, it always does. That’s the magic of it all—of weddings, of life, of living. Enjoy the day. Enjoy the moment.

Real Weddings: Britta and David

location: Nassau, Bahamas
ceremony and reception: The Wyndham

 

Britta and David partnered with us last year on a project to raise funds for charitable organizations. The deal was simple. They made a gracious donation to a charity, and I shot their wedding at no cost. The only thing I asked in return was a bit of creative latitude. Nothing wild, just the freedom to shoot things as I saw them.

They let me feel free to be myself as a photographer. To include my most personal vision.. images I’ve always felt no one would be interested in.. as part of their wedding. I recently heard that stories happen when you do something you wouldn’t normally do. Britta and David changed the arc of my own story, letting me venture beyond myself. Maybe I didn’t quite get where I wanted to go. Maybe I wasn’t quite who I had hoped to be. But they let me see the world in a different way. They opened my eyes. It was worth so much more than any single booking could be, and I love looking back on their big day.