The wedding - setting the stage, part 3: The hired photographers

First, let me say that as hard-working professionals with a job to do and the determination and will to get it done, I greatly respect the two individuals to the right - the still photographer and the videographer who works with him. Second, I must also say that, for me personally, they were my bane, my nightmare. They took all my plans on how I would shoot this wedding and utterly destroyed them.

Yet, how can I hold it against them? They were in their country, making their living. They had a job to do and they did it. They are guided by a photographic philosophy that is the exact opposite of mine; a philosophy that when exercised completely dominates the scene and makes it impossible for a shooter such as me to exercise his philosophy.

Yet, how can I say that my philosophy is better than theirs'?

Perhaps theirs' is better than mine.

I don't think so, but I could be wrong. Perhaps it is.

It had been Soundarya's intent that I would be the only photographer to document the wedding, but the groom's family wanted to bring in a photographic team of their own, a team that had worked for their family before and had pleased them with the product that they produced.

It was their right to do so and they exercised that right.

Here, in the above setting, this did not really pose much of a problem for me - but inside, during the actual ceremony, it put obstacles before me that seemed to be insurmountable - yet I had a no choice but to surmount them as best I could.

This was the problem: while a photographer cannot help but interfere a bit in any event that he shoots, my philosophy is to interfere the least amount possible and still do a good job. Their philosophy - and let me say that in India it is not only a philosophy that is accepted, it is expected, embraced and appreciated - is to interfere to the maximum amount possible.

So maybe for India, it is a better philosophy than mine.

By my philosophy, the very act of shooting an event with a flash constitutes interference. First, the flash interferes with the natural light. If I find that I absolutely must use a flash, then I will find a surface to bounce it off of, to soften it up a bit, to direct it at the subject at angle that allows it to throw in some shape definition.

What I would never do is point the flash straight at the subject, except, perhaps, very rarely, on a low-power discharge as fill light. When a photographer aims the flash straight at his subject, it just takes whatever quality of light and subtlety of tone that might exist and wipes it out. It washes out shape and definition. It creates a pasty image.

Yet, the first Indian wedding photographer that I ever encountered quite literally chastised me for shooting without a flash. "Straight on flash - that's the best light in the world," he told me. "It's the only good light. You can't get a good picture if you don't use straight on flash." He actively sought that straight-in, pasty, washed-out look and treasured it when he got it. His clients were happy with his work.

The natural look disgusted him and he made certain that I knew it. 

The second way a flash interferes is that it can simply be annoying to people to have flashes going off in their eyes all the time.

So I try always to avoid flash.

But India is a place where 50 things always seem to be happening at once, so I suppose a flash going off repeatedly at a wedding might not be an annoyance at all. Probably, no one even notices it.

Here, you can see the difference in philosophy. Note the little red light that says his flash is recharging, but still ready to fire. Also note the two windows through which a nice, soft, yet defining light pours down upon the beautiful bride.

I would (and did) use that window light. I would turn Soundarya just a little bit, so that the window light would give some shape and definition to her face; I would allow the light to preserve what it could of the natural subtleties of the scene as it actually appeared before me.

In just a moment, this photographer will blast his flash in full-force, and wipe out that window light and all the shape-defining and tonal subtleties that it carries.

But this was not really the problem for me. He could shoot his flash all through the wedding and I could shoot available light and only very rarely, perhaps one, maybe two frames at most, if at all, would his flash overlap into my exposure.

The problem was the photographer's assistant, the videographer. He had his own, straight-in-light, and it was a monster - a genuine flood light. Raised a short distance above his video camera, it poured a bright, intense, glare down upon everything that it pointed at, and anytime anything was happening, that light was on.

If I was by the videographer, then it washed my pictures out. If I was off to the side, it might cast some shape and definition into the scene, but it was harsh shape and definition, with hard, dark, shadows falling straight behind the subject.

If I were opposite him, then it was just like shooting straight into the sun. I could hardly even see. The lens flare was awful.

As for the photographer, who was also a choreographer, he also had no qualms about pushing me out of the way. He usually did this by holding one hand out, palm toward me. If there was no contact, he meant "move right now!" If he was not satisfied, then that hand would push against me.

Now, I am not a photographer who lets any other photographer push me around. Once, while I was shooting a story that was also an international event, a videographer for one of the major television news networks bulled butt-into me as I was framing my picture and forcefully shoved me out of his way. I retook my position and he wound up face down in the snow with a major lens cleaning task ahead of him and did not try such a stunt again.

But this was different. I was in another man's country and he was making his living and this was Soundarya's wedding and I did not want to take any action that might put a blemish on her special and beautiful day, so I would yield and look for another angle, even if I did not like that angle so well.

Except for one time: I had a scene framed just the way I wanted it when the photographer put his shoulder against mine and began to push. I held my ground. He pushed harder. I held my ground still, shooting as I did. He pushed still harder.

And then I said, "Did you know that I came all the way from Alaska at my own expense to shoot this wedding?" He eased off. But that was the only time he did so. He considered the wedding his and saw me as interloper.

Yet, a thought occurred to me. If I somehow insisted on having my way, on shooting this as I would like, then perhaps I would be an interloper. I was shooting a wedding in India. In India, or least in Bangalore, it appears to me that this is the way weddings are shot - with a photographer blasting away with a flash while at the same time directing a videographer who has a monster flood-light atop his camera.

Obviously, their clients like their work or they would be out of business.

This means that it is all part of the scene - even that monster flood-light is part of the natural scene; it is the light that is available and if I am really any good, then I just had to work with it - harshness, shadows, and all - and somehow make it work. 

And I would be an "Ugly American" if I tried to make it otherwise.

So I did not shoot Sandy's wedding the way I had wanted to, I shot it the way circumstance mandated and did the best that I could. I shot it as it was, not as I wanted it to be. And really, to one degree or another, that's how a shoot almost always is. Nothing is ever completely as you would want. A photographer must be flexible.

In this case, really flexible.

Comments

[Paul]

First, I enjoy reading your blog and would assume that you have many followers. I am also envious of your somewhat leisure although busy lifestyle where you can travel as much as you do and take pictures and then comment on them. I too have a G10 and 5DMkII and will be anxious to see what is wrong with your 5DII. The real reason I am writing and I know it is none of my business, how can you afford to not work, travel, own the cameras you have and buy coffee every day? Have you learned something that I dont know. Sorry, for the intrusion?

[MissSunshine]

I think I know the psychological reason for the demand for floodlight photographers. They are recording a ceremony, a ritual event. This is the day in which the bride and groom are literally "in the spotlight". It is their movie star moment, and the bright light and flashes are part of it. This is theatre, not "cinema verite".

As for the reader comment above, the answer for many in America is: live off the savings from the last job, put the expense on a credit card and pay off the loan a little each month, pawn or sell any items of value you bought when money was coming in, and find ways to cut back on other expenses.

Of course, the state of Alaska is unique in that a yearly check is sent to legal residences by the state government, not a huge amount, but it helps.

[kavitha]

I wish you had told me, we could have teamed together to knock that photographer off.

That was very rude, mean and unkind of him to push you.

Well, these guys do put on their flash despite good amount of natural light.
Most of my pictures appear bleached and caked while clicked from a studio. I guess they are trained so.

[Wasilla, Alaska, by 300]

Paul - I'm glad you follow and thanks for writing. Since I seldom work less than 12 hours a day, and sometimes much more, seven days a week, I am a little perplexed that you think that I do not work, but you have asked some interesting questions. When I can find the time, I will make a post just to answer them.

Interesting theory, Miss Sunshine.

Kavitha - that would have been fun. At the time, it did not seem like something that I should mention to anyone. Maybe I still shouldn't have. I appreciate the thought.