What makes a timeless wedding photograph at the Samoset Resort
Shayln and Max had an incredibly touching November wedding. There were so many family moments, so many good people that showed up to support them and their family as they tied the knot.
Even when the day itself is timeless, and the moments are timeless, making a timeless photograph requires that there is an un-distracted emotion attached to it.
We had a connection with Max and Shayln
The first and most important thing we could ever do, is to find clients that love to work with us. We don’t consider ourselves event photographers. We’re not there to simply snap pictures and hand them over straight out of the camera. We want to put everything we have into making timeless photographs for them, and we need their help to make that happen.
Together we planed for emotional space
With every single wedding client, we work through your time line with you to give feedback on how it will affect your wedding photography coverage. We’ll add time where it will help us get better photographs, and more importantly, where we need to leave time for emotional space.
As humans, we all get caught up in emotional days. Those emotions usually get bottled up and don’t always come through in an image. So we choose rooms where we can close the doors and let dad stand for a few moments in silence; to give the two of you uninterrupted time for yourselves.
Before Shayln and her step-father arrived we eliminated distractions
A good canvas has negative space that is free of distractions. Before Shayln’s step-father joined us we removed two end tables and two large chairs. We closed the doors and kept the room free of distractions visually and emotionally. Magan and I set a flash to fire on the far side of the room so that we would have enough light on Shayln and her dad for a clean final image.
We had enough awareness to stay out of the moment
I was asked recently on another image why I didn’t turn the father and daughter around to get his expression like we captured in this photograph. The answer was simple. You can plan a great deal, but once the moment is there, its not my place to interrupt.
This is part of what makes it timeless. An image is just a picture, a snapshot. I want more than that for my clients. I want it to be timeless, and a picture doesn’t become timeless unless there is an emotion attached to it. If I interrupt, you won’t feel the same way about the picture years from now, and it won’t ever become a timeless photograph.
We took multiple images to make this one photograph
A number of my final photographs from every wedding are made from multiple images, and even if they aren’t we take multiple images just to have options later.
Those images are culled down by us in the studio. We remove ones that aren’t pleasing, either by a flash that failed to fire, or someone caught on camera while they are speaking.
After the wedding, we put all of those pieces back together
Putting those pieces back together in this image included painting out a chandelier, removing several wall outlets, the corner of a table, and eliminating several knots in the wood that shown through. We also removed distortion from the lens and corrected the perspective of the walls so that they are architecturally correct. Often we will merge two images to get the expression right, but in this case it simply wasn’t needed.
What really makes it timeless in the end is the emotional attachment
The final photograph looks timeless not because of the image itself, but because there are emotions attached to it that are free of all distractions. It is a photograph that Shayln and her step-dad will see for years to come, and be able to re-experience that moment’s emotions all over again.
If this type of photography is what you want out of your experience with a wedding photographer, check out our information page.