As a bubbly, romanticism minded teen girl photographer, your first wedding is something you never forget. Even as you go on and photograph other weddings, there are no feelings inspired from them that, combined, create the exact combination of giddiness, nervousness, and total confusion.
Well, perhaps not the last one.
When I photographed my first wedding (as a second shooter, mind you) I was seeing a wedding for the first time. Yes, it’s true, in all of my sixteen years, I had not ever been to a wedding. I would like to think that the blank slate I had in my mind about weddings helped me capture moments that would have otherwise gone unnoticed by me had I been the proud owner of a belt with experience under it.
I was so very awkward, and believe it or not, somewhat shy. Up until a few months ago, I had never truly embraced the gawkiness that accompanied being 16 and 6 feet tall. I would like to share with you an elaborate story about a happy go lucky girl who was shaking hands, smiling boldly, and eagerly snapping away photos, but I would be telling you a very horrible lie so I won’t even unravel the stories of how I was mentally chiding myself the entire day. Even still, at the end of the wedding, I walked away with a better knowing of myself as a teenage girl, as a photographer, and as an artist. As the glasses ran dry for the last time and as laughter faded with the evening, I felt something inside of me that, to this very day, has not left.
It was a truly beautiful experience and I compared every wedding after to that first wonderful experience and every single bride and groom was matched against Lindsey and Stephen.
But, after a small period of time and a flooding of great inner conviction, I knew I could not, in any form of decency, approach weddings with that type of attitude. I had to come to every single celebration with brand new eyes and a fresh canvas of inspiration on which to draw upon. So from that very enlightening moment I made it a point to erase all emotionally tied bias and photograph the love shared between two people on the day of their wedding.
My first wedding was September 12, 2009, just 6 months after I purchased my dSLR. I photographed the entire thing, with the exception of perhaps 20 or 30 photographs, with a 50mm 1.8 lens. So do not ever be fooled into thinking that you need the newest full frame body or the sharpest glass to produce your best work. And heaven forbid you fall prey to the petty myth that you need to shoot a certain brand or have certain settings and particular accessories in order to capture a moment. I will say, however, that coming into this wedding I had a lot of technical knowledge and was shooting in Manual (and okay, Aperture Priority too) a large majority of the time and that helped me capture and create images that I very much fancied and did not leave me incredibly reliant upon my camera. So just keep that in mind : )
