The Most Successful Wedding Photographer

My friend emailed me a picture the other day and when I saw it I cried.  It was a picture of one of my sons and I at my son Jake’s wedding.  When I looked at it I could still feel my son’s arms around me.  This is my son who is stationed in Japan and I hadn’t seen in two years.  I don’t even care that my face is looking pretty old, I  just absolutely love it.  It’s the wedding of one of my children and emotions were high.  I’ve shot at least 30 weddings but have never been the Mother of the Groom.

When I first started shooting weddings, I dreamed of being the most successful wedding photographer in the world.  I mean if you’re going to do something you might as well be the best right?  I’ve always tried to capture the emotion of a wedding day because I knew that’s what couples wanted but slowly my focus started to change.  I started to look at Pinterest, which I still love by the way, but I started looking at it in the wrong way.  I started imagining all these perfect shots I HAD to get. I started to look at wedding blogs and thought if only every wedding had that many details or that amazing venue.  If you’re the best photographer in the world you have to learn how to crawl on the ground or climb up a tree.  You have to shoot through something or spin your camera to get some cool light effects.  I was no longer shooting for the couple but I was shooting for what I would show everyone else on Facebook.  Emotion started not to be as amazing at getting THE COOL shot. I’ve got to get an amazing shot, I’ve got an award to win!  Now let’s face it I’m not all that creative so the pressure was starting to get to me.  Every time I posted a picture on Facebook I stopped thinking about if my client would like it and started caring more if other photographers liked it.  Now don’t get me wrong, I love other photographers and I appreciate how much support they’ve given me on my fan page, but really,  my job is not to please them it’s to please the amazing couples who have entrusted me to their most special day of all!  When it comes down to it clients don’t really care if the shot has awesome bokeh or glorious sun flare. What they care about is an image that actually captures an emotion where you can just feel yourself right there in the moment.  My job isn’t to win an award when I’m shooting a wedding, it’s not for my fans on Facebook to be amazed at and tell me how great I am.  Although that does make me feel pretty dang good.

My job, which I knew starting out but somehow lost,  is to make a whole entire family look back on their day and remember exactly how they felt at that exact moment for the rest of their lives.  If I can do that than I’m the most successful wedding photographer in the world.

 

Now this is an amazing picture.  This is me and my son Justin who I miss dearly now that’s he’s back in Japan.  This was taken by my amazing friend Jenn Morrow who knows just how to capture emotion.

 

 

Thank you for reading my ramblings!