Three reasons we love awkward!
#1 Awkward is honest. Hear me out.
It’s not natural to feel comfortable with some creeper pointing a camera at you all day. Setting aside your fight or flight reflex kicking in, if you don’t like having your photo taken it probably means you value living in the moment. This is absolutely the right frame of mind to be in on your wedding day. For you and your guests.
You’ve probably heard people say “The day just went by so fast”, and the temptation is to have your phone out, living through the screen so you can re-live it later.
But that’s what we’re for.
You might be reading this going ok, that’s all great but still don’t know what to do with my hands in photo’s. (one in my pocket and one smoking a cigarette) That brings us to point 2.
#2 Awkward is how you feel on a first date right. Your inner monologue is something like “are they going to like me, does my hair look good, do I have anything in my teeth, why is the sky blue… wait… stay focused… we’re busy undermining our confidence”.
And it is all about confidence.
Awkward is the step before feeling comfortable. Your about to marry someone who you probably had that awkward first experience with, and as a photographer awkward is just the step before I take an amazing photo of you feeling relaxed.
I probably can’t make this point any bigger, but whether I’m photographing you or someone else is, to capture your wedding day helping you feel comfortable is a huge part of my job. At the end of the day you should be saying to yourself “ I came for the amazing photos, and I stayed for the banter”. So Awkward is fine, it’s the step before we’ve gotten to know each other and if I’m lucky enough to be your photographer we would have had many chats before your wedding day to get that out of the way.
“But I still feel like I smile like a golden retriever, who’s been told its time for walkies”…
#3 A real belly laugh, you know the ones where a bit of wee comes out? They’re contagious. When you see someone really letting themselves go into a good laugh you can’t help but smile. It’s the same when you look at photos, it’s part of the magic of it I guess and why I love it. A good photo doesn’t interrupt that moment. It isn’t posed perfectly. You’re going to look a million bucks on your wedding day, and when you let yourself go into one of those full body laughs it’s going to look great.
It's the same for all the emotions you’re going to feel. Capturing the groom forgetting to breath as the bride walks towards him for the first time, is magic.
And the moment most awks for people is the location photos, where it’s just you two and you’re being told to pose like something from a Pinterest board. Again, if I’m lucky enough to capture your day, we won’t be doing this. For me it’s all about movement and making sure this section of the day where I’m photographing you two alone isn’t an emotional/energetic cul-de-sac. You’re going to be on such a high, interrupting that to over engineer a photo is going to ruin it… and that’s awkward.
I’ve got a bunch of little things I do with my couples to make this moment feel genuine and special. So if you’d like to hear about it, hit me up.