When a photographer gets married, the first question is: "Who is doing the photos?!" Well the answer is simple... I will do it myself. I will use a tripod and a self-timer...
As a photographer in the wedding industry for so many years, having seen so many weddings, I had my 5 cents worth on just about everything when we were planning the wedding. But my idea of doing my own photos was obviously close to impossible, so we then decided to use a good friend,
Adam Hilton. He was still fairly young in the wedding industry, so I thought I could manipulate him to do the shoot my way... he listened to what I wanted but luckily did his art his own way and needless to say we have really awesome wedding photos. There was just one thing: as I was marrying a beautiful girl, it was impossible not to grab the camera and shoot away. The end result is beautiful wedding photos, however the groom didn’t feature as much as he should have... he was too busy assisting his photographer in photographing the bride.
Here are some of the original images taken on 14 March 2003.
*Above image by Adam Hilton
Now I don’t have the chance to do photos of Lizelle in her wedding dress everyday, so we decided to take the dress on our honeymoon. We waited about a week to do a shoot on an isolated beach in the Eastern Cape. Finally I got to use the tri-pod and self-timer. Once again I did loads of images of the bride….the few that I feature in was taken by self-timer, I just ran to the back to be out of focus then looked over in the distance (those who know me , know I hate photos of myself). If you look closely you can see I forgot my razor and the washing powder I used already shrunk my shirt, can you believe it?
This year, Lizelle and I are married for 10 years, and I thought it might be a good idea to do a Trash the Dress session with her. She was keen so the dress and my professional kit was packed to go on holiday with us. This by the way rarely happens, my pro kit stays home when I am on a family holiday. Most people think, being a photographer for over 20 years I will have
loads and loads of photos of my personal life. I don’t. I enjoy life. I
want to live my life. I don’t live it through my camera, I feel you miss
so much if you only look through a view finder. I see this every week at
weddings, guests look at the wedding through their mobile devices, and instant cameras, see
who can Facebook the first image of the bride, the first kiss, the first
dance...then I feel the moments are captured poorly and not
experienced greatly!
We were out there on the beach at 06:30am - way before the sun even showed its face in the east - on a chilly morning in July. Being on the beach so early with Lizelle doing a few photos was an experience. We had so much fun: She was freezing her behind off and I just kept saying: “Babe wait for the water it will make an awesome shot!” The two hours we were out there just flew past, and once we were done we just rinsed the dress, and now I wait for the 20 year shoot!
My wife, thank you for 10 years, two beautiful kids and a few grey hairs!
This Trash the Dress session was so much fun for me. Like Patrick said, you'd imagine that a professional photographer does loads of photographs of his family, but that is simply not the case. He rarely photographs me in a "professional" capacity, and that is why this shoot was so special. He was the ultimate professional, even when his camera refused to work properly, and treated me like he would one of his brides!
Patrick, as I've said before, but would like to reiterate it here...
You're talent knows no boundaries!
.jpg)