Professional wedding photographer......FAIL

Sorry - I managed to watch about 7 seconds of the clip before the narrator did my head in.

Cmon, a note of realism here, gear isn't irrellevant - better gear means you can have sight of more situations. Especially when using natural light, f stop matters. It absolutely doesn't define your ability though, ie what you can do with it. You can make perfectly sharp shots with a kit lens and low MP camera, but enlarging them to A2/A3 is always going to be trickier than with high MP and best lenses.

I didn't look at all of it but the question here is really what service they were contracted to deliver. If they claim professional and there's no contract then they're setting themselves up for a fall, arn't they, because professional isn't clearly defined. There's a lot we don't know about this case and there's a bit of showboating going on too. For all we know this was a package and the bride chose the low res JPG package - we just don't know. Their website has been taken down too and it's not available in the wayback machine either. We just don't know.

For me the most disturbing part was that the photographer ladies seemed remarkably unaware of technicalities. There are some basics that you have to know as a photographer and they didn't seem to demonstrate a lot of knowledge about those. They really didn't help themselves - for example not to know the speed of the lens!? Hello!?

Judge Brown did say hes was a canon shooter, so he was obviously predisposed to thinking more expensive gear automatically equates to better images.

He found the woman guilty of shooting with a substandard camera, and punished her accordingly.

She'd have got jail time if she had said "Pentax".

I'm with jackitec

Entertainment pure and simple Entertainment


If you watch the judge next week he as done something else, pure Entertainment

James

He's not saying that. He's saying better gear = better enlargements. Which is kind of rather true, especially if they're crops. He's also saying better gear = more lowlight capability. Which is also kind of true in my experience. His reasoning, I think, is if you're calling yourself a pro then really you'd better have the tools to do the job - a complete toolset which is flexible enough to cope with unexpected issues.

Surely this isn't such an unreasonable thing to ask. I, for example, might get cranky, if I took my car for a service and all the guy had was a screwdriver - wouldn't you?

at no time did the photographer say that she had been to the venue to investigate the rules of the church or reception.

but i still stand firm, simple Entertainment

James

agree. He also commented on technique...

Also, if those ladies did handheld shots inside the church they're surely fairly unlikely to be pin sharp at those shutter speeds regardless of image stabilisation. Do Canon kit lenses have the same slow shutter speed stabilisation stuff that the expensive lenses have?

Since recently they do.

Indeed you're right.
Some members here have done a shoot for their friends wedding and most if not all ended up buying a faster lens like a 50mm f/1.4 or f/1.8 to have something for lowlight. Is it wrong to presume a pro has the equipment that is needed or has the knowledge to deal with it?
Of course this was entertainment but i'v read the same thing happening in the UK and those are the one destroying the market, i wished that the profession photographer was protected, it would mean that people without a decent understanding can be dealt with and that you can protect people from people like you saw in the clip.

A couple of comments on the video, if I may.

About the Photographer:
1) If you're getting paid for a job, use a professional printer. It might cost slightly more, but for those type of prints (they looked like 8x10s) it's not going to cost you significantly more.

2) Her kit was fine for weddings, if she knew what she was doing. Don't diss the gear when it's most likely the photographer at fault.

3) She should have visited the venue before hand, spoken to the vicar, tried to work something out. It's absolutely inexcusable to turn up at a wedding then moan about lighting and other restrictions placed onto you. Remember, it's their house so it's their rules.

4) Sign a contract before the wedding discussing the types of photos you're going to take. If you're not sure about making the shots, DO NOT PROMISE IT! Immediately after the wedding, when you deliver the photos to the bride ask her to take some time to fill in a satisfaction form. Most brides are happy with the photos they get. It's only after they've spoken to a "knowledgable" relative do they get upset. The satisfaction survey is your "insurance".

About the bride:
1) As with anything in life, if you're cheap you're going to get cheap results. Have realistic expectations inline with the price you're paying.

About the judge:
1) It's not the size of your lens but how you use it that matters.

2) Also since it's an APS-C camera, a 28-70mm would be horrible. Go for the 17-55mm IS instead

The photographer didn't do a fantastic job, but for the price that was paid I think that the job she did was fair. If I could see the photos IRL, perhaps I'd change my mind but from the video they looked ... slightly below average.

Are you joking? Any photographer with a little bit of knowledge knows weddings are ALWAYS bad when it comes to lighting, so they don't go there with "cheap" kit lenses. They use zoom and prime lenses with large opening, not something that has an opening of 5.6 at the long end. Their equipment is substandard for the job. And no back up at all. A camera with only 6 megapixels can do the job, but not a lens with an opening of 5.6.

When I did my Uncles wedding as a favour, my first thought was "I'm going to need something faster than my 16-45 F4 here". It was the excuse I needed to buy a 50 f/1.4.

I wouldn't dream of calling myself a pro photographer or trying to market myself as one, yet it was obvious to me that slow kit zooms were not going to cut the mustard.

Having done the wedding, my initial suspicions were confirmed. That is, if I was going to do anything like that regularly I would need a set of DA* f/2.8 zooms (most notably the 50-135).

Of course, if I was charging even the low end of the prices I've been quoted for wedding photography, those lenses would pay for themselves in 3 or 4 gigs. Shame I'm not a good enough photog really.

I think it's more like one gig, based on wedding photographer prices around here!

You don't really need fast lenses for wedding photography. They're nice to have, but they are not absolutely essential. If you take a look at the work done by people like David Ziser, you'll see that he uses the Canon 18-200mm for a lot of his shots. Many of them are shot at around f/5.6. Here's a photo he's taken with an 8 MP Canon 30D with the kit lens (i.e. 17-85mm which regularly gets slated by pixel peepers for the amount of distortion and CA). In fact he doesn't use anything faster than the 70-200mm f/2.8 and even then he rarely uses it. Give that 6 MP camera to photographers like David Ziser, Monty Zucker, Yervant, etc and they'll churn out master pieces. To me, that suggests that the photographer is far more important than the equipment used.

Having better gear is always nice though

I`ve only ever done two - one with my daughter for her best buddy as a present ( extremely happy ) and one as an observer at my daughter`s wedding last July ( only took 580 shots AND stayed sober !! ).

With the *istD I have used my trusty Pentax 70-300 f 4.5 FAJ, the( now sadly stuck at f8 ) Sigma 24-70 f2.8, and the heavy but handy Sigma 28-300 f3.5.
I also had , but now sold from lack of use a Pentax FGZ 300 flash unit.

I certainly would not wish to be asked to do it for money as I would find it far too intimidating - I`m a cook for heaven`s sake !

Tony