It's rampant in the wedding biz these days. Vendors, guests and family members are getting worse with their camera manners. Call it attention deficit disorder, boredom at weddings ... or perhaps just call it for what it is: Rude.
As artists, professional photographers like (and need) to be able to do their very best job without interference. We feel a loss if we can't create images the way we intended to and the way a couple has dreamed we would (while never ignoring the fact that the couple has also paid generously for the photographer's professional services).
Like a musician or oil artist, professional photographers are justifiably sensitive to outside noise and interference. After all, who wants to perform in (or listen to) an orchestra when a wannabe musician decides to play along with a kazoo in the audience? And who tosses a splash of Glidden Semi-Gloss on a canvas before a master painter's brush strokes have even dried?
When a talented photographer walks into a wedding hall ... he or she just wants to create! "I want to be allowed to be the artist that I am," is something David has been heard to say. People who interfere with the bride and groom's dreams of having perfect professional photography are disruptive and disrespectful of the couple and the professional photographer. We've heard more than a few couples apologize because of their guest's univited interference and rudeness.
PointandShootarazzi want to be instant stars. They'll let nothing get in their way of supposed fame. Their Etch-a-Sketch version of photography will play well on fb mere moments after the flash, click and send. They'll post their blown-out and blurry stick-drawing pixels on a Wall and take reward in counting how many Likes and Comments pop up with each of their posts.
"Look at me .... I fauxtographed Jack and Jill at their wedding! I'm so Good!" states the PointandShootarazzi.
Then PointandShootarazzi breaks his or her own arm while patting him/herself on the back - ignoring or oblivious to the fact that they possibly ruined a professional photographer's efforts to create a truely remarkable image. And some of PointandShootarazzi's fb friends see how cool it is to be a PointandShootarazzi ... so cool that they decide they'll do the same thing when they're at their next special event. "It must be okay to be a PointandShootarazzi because everyone else is doing it." It's self-perpetuating.
Yet, we photographers resist the temptation to show up at someone else's workplace to do everything possible to upstage them at their job. What's the difference? Everyone has a hammer - but they don't show up at a construction site and start wacking away on nails. And who doesn't own a spatula or spice rack? When have you ever heard of someone going back to the kitchen at Simon and Seiforts and handing over a jar of Nature's Seasoning to the chef?
So, in the end, one way to improve the quality of the wedding work environment is by contracting only with clients who have hired the studio multiple times over the years. This helps but it's never a guarantee. But, it's one of the reasons David Jensen Photography limits its wedding commitments to less than six a year.
As the song goes: "People are crazy."
Well said and also sad commentary. I think weddings are overrated anyway.
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