So You Want Candid Moments Captured On Your Wedding Day ?

The word “candid” is a popular term couples use to describe how they would want their wedding photos to look like. For wedding photographers, “candid” means this, as defined by Merriam’s Webster Dictionary:

                          candid

                           photography: showing people acting in a natural way because they do not know that they are being photographed.

Why am I even quoting the dictionary you ask? Well, before I even deal with the topic of shooting candids, I should at least clarify what I’m talking about. It was pointed out to me by people in my industry that clients sometimes use the term candid when they actually meant “natural”. Natural in the sense that the subjects photographed casually posed themselves and were aware of being photographed. It’s like when a photographer happened to approach a group of friends during cocktail hour and got them to face the camera and smile.

For photographers, shooting candids is synonymous to shooting as a photojournalist. We do not control what our subjects are doing.

There’s a lot of reasons why some wedding photographers, such as myself, are driven to shoot candids. When done well, moments tell stories — about the day itself, about relationships, about love. When we shoot moments, we capture emotions. Emotions define experiences. Experiences define what it’s like to be human. And that’s what fascinates us.

When people view your wedding images and see people’s emotions from the day, they’ll not only see what your wedding looked like. They will also feel what it felt like to be there at that particular moment in time.

Moment-driven wedding photographers will capture the day as it happens. However, there are a few things that would make it challenging for us to get the moments you want. You might want to take notes.

1. Creating a tight wedding day timeline.

If you’re rushing, you’ll only be concentrating on completing tasks —- having your hair styled, putting your dress on, getting to the church on time. You will get photos of those for sure. But as what my mentors have taught me, those are just “doing” photos. It doesn’t mean much really. When you’re rushing, you’re not allowing moments to happen. Moments like your mom tearing as she zipped your dress up. Of your bridesmaids laughing hysterically because of an inside joke only you and your friends understood. No one is going to be tearing up or laughing hard if they’re stressed out about being late. If your timeline can breathe, so will you.

Take for example the photo below. It’s a photo of Bethany and her bridesmaids performing an impromptu song that left everyone in the room in awe. They were amazing. This moment would not have happened if they were all rushing around.

2. Constantly posing for the camera.

With the birth of smartphones and #selfie on social media, we now think we know how we want to look like on photographs. Some people may have trained themselves on how to pose accordingly when a camera is pointed at them. Which is okay for portraits. But not so much when your wedding photographer wants a touching photograph of you and your dad sharing a moment. We don’t want you to stop and pose. We want you to just be you. Not the posed you. Not the Instagram you. Just you. Ignoring us as if we’re not there will help us tremendously. And when it’s time portraits, rest assured that we’ll pose you in the most flattering way we know. We’re the pros.

3. Treating your whole wedding day as a portrait session.

If portraits are more important to you than capturing emotions, treating your wedding as a full day portrait session is fine. You just have to be aware that it’s not going to help real moments to occur organically. We understand that portraits are important. In fact, we love shooting portraits as well. It’s the time during a wedding when we can get really creative. But if you schedule your whole day — aside for the ceremony and reception — going from one location to another and another and another just for portraits, there’s not a lot of moments to be photographed there. It’s fun at first but it might just tire your wedding party if they’re being asked to pose again and again. Based on my experience, a regular person can handle up to two hours of portraits before they get exhausted. A tired person can suddenly turn into a grumpy one when pushed to their limits. When that happens, there isn’t much anyone can do to get a grumpy person to look happy at all.

4. Not having fun.

So what if the the roses on your bouquet don’t exactly match your wedding colours? So what if your cousin’s girlfriend decided to wear white on your wedding day? So what if your Aunt Jemima thought your sand ceremony was tacky? On your wedding day, those smalls details don’t matter. What matters is that you’re marrying the person you love. Just let all your expectations go. Be in the moment. Have fun.

So there you go! I hope this article is of help to you. If you’re looking for a moment-driven wedding photographer in the Greater Toronto Area, please don’t hesitate to contact me!