Wedding Photography - Do It Yourself Processing?

[Grumpwurst]

After reading the entirety of this interesting thread, I'm still stuck on the fact that it'll be almost 3 years between engagement and wedding! My wife and I only had a 3 month lapse between those 2 dates.

But, I guess, in the rest of the world's defense, we had to pay for our wedding so it was done on the big ole cheap (less than $2000 for everything including dress and my suit).

We thought that when we made it to 10 years (3 years from now), we'll have a bigger, more expensive kick-a** wedding at WDW where only those of our friends and family that can afford to go will be there...haha

I'm sure that will include alot of my Disney family since they jump at a good cover story on why they are going again for the umpteenth time in a year..

But back to the discussion at hand....

If you do decide to train a family member or friend make sure they know what they are doing and you've done some trial runs in similar lighting. As I said, my wedding was done inexpensively since we had to pay for it. So, my good friend took the photos. He insisted he knew what he was doing and I didn't question him since he is a graphic artist by trade and degree and I knew photography was his hobby.

Well not a single picture was usable on 10 rolls of film. They were all very orangish in hue (bad white balancing if that is term existed in film photography) and many were blurry.

So, we had to call around to our friends and family who were there to see if they had taken any with their personal cameras which were P&S and disposables....So we only have a couple dozen photos of our wedding

 

[mSummers]

We thought that when we made it to 10 years (3 years from now), we'll have a bigger, more expensive kick-a** wedding at WDW where only those of our friends and family that can afford to go will be there...haha

That's a cool idea Ray!

Sorry to hear about your wedding photo problems... You're correct about the white balance being a problem with film. Most film was daylight balanced, so when you put it inside under artificial lighting, the colors didn't come out right without filters to correct it.

 

[WDWFigment]

After reading the entirety of this interesting thread, I'm still stuck on the fact that it'll be almost 3 years between engagement and wedding! My wife and I only had a 3 month lapse between those 2 dates.

But, I guess, in the rest of the world's defense, we had to pay for our wedding so it was done on the big ole cheap (less than $2000 for everything including dress and my suit).

We thought that when we made it to 10 years (3 years from now), we'll have a bigger, more expensive kick-a** wedding at WDW where only those of our friends and family that can afford to go will be there...haha

I'm sure that will include alot of my Disney family since they jump at a good cover story on why they are going again for the umpteenth time in a year..

But back to the discussion at hand....

If you do decide to train a family member or friend make sure they know what they are doing and you've done some trial runs in similar lighting. As I said, my wedding was done inexpensively since we had to pay for it. So, my good friend took the photos. He insisted he knew what he was doing and I didn't question him since he is a graphic artist by trade and degree and I knew photography was his hobby.

Well not a single picture was usable on 10 rolls of film. They were all very orangish in hue (bad white balancing if that is term existed in film photography) and many were blurry.

So, we had to call around to our friends and family who were there to see if they had taken any with their personal cameras which were P&S and disposables....So we only have a couple dozen photos of our wedding

Ha, we get that a lot about the three years thing. We are both currently students, and we wanted to wait until we both graduate before getting married, as we do not have adequate breaks for a proper honeymoon until then (with the exception of summer break, but then we're both expected to have internships). Plus, I like the idea of starting a new chapter in our lives with us beginning our married lives and graduating all at the same time. But yeah, three years is a long time...

As for your story, I am so sorry to hear that. We would not trust a family member (solely) as the photographer no matter what for that reason. Given that we've found plenty of photographers who will give us the files, I won't even be trusting a family member with my equipment. Even if no photographers would've given us the files, we still would have filed a pro, just because a bunch of prints and a book are much better than digital images that aren't worthwhile.

By the way, I love the idea of an expensive nice wedding at WDW. We plan on doing vow renewals (getting ahead of ourselves a little?) there someday. We just couldn't do it on the first go-round.

 

[Grumpwurst]

I can fully understand the idea of wanting to wait till you get married until you were out of college. I didn't realize you two were still students. Nothing like the stress of finishing school to add to the stress of starting a life together.

Hey, must some advice from someone that's not too old...haha

Remember the wedding is a day, the marriage forever. So, try not to put too much emphasis on the day and forget the real work begins the day after.

 

[Tim]

the paid guy probably does not know that granny has not spoken to uncle fester in 20 years over some imagined slight and that the wedding has resulted in them burying the hatchet (in each others backs if granny had her way)

that is something that is usually determined and added to the contract up front, if the photog. knows what he/she is doing.