Capturing emotion in wedding photography
Melissa Mannion June 19th, 2012
One of the most misinformed comments that I often hear is ‘you must be so bored with weddings, they are all the same.’ Perhaps if the same two people got married every Saturday then this might begin to be true- a kind of ‘Groundhog Day’ of weddings. Of course, every wedding that I photograph features an entirely new set of characters, locations and circumstances so happily no two weddings are ever even remotely similar. Yes, of course there are common threads such as a dress, flowers, a venue but there are many more differences and one of the key differences is in the little moments where people’s humanity shines through. A challenge that I set myself is to capture true emotions that make the photographs completely unique to each couple.
Below is a sequence of photos from the father of the bride seeing his beautiful ‘little girl’ in her wedding gown. Such a powerful moment and one that can not be staged. The final photo in the sequence is when the emotional tension is broken by the bride and her parents laughing. One of my favourite facebook comments came from this image’I can hear you guys laughing in this photo…’ That perfectly sums up what I strive to achieve in my wedding photography- to create an image that enables the viewer to be in that fleeting moment and keep it forever.
