What is Documentary Wedding Photography?
What is a Documentary Wedding Photographer?
I have a spoken a little bit about styles of photography in my wedding planning blog posts before, what to consider when you are choosing a wedding photographer as there are many different styles out there.
Documentary photography is a candid and unposed style of photography with little or no direction.
It means watching the day unfold without getting involved and altering the scene.
It means spontaneous moments.
It means focusing on what’s real.
Documentary photographs aren’t about producing polished, posed, curated or formal photographs, it’s about capturing genuine expressions.
“One guest who was a wedding photographer for years, said he didn't realise that you weren't a guest for a good couple of hours because you blended so well! And of course, we loved your company.”
One of the biggest differences between someone who identifies as this being their key style and someone who doesn’t is about how much you intervene or changes things on the day e.g tidying up at bridal prep, or taking time to straighter the dress perfectly.
As a documentary wedding photographer is someone who just lets everything unfold naturally and captures what goes on around them without involving themselves to alter the images they are taking. There are plenty of amazing wedding photographers who have a more stylised way of shooting which is perfect for some couples, but that is the oppositre of what I am!
I have heard so many horror stories about couples that 30 years later can recount how uncomfortable their photographer made them feel (granted wedding photography was very different back in the day for our parents and grandparents generation!) and i have heard more than my fair share of stories about bossy photographers lining people up for hours to take group shots.
“We barely noticed her throughout the day which kept everyone nice and relaxed!”
How do you do this?
Mostly I do it by not acting like a scary photographer who’s getting in your face, but another wedding guest who happens to have a (fancy) camera and isn’t hitting the champagne like there’s no tomorrow. I like to fit in at weddings, it makes people chat to me and therefore relax around me which helps get those natural photographs.
My camera is super quiet, and even has a TOTALLY SILENT mode which is awesome for quiet ceremonies or times when I want to be extra discreet. Plus it helps put people at ease if they don’t have a click-y noise going off all the time.
On the subject of my cameras, they are SMALL! which makes them look very unassuming and make me look even more like a guest (except the bad ass leather holster I wear - that’s a bit of a giveaway)
I am always ready for anything! I am constantly looking about, reading the space and the people and anticipating what’s going to happen next that I can click my camera at.
Why do you shoot like this?
It’s real, cut the crap, upstaged documentation of your wedding day. I want to fight against the world of doctored images and questing after that ‘1 perfect' instagram worthy photograph - against the idea of striving for perfection.
It’s more emotionally connecting - the things that might go unnoticed but when you look back you remember just how that felt. To me, that has so much more value that contrived photographs that look ‘flawless’.
Is documentary wedding photography all black and white?
Absolutely not! Some of my favourite moments I choose to deliver in colour. Black and white can be powerful and there are some images I just see and can’t wait put in monochrome but often colour can bring something special to a photograph too. Quite often with close up, emotional images black and white works well because it lets the viewer focus in purely on the content instead of being distracted by the other elements of the image. With all my wedding couples I deliver how I would choose the photograph, but I always offer free re-edits from black and white to colour or vice versa if you have a preference.
“We have adored looking through at the images you captured that we missed on the day, or moments that we thought nothing off suddenly caught in the moment are extremely special.”
“It felt to us more like you were one of the guests on the day”
I’ll be honest, I was always quite reluctant to go for a professional photographer as I imagined posing for a camera in an unnaturally sentimental way and ending up with photos that were beautiful, but weren’t at all ‘us’… If this was my view of all professional photographers, then you have definitely managed to disprove my thinking.
Ben & Naomi
How I approach couples portraits as a documentary photographer?
It’s a little bit harder to be unobtrusive and in the background when it’s literally just you two, and me (I’m not *that* much of a ninja). Primarily I just give you space to have a breather and be yourselves, the wedding day can be really intense and go by in a flash so having 10 minutes with you new husband / wife is a good time for you to take stock and maybe actually say hello to each other! So to start with I back off and give you a little time to have a hug and a kiss together. I will have mostly scoped out some cool spots so we’ll walk slowly to those which gets some natural movement photos and then in a particularly cool spot I will back off a bit again and let you chat about your guests, how you’re feeling, the best moments so far. My whole approach is centred around people being themselves to let their wedding photograph capture their personalities.
Also it’s a bit about what goes on before the wedding day too, and this is how I get to know couples beforehand so they feel comfortable around me and trust me to do my thing on the day. I do this through my SNAP & CHAT sessions where we meet up for a tea / wine and chat about anything and everything. It always give some a little insight into who you are as a couple to make sure I take the most personal and best photos I can for you.
Also I just LOVE these moments like in the above images where you just don’t know that I’m lurking in the background to take a photo….
Finally just a caveat to this; I shoot documentary wedding photography 95% of the time. The other 5% means I do still do the family formals because I believe they are an important part of the day too - but they definitely don’t drag on for hours and they’re not fancily arranged like a film poster. If you want to read more about how I approach these you can do so on this blog post.
So there you have it! I hope I’ve answered a bit about why I call myself a documentary wedding photographer and unearthed some info about what that actually means. Feel free to let me know anything I missed or any advice for couples thinking about what style of wedding photographer to choose.
“Many of our guests didn’t even notice we had a photographer and we loved having you as a guest – we hope you enjoyed the day too!”