Door 6: Cuddles
Fujifilm X-Pro 2 – 56mm 1.2 – 1/1600sec – f/2.0 – ISO 200
I spend probably 80-90% of a typical wedding day walking. I walk all around the venue. I walk to places I think will look interesting for pictures and I walk to places that I’m not convinced will work for pictures. I always look for different ways to show the context of the wedding day and where the guests are spending their time. I try to see the venue and the whole day from the eyes of a guest.
But while I do that I look for moments like this. I don’t spend the whole day with the camera to my eye and that’s because I’m often people-watching. It’s a really important way for me to anticipate those real, genuine moments that might pop up for a split second and then vanish to memory.
This particular image was taken at Ellenborough Park in Cheltenham very shortly after a couple of brief formal group shots with the bridesmaids. The best part of group shots for me is the moments after the photograph has been taken when everyone relaxes and behaves like they normally would without a camera pointed at them. I’m photographing slightly further away for this than I normally would, purely to avoid disturbing what unfolded to be a lovely moment.
For the photographers out there, you may notice that I took a slightly softer approach to the black and white conversion than I normally would – I believe that for this embrace and the subjects the full-on contrasty monochrome would be too much.
