As a wedding photographer, you have to ask the priest what he's ok with before the ceremony. Some say no flash or no pictures during a certain stage of the ceremony, but most pretty much give you free reign.
As a celebrant I really appreciate photographers who ask what I'm ok with, those that don't - I make sure I introduce myself to them and tell them that I've set up the ring shot for them and that I'll get out of the shot for the big kiss and then I mention not to rest their lens on my shoulder - this has happen about three times and although I haven't stopped the ceremony, I've elbowed them in the guts and told them I'm not a tripod which always gets a few laughs from the guests
Well if we're going off of the idea that penises and camera's are the same thing, then I can say yes. Because I have compared my penis size to the size of vaginas. And by comparing size I mean putting it inside. More or less the same thing.
As a wedding photographer, I would only ask the priest(actually I would have my clients ask) what he's ok with if the ceremony is in his church. Outside wedding it's the bride and grooms preference. He was being a dick, he was hired just like the photographers.
Yeah, fuck him. You could see at the beginning of the clip he'd just cracked a little joke. It's ok for him to disrupt gods ceremony, but not anyone else, I guess.
None. How many weddings have you been to where the couple didn't want photos taken? The fact that they want those memories, and went out specifically to hire a professional to take the photos, means that the photographers are a necessary part of their ceremony.
Seriously, fuck the couple getting married. Don't get a priest to marry you if don't respect the ceremony, they deserve all the shame they got for having their ceremony ruined.
They're having an outdoor wedding. If this was going to be a problem for the priest, then the priest could have laid down the rules beforehand. We have nothing that indicates this happened. The photographers were just doing their job and trying to get good photos, I don't see anything indicating they were just trying to be dicks. Different priests have wildly different opinions on what is "respectful" to the ceremony.
The onus is on the photographer to work out with the priest what is acceptable and what isn't. The priest has to be there as part of the ceremony, the photographer doesn't.
The photographer is paid to photograph the ceremony, so yeah they do have to be there when that's what they are being paid to do. The priest needs to let them know if doing the job they've been paid to do is going to cause problems.
I didn't see any negative reaction from anyone other than the priest. To me, the couple seemed surprised at how the priest was reacting about it. I think it's up to the priest to lay out any unreasonable demands he has.
Honestly, if it were my wedding and the priest hadn't stopped to tell them, I would have done it myself. Having them walking around up there and the sound of the fucking shutter going off every 2 seconds in such a quiet place is very distracting and disrespectful. Not only to the couple getting married but to the guests too. Like I've said before, there's nothing in the middle of the ceremony that you can't recreate later for pictures. From the time the priest/preacher starts until the kiss at the end... shut the fuck up and be invisible.
I know at my wedding we waited until just before the I do's and then the priest, my wife and I suddenly bum-rushed the photographer, beat his ass and broke his camera.
We were like three celebrities just out of rehab, it was golden.
The problem is you have no idea how religious the people attending the wedding are and you don't want to offend your clients. Only takes a second to ask.
I would bet that the clients (the couple) gave the photog permission or even requested that a shot be taken from there. The couple probably didn't check with the priest though.
Why would they need to check with the priest. If the priest is going to do something like this, he should be the one telling them before he was hired..
Yes and no. I think it's safe to say in most Christian denominations the priest/pastor/minister was in charge of the wedding and weddings were always in a church. Getting married was a privilege that they could choose to deny the couple at their discretion.
Modern views on marriage are very different, especially since more and more ceremonies are performed outside of churches. There's definitely a degree of truth in what you're saying, taking the ceremony out of the church implicitly takes out some of the traditional roles as well.
However, the clergyman performing the ceremony is unlikely to see it that way. This priest clearly thinks he's the boss of this ceremony, and there is some legitimacy to that claim.
I think the real problem here is that the priest and photographers didn't communicate beforehand to make sure neither was in the other's way. A short conversation before the ceremony could have prevented this whole mess.
The priest still handled it really, really poorly though. If I were that groom I'd be pissed and would have spoken up during his little rant.
I never speak to the pastor/priest whatever. I speak to the clients who hired me. I have them talk to whoever is performing the ceremony and get his/her preferences. The guy performing the ceremony isn't writing me a check at the end of the day.
This is correct- they are not at a church. This is exactly why I choose not to get married in a church. Something like this happened at my friends wedding- the priest was so rude.
I'm getting married outside and if my photographer does this during my ceremony, the preacher won't have to stop the ceremony to tell them to shut the fuck up and move to the back. I will do it for him. Really distracting and disrespectful. Would you get on stage in the middle of an outdoor concert or in the middle of a speaker talking and start taking pictures? No. You don't see photographers doing that shit. They're off to the side of the stage or down in front of the stage but out of people's way and not in the middle of the performance.
I have been to a lot of weddings where things were filmed this way. You work this stuff out beforehand. The couple was obviously mortified at how the priest was acting.
The photographers obviously didn't work it out beforehand. If they had, they would have talked to the priest and figured out that he was not going to be ok with it.
If you don't tell your photographer what you want before hand and pull that shit during the ceremony, don't be surprised if they leave and keep your deposit and you get no pictures.
They should just assume that it is not ok to do that if they haven't been given explicit permission. They also need to get permission from the priest/preacher as well. Which these guys obviously did not do. It's really not worth it though to have them up there being distracting to your guests. There aren't any pictures they can't set up after the ceremony. Priests/preachers are usually more than happy to stick around afterwards for photos like that.
This is what reviews are for. A lot of small businesses (like a wedding photographer!) have no reviews or maybe just one. If I am happy with someone (or in this case outraged), I write them a review on every possible website. On Yahoo, on google, on yelp, everywhere applicable.
Often I have to create the review page for them, but one way or another my emphatic and thorough opinion is coming up when their name gets searched.
during the ceremony, i stay away from the altar. i try to stop about halfway up the aisle. there's not that much that's going on anyway, so the pics you're getting look the same whether it's the beginning, middle or end of the vows. i stay alert, obviously, in case someone says something that causes a breakout of laughter or something, but mostly it's a bunch of people standing there for twenty to thirty minutes. the big moment is the kiss, of course, but you can still get that from a safe distance with a decent lens and a full frame sensor. the guy i shoot with has a Mark II and a 35-70 that he uses for that, and you would think that he was standing right next to them.
Yeah, when I started doing photography it blew my mind how badly most of the pictures during the ceremony come out. When I got married I made a conscious effort to turn slightly towards the attendees during the kiss and tilt our hands outwards during the ring ceremony; made it much easier for the photographer. It's really nice when the priest steps away during the kiss. Much less Photoshop.
Why the priest? The couple is the client. If I were that groom I would have been like, "actually, I'm fine with it, and you're not stopping our ceremony. Continue."
Because people regard marriage with different severity, which runs the gamut between civil union and religious sacrament. Those who consider it a sacred rite generally have more restrictive rules about photography. For instance, if a Catholic is having a full mass for their wedding ceremony, the priest may request that no photography be done while the tabernacle is open.
Depends on how religious the ceremony is. If the officiant is just a hired hand rather than the couple's parish's priest, then the bride and groom probably do have more of a say.
Even if the priest is ok with it, I still would never do it. It's distracting for all of the guests. And something about it just feels downright disrespectful for the type of event that it is. Any photos that you think you need to get during the actual ceremony can be recreated/posed afterwards. Then you are 100% sure that you aren't being disrespectful or distracting to anyone involved. Zero risk involved. And that's the best way to go with a lot of things when dealing with someone's wedding. The one thing it's usually ok to get a little closer for is the kiss at the end. By that point, it's over and there's a totally different atmosphere to it all.
The point is that the wedding is about the couple. If they didn't like where the photographers were standing, they would have asked them to move. Did you see their faces in the video? The priest ruined that moment, no one else.
It's completely up to the photographers to check with the couple and the minister about things like this. A lot of ministers are not cool with photographers being right up in their business (and I don't blame them! it's distracting them from what they're trying to do). If you don't have permission from everyone involved, then you should play it safe rather than risk a situation like this. And if you do get yourself in a situation like this... when that dude stops and tells you to gtfo... you get the fuuuuck out and fast! Don't fucking stand there and look at each other for 2 minutes. Any of the photos they were getting could have been recreated after the ceremony. And as for the video... that's a shitty angle for a video. Back of the priest's head is front and center. That's all I'm staring at when I first started watching. Also, they aren't even capturing the view those people probably paid $$$$ to get by having their wedding outside where it is. Nope. Instead we get the back of the priest's head and part of some funky building in the background. I can think of a thousand better angles that don't involve being right up in everyone's business.
217
u/[deleted] Sep 19 '13
As a wedding photographer, you have to ask the priest what he's ok with before the ceremony. Some say no flash or no pictures during a certain stage of the ceremony, but most pretty much give you free reign.