Prior to the wedding day, I accompanied the beautiful bride and scouted if you locations appropriate for their first look at Kortright Centre. In the vast forest, there are quite a few spots there absolutely phenomenal locations for the Brighton group to see each other for the first time before the wedding ceremony.
However, as it usually happens, on the wedding day things have changed. In the morning of the big day, the weather forecast changed into 50% rain. As such, the beautiful bride to want to take a chance to ruin her white gown prior to the wedding ceremony. As a result, we decided to use the balcony surrounding the main building at Kortright Centre for Conservation as the first look location.
I often see even the best Toronto wedding photographers make a crucial mistake on the couple special day. The professional photographers think more about their business and not about the bride and groom. As such, they often push couples into doing something that doesn't define them. For example, I keep seeing uncomfortable poses and clichés being repeated over and over.
During my consultations with the clients, I try to understand what is most important to them when it comes to wedding photography. Some couples confess that they couldn't care less about posing while others are pretty comfortable in front of the camera and don't mind it at all. It really depends on the client.
I also use social media to get a thorough understanding of my client's personality. One of the secrets of a being a successful artist is the ability to relate to the couples and also to understand their expectations. I would rather under promise and over deliver or even better over promise and over deliver to keep my clients happy.
Ensuring that they understand the clients' style and expectation is crucial for me. For example, if my clients are expecting a pure photojournalistic coverage and I prepare static poses brides and grooms will be very unhappy with me. In turn, in the long run, that will hurt my business.
In this particular photograph, we can see the bride in the foreground facing the camera. She's smiling and her head is turned slightly to words the direction from which we can see the groom advancing in the background.
The bride's face expresses emotions of happiness and nervousness in anticipation of the moment when they will see each other. Despite the fact the groom is slightly out of focus, his gait is telegraphing us is eager to see the love of his life.
From a compositional perspective, this is a dynamic picture. The leading lines originate from the foreground and converge towards the groom. The bride's gaze creates a virtual leading line that pushes the viewer's attention towards the groom. Because the groom is out of focus, the viewer is forced to return to the bride in a loop that increases tension and makes this picture extend out.
To capture this beautiful photograph, I used a Fuji 23 mm 1.4 lens mounted on one of my Fuji XT2 cameras.
Location: 9550 Pine Valley Dr, Woodbridge, ON L4L 1A6.
