Practice Wedding of Ryan & Sasha

I’ve known my friend Ryan for a couple years now. Prior to their wedding, Ryan and Sasha dated for at least 5 years. Last year he was one of many people that asked me if I can shoot their wedding. Obviously at the time I was not ready and sadly said no. However, when his wedding day was approaching I asked him if I can take some practice shots for future weddings. A nice guy like Ryan is, of course he said yes. The wedding was awesome from beginning to end. I had lots of exposure of what shots to take and I even watched the photographer that they hired. He was very calm and knew what he was doing. At one point after the ceremony, the photographer softly shoved me aside and said, “dude?” I guess I was in the way, but I really was not in the shot. Everyone else was taking shots around the same spot as I was. Maybe because I had a camera just like his and thought I was going to steal his shot, who knows. Oh well, I respected him and moved out the way. I guess I wouldn’t want someone to be in my shot. I learned a lot in this wedding. You have to be quick with ideas. You have to be in the right spots. You have to know what kind of lighting is around you. You have to have patience and confidence. You have to be organized. You have no breaks. And, you have to be serious about weddings, because you only have one chance on most shots.