How to tell documentary from posed
Every photographer’s website says natural and relaxed. Here is how to read a portfolio and work out what you would actually be getting.
Ignore the adjectives
Every wedding photographer in the country describes their work as natural, relaxed and unobtrusive. The words are free, so everybody uses them. What tells you the truth is one full gallery from one wedding, start to finish, rather than a highlight reel assembled out of forty different days.
Ask for that. Any photographer worth booking will send one without being asked twice.
Four things to count
How many people are looking at the camera? In genuinely documentary work, most are not. Are there photographs of things going slightly wrong, of rain, of somebody crying badly rather than beautifully? A gallery with no chaos in it has been curated within an inch of its life.
Is there coverage of the parts nobody photographs, like the two hours of standing around, the setup, the clearing away? And does the light change as you scroll, or does the entire wedding appear to have happened in one golden hour?
Neither one is better
Posed photography is a real craft and some couples want exactly that, done well. The failure is not picking one. The failure is booking somebody who does one thing while quietly expecting the other, and only finding out eight weeks after the wedding.
choosing a photographer
