Weddings.

I've been off TAFE sick for the past two weeks and haven't yet had the time to jump into our next movement of study, so I thought I might talk a little about the wedding that I second shot on Saturday with one of my classmates. 

This was my second time shooting a wedding. My first time was a complete disaster - it was the beginning of 2011, I wasn't highly experienced with people or with my camera, and I was the only shooter there! As hard as I tried, I went in far too unprepared and made rookie mistakes that I look back and laugh on now. Back then I said I would never do another wedding again, so this one was a challenge to me. It was a way of seeing if I could do it. It was a way of seeing if I wanted to. 

I was definitely less stressed than what I had been the first time around, likely because I wasn't the one who had to worry about getting all of those important shots. And that, in itself, is what should have tipped me off straight away - if I can't handle that stress, why would I want to be a wedding photographer? 

My reasoning for it was always that I wanted to capture those moments, to take pictures that people would want to take out and look at all the time and hang on their walls. But I can do all of that without having to shoot weddings. 

So if this wedding taught me anything, it's that I don't want to shoot weddings at all - I just want to shoot portraits. Things where I can be in control and there's not a long list of shots that I must get.

I feel lighter for having made this decision.