Digital Wedding Photography: Capturing Beautiful Memories

This book gives a tremendous amount of valuable information. The author covers many aspects of the wedding photography world, both the photographic side and the business side. The reason I gave this book three stars, rather than four or five stars is because the author seems to have the idea that the more and fancier equipment a photographer owns, the better and more successful a photographer he or she will be. Throughout the book, the author concentrates on exotic locations and seemingly tries to make a correlation between expensive camera gadgets and sales, instead of concentrating on technique and how to get the best photos out of the equipment you may already own. In reality, a camera is only a tool, and even great equipment can yield poor photos in the wrong hands.

I think this book would be better suited for already-established photographers who are looking for ways to expand their business and build their gadget collection with art lenses and other fancy gear. This book would be the perfect companion to a local part-time photographer looking to go full-time into the world of destination wedding photography, or to any photographer who aspires to one day cater exclusively to the wealthiest and most celebrated clientele. To a less-experienced photographer, or a novice photographer looking to go pro or semi-pro, this book is — as a college professor once told me — smashing ants with hammers.
Rating: 3 / 5

I bought this book because of all the very high ratings this book received. This was mostly a waste for me.

There is far too much basic information. Anyone going to shoot a wedding, should already be assumed to have a good basic grasp of work flow, how to load images to the computer (Really? Are you serious? Yes, this is also described in this book) and should certainly know the `rule of thirds’. These things can be found in any basic photography primer and is a waste of space in this genre specific book. These are just a few examples, there is much more that is superfluous.

There is not enough information on posing a B&G for formals and not enough lighting diagrams to go with this. Yes, every wedding is different, but there are basic WEDDING SPECIFIC standard techniques that seem to be missing.

Also, way to much space is spent on `location photographers’. Seriously, how many of us will ever be invited to the Bahamas to shoot a wedding? And if you are at that level, you don’t need this book, that’s for sure. It seemed to be more of a glorification of the Author, in a pseudo modest way (oh, it’s very hard, all that travel and diarrhea…), than valuable information for the reader.

Overall, this is both too much and not enough. Too much basic information, yet not a truly comprehensive primer. Not enough wedding specific help if you are already an experienced photog, yet need to improve your wedding specific skills.

Yes, there are some redeeming points, like etiquette in certain situations, some ideas to be on the lookout for, some creative directions to thing about, yet on the whole, not enough to warrant this pricey book.

Rating: 2 / 5