Three Reasons Why the Digital Camera Age Has Lowered the Quality of Wedding Photography

Don't get me wrong. I love the digital photography age. I love its convenience, ease of use, and cost savings. I love being able to digital edit and manipulate my images. However there are some downsides to the digital photography age. Mainly, too many people think that aunt Sarah, who loves to take pictures and has a pretty darn good digital camera, will do an adequate job taking their wedding photos. High mega-pixel digital cameras have brought amateur wedding photographers out of the woodwork. Why is that?

Reason 1 - the image preview
Mainly because the photographer can see the image preview immediately after taking the shot. They can see, more or less, whether or not it turned out. You see, back in the day when photographers were using film, photographers did not have the advantage of seeing the image preview. They absolutely had to know what they were doing because they didn't get to see their work until sometime well after the wedding. A simple mistake of leaving the lens on manual focus when you thought it was on automatic focus or miscalculating the exposure settings or flash settings could ruin a wedding album. There was no "oops, that one was too dark. Or oops the flash was too bright on that one. I'll quickly adjust the settings and retake it."

The digital image preview can have its drawbacks, however. A would be professional photographer can feel invincible with the power to quickly preview and adjust settings on the fly. But the image preview still doesn't solve every problem. For instance...

- It is still very difficult to tell if an image is in precise sharpness from the small image preview.
- You could still miss seeing that strand of hair that was in front of the subject's face.
- If you are taken a group shot, you can easily miss if someone blinked during the shot.

Sure, you can zoom in on the image preview on most any digital camera these days and check on these items that are hard to make out on the small preview. That is if you had the time. But if you are shooting a wedding you don't have time to zoom in on every preview or even to glance at every preview between shots. If you did, you may miss a very important shot that happens in only a split second.

Reason 2 - increase in the quality of pictures from automatic camera settings
The quality of these digital cameras only continue to increase and thus so does the quality of the pictures they produce automatically. Most amateur photographers don't know how to use the settings on their cameras properly. They are completely dependent upon the automatic settings of these high quality cameras. So what is so wrong with that you ask?

Well, as great as these cameras are with their automatic settings there is still no substitute for understanding the intricacies of camera settings. How the shutter speed affects the lighting and motion blur or how the aperture affects the lighting and depth of field or how the ISO affects the brightness and graininess of an image.

These high quality cameras fair really well in ideal shooting conditions. Specifically outdoors on a clear day. But all too often a photographer has to photograph a wedding in conditions that are not ideal. Many churches, for instance, are dark inside. Too dark for "ideal" shooting conditions. I once had to photograph a wedding ceremony that was conducted by candle light. Would the automatic settings of a camera save the photographer in this situation? I wouldn't count on it. What would they do if the image previews were too dark? Hope the camera adjusts automatically I suppose. Receptions are notorious for being dark as well. Especially if their is any dancing going on, many times with colorful, flashing lights lighting the dance floor. There are many other situations when the subject if darkly light (maybe in a shadow) and the background is brightly lit (in full sun) or vice versa. The camera's automatic settings will be forced to choose which one to expose properly leaving the other too dark or too bright. Will it choose correctly? I have shot several wedding ceremonies outside at sunset when it is beginning to get dark and yet the sun is still very bright by comparison and is casting very bright highlights onto the subjects. These situations are infamous for confusing the camera's automatic metering system.

Reason 3 - Price
High quality digital cameras prices are constantly being lowered making it much easier for the amateur photographer to get started. I upgrade my camera every two to three years. Every time I have gotten a much better camera. And yet, every time I paid less for the better camera than I did for its predecessor. And lets not forget the price you save on film and being able to digitally upload your images to a lab for prints instead of having to mail the film.

And there you have it, three reasons why the digital camera age has lowered the quality of wedding photography. Now don't get me wrong. I don't have anything against the amateur photographer. I used to be one and professional photographers have to start somewhere. Just know the risk versus reward before deciding to let aunt Sarah photograph the most important day of your life.