My Wedding Was Shot On Cameras You Wouldn’t Think Of Using Now.

I was married not far short of 15 years ago, but the cameras that were used were cameras that today, you wouldn’t think about picking up for professional work. In fact, even 15 years ago they were obsolete, but we had great images and sets of lovely canvas’ for our walls. 

We got married at the beginning of 2014, although the weather was awful, with torrential rain, we were lucky that the rain stopped in-between outdoor shoots. Our venue was a beautiful (inside) wedding venue, but it was quite poorly lit inside, with large windows letting in blaring light on one side, and darkness the other side of the ceremony room.

“All that matters…“

But what is most interesting about the wedding is the equipment used. A Nikon D40 (a 6mp, APS-c camera from 2006) and a Fujifilm S1600 (a 12mp bridge camera from 2010 with a tiny sensor). Yes, you read that right, no full frame goodness, no 25+mp cameras just old tech cameras in the hand of my niece who is a professional wedding photographer (and does not use those cameras any more!!!).

As for lighting, natural light was used, as well as a Godox flash on the D40, or the on camera flash on the Fujifilm. As mentioned, when we popped outside for images, we were lucky as the sun shone and the rain passed.

The images of course were great, we wanted natural images and family group shots and just memories of the day. The important thing was we had images for photo albums, images for large prints and images for wall canvases.

“And time moves on, and so does the tech…“

Of course, there is me shooting with my full frame monsters and F/1.4 glass these days, and seeing all other professional photographers working around us all with their full frame gear and expensive glass and thinking to myself how lucky we are now to have all this, with far better capabilities in autofocus and low light etc. And then I started talking to someone yesterday about wedding photography and the memories of my own wedding and it’s cameras came back to me.

This person I was talking worked in the camera shop that we were buying new equipment from (a new lens, not for me, for my buddy) and although he wasn’t a full time wedding photographer, and always the second shooter, he was telling us how this weekend he is shooting a wedding with a Nikon P1000!

The P1000 is a bridge camera from 2018, and even then it’s technology was not far removed from the Fujifilm S1600 that had been used in my wedding, and even the tiny senser sizes are almost the same!

I asked him if he knew if he knew what he was getting himself in for, and he sounded excited! As a second shooter you can allow yourself accidents and mishaps, you can allow for missed focus, motion blur etc, as long as you get SOME shots that are useable. The main wedding photographer takes care of the stuff that needs to be done, while anything else people get is a bonus. 

“And in conclusion…“

My Wedding was a great day, the images we received, while not technically as spectacular in output as the images I deliver these days doing weddings, were excellent and captured the day perfectly. Would the images have been better captured on my equipment, of course (not having to worry about light, noise or autofocus  is amazing), but all things considered, using the tools they had for my wedding, a fantastic job was done.

Would I recommend using other cameras for life events such as a wedding? As long as there is a main shooter capturing things with quality equipment, I think a second shooter, or even a third shooter can use whatever they want.

As you know, in general use, I use all sorts of weird and wonderful cameras, with sensor sizes the size of a pin, upwards! For weddings though, I’ll leave that up to my third shooter!

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