Steven Taylor is a documentary wedding photographer based in the Lake District who works with his son, Josh. Today he joins us for a an insightful interview and a peek into the life of a documentary wedding photographer…When I was sixteen I was torn, I wanted to become a beach bum and surf all day but I lived on the Suffolk coast so it was hardly Huntingdon Beach. I was in a rock and roll band so I thought maybe I could be a pop star but although I knew lots of chords my sense of rhythm and pitch was not brilliant. I fancied being a film-maker, I had a standard 8 cine camera and I shot a lot of Kodachrome of my surfing pals and I wanted to paint. In the end I went on a foundation course at my local Art School so I could become a painter. One of the things we were taught was photography. I don’t know what it was exactly; it might have been the darkroom that got me. It was like alchemy watching the image appear in the dev tray, I loved it.
My photography tutor, who I recently found out, died in a tragic and rather bizarre lawn mowing accident, introduced me to my lifetime photographic influences. Ralph Gibson, Raymond Moore, Paul Hill (who, years later was my MA professor), André Kertész and for me, the main man, Henri Cartier-Bresson. I also started collecting the Time Life series of photography books. Those were illustrated with images from the archive of Life Magazine, so I was exposed to the photography from the heyday of photojournalism.
In 1976, 2 years into my art school course I went to work at weekends for a wedding and portrait photographer. Eventually he took me on as his full time assistant and trained me to photograph weddings on my own. In the summer of 1977 I bought a Mamiya C330f. I couldn’t afford it outright so my boss bought it and I paid him back by giving him the £5 per week he was paying me to work for him. I had to work behind a bar in a holiday camp in order to live.
I’ve never done anything other than be a photographer, or work in photography. I ran a gallery; I taught photography at Lancaster University, I did a residency for a community project. I worked in advertising, shooting room sets on 10×8 transparency. I did industrial work for Shell. I worked on magazines and newspapers and for a time I specialised in architectural photography. Through all that though, since 1976, I don’t think there has ever been a period of longer than 6 months that I haven’t been the principal photographer at a wedding or ten. For the past 17 years wedding photography has been my full time occupation.
In 1976, I was trained in very traditional wedding photography and for 10 years or so I didn’t really question it. I thought that was the right way and although I didn’t feel comfortable asking people to contrive moments of their wedding and pose for portraits, I just got on with it.
I loved the work of those old “Life” magazine photojournalists and I read “The Decisive Moment” quite early in my career but I didn’t make the connection to wedding photography until much later.
I had (still have) a friend, Andy Perkins, who is a photographer and has just come back to photographing weddings after a successful travel and corporate career. In those days, he did weddings the way we all did. We used to talk about photography and meaning and we used read Susan Sontag and Roland Barthes et al. We also used to talk about how it would be if we could get paid to photograph weddings like HCB would if he was a wedding photographer. When his sister got married in 1988, Andy persuaded her to let me photograph her wedding in a documentary style. That was my first one. I didn’t know if anyone else was doing it then, so I had nobody to follow or copy, all my influence came from HCB, Magnum and those old photojournalists of Life magazine.
After a stint of teaching, community projects and work as a gallery curator I set up as a freelance again and went after weddings. It was 1994 by then and what I was doing as a documentary wedding photographer had started to get popular all over the world. Because there were only a handful of us doing it in the UK I used to get loads of work all over the country. Where as before wedding photography rarely took me out of town I was in demand from Bath to Edinburgh. It was a great time to be a documentary wedding photographer. I used to hand print all of the black & whites myself and that, combined with the fact that what I was doing was different and unique, started winning me some awards.
I don’t believe it is of any use calling your self a documentary wedding photographer because of some stylistic, aesthetic. For me documentary wedding photography is a philosophy, It is the approach that defines the genre. I take my lead from the words of Henri Cartier-Bresson
“…We photographers deal in things that are continually vanishing, and when they have vanished, there is no contrivance on earth that can make them come back again. We cannot develop and print a memory… Or task is to perceive reality, almost simultaneously recording it in the sketchbook which is our camera. We must neither try to manipulate reality while we are shooting, nor manipulate the results in the darkroom. These tricks are patently discernible to those who have eyes to see….”
…and from the same essay…
“…In whatever picture-story we try to do, we are bound to arrive as intruders. It is essential, therefore, to approach the subject on tiptoe… A velvet hand, a hawk’s eye- these we should all have… ”
From “The Decisive Moment” 1952
I believe that by following a philosophy and laying down my own ground rules the look of what I deliver will follow organically. I prefer to make the majority of the images in black and white because colour can be a distraction. When you look at a colour picture often, the first thing you notice is the dominant colour, if that is an important part of the story that should be a colour picture. If something else is more important then by confining the image to shades of grey the integrity of the narrative can be maintained. I don’t make images at a wedding for the sake of pure the image alone. If a picture doesn’t have a part to play it doesn’t make the edit.
So those are the influences.
What inspires me?
Everything, but most of all the people and the wedding itself. Like everyone else, I am constantly bombarded with visual, audible and written material on a daily basis. We have to pick out the stuff that inspires us though.
2.You were nominated by Kodak as one of the top 10 wedding photographers in the UK. What does this mean to you?
I stopped entering awards in 2005, I had done fairly well up to then and that year culminated in getting into the Show and catalogue for the Schweppes Portrait awards at the National Portrait Gallery. That really was a great achievement, only 60 images were selected out of 6,000, and with a first prize of £14,000 it attracts some of the world’s top advertising, editorial, fine art and documentary photographers. That was going to take some topping.
I don’t really like awards within wedding photography because I don’t agree with the criteria the usual judges of that type of competition use to judge a successful photograph. I really believe they don’t look any deeper than the surface of the print.
At the end of 2010 I saw an advert for the Kodak wedding and portrait awards, I had won that competition a few years back so I thought I would just put one image in and it made the final 10. I was surprised because it was the only documentary image in that ten, but I thought it gave me the right to say I was selected by Kodak as one of the top ten wedding photographers in the UK for 2010. I have it on my website and blog. Clearly, it’s only the opinion of a panel of judges and then, only based on those that entered images in the first place but I think it is important to let customers know it might be worth having a look at this photographer’s portfolio. That’s when they can decide if what I offer lives up to my claim.
3. What’s in the bag?
2x Nikon D700 bodies.
35mm f2, I use that for virtually the whole wedding.
85mm f1.4
50mm f1.4
4. Which one item can’t you go to a wedding without?
My son, Josh.
For a long time I thought if I was to be unobtrusive I should work alone, I thought two people equals twice as obtrusive. Josh persuaded me, when he was 18, to work his gap year in my business. He did eventually talk his way into coming to weddings with me and, at first, assisting then eventually shooting a bit. In 2006, he went off to study contemporary Photographic Practice at the University of Northumbria. I thought he would probably want to go into something more glamorous than wedding photography but when he came home he asked if he could join the business. By then he had got pretty good and is a wiz with a Mac, so I jumped at it.
Josh is not what the “new young things” call a 2nd shooter. He is very much on an equal billing and over the past three years has made some of our best images. The two photographer deal works really well. We think alike; we like the same films and books and admire the same photographers. Josh has developed a style of wedding photography that, unsurprisingly, is very similar to mine. On the day we work separately but together, during prep, Josh goes with the Groom and I go with the Bride. We take up complimentary positions during the ceremony, speeches first dance etc. and at other times in the day we have two pairs of “hawk’s eyes” alert to what is going on. Together we can deliver a more comprehensive story than if either of us worked alone.
He also does all of the processing and has an intuitive understanding of “techy stuff”. Handy for operating the Sat Nav.
Having gone with this approach for the last 3 years it doesn’t feel anymore obtrusive being two of us. Being unobtrusive is all about how you conduct yourself, we understand that and we still get mistaken for guests.
5. Where would you most like to photograph a wedding?
This year we photographed a wedding in Tuscany it was fantastic. Gorgeous light, fab location, it was a Jewish/Catholic ceremony outside, under a Chuppa, lead by a Humanist Celebrant. I’d like to do one like that again. Next year we are being flown out to Brisbane in Australia, so that’s going to take some beating but I would love to photograph a wedding in Venice.
6. Tell us about the Documentary Wedding Photographer Facebook page…
This year we’ve started to work with a business partner, Megan Henshall. Megan works with several photographers as The Photographer’s Business. She helps them with branding, pricing and selling as well as understanding and identifying their target market. Some of the aspects of our business that photographers tend to be not very good at.
Together we run mentoring programmes for documentary wedding photographers. We are also in the process of organising a series of workshops and, eventually, webinairs to help documentary wedding photographers find their vision as artisans and business people.
One of the things Megan and I thought would be a great idea was to get a bunch of like-minded souls to share their work, inspirations and thoughts about what it is we do. So we set up “DWP share”, it’s a Facebook page that has nothing to do with the Department of Works and Pensions. We’ve already got quite a distinguished bunch on there from all over the world, we are seeing some lovely work.
We followed that with “DWP talk” which is a forum on Linkedin for said like- minded folk to shout, argue, banter, boast we are not encouraging grumble but I suppose we can’t stop that.
There is a lot more to come.
7. Whose wedding (dead or alive) would you have liked the opportunity to photograph and why?
I don’t know. Most of my heroes are, or were photographers, I think it would be quite daunting to photograph Henri Cartier-Bresson’s wedding. I have photographed the weddings of other photographers and a few filmmakers. It’s flattering when such visually in tune people commission us, but I think HCB would have scared me. I’m not really into modern celebrity culture, in fact I worked for a pop star about 10 years ago, can’t tell you who because I had to sign a non disclosure agreement, but I didn’t know who she was until my assistant told me.
David Bailey photographed Reggie Kray’s wedding, that would have been pretty cool but you wouldn’t want to put the fix in the dev tank first.
8. Tell us 10 random things about yourself?
1.At some point in the last 20 years all my hair disappeared from the top of my head and mysteriously reappeared on my back.
2. My iTunes thingy often plays John Lee Hooker followed by Puccini, Miles Davis followed by Ravel with a sprinkling of Led Zeppelin.
3. I am obsessed with photography; it’s history, critical theory and making images.
4. I enjoy writing but I’m not very good at it and failed English O’ level three times.
5. I have an MA in Contemporary Photographic Practice from DeMontfort University.
6. I don’t receive a live TV signal, I sometimes watch stuff on iPlayer etc. and I have a lot of DVDs, but no actual telly.
7. I don’t follow football but I have been known to wear my 1966 England shirt on important England match days.
8. Last March I scrapped my diesel guzzling, road taxing Land Rover and bought a Fiat 500, which is congestion charge exempt, only costs £35 a year to tax and £40 fills the tank.
9. I’m crap at DIY.
10. I hate queuing, supermarkets, bureaucracy, rules, drivers that don’t put their lights on in the rain, rain… although I live in the Lake District, cold, heat and people that moan… oh!
9. What are your 3 favourite films?
You want me to list my 3 favourite films in order, but I can’t.
I love film, lots of them. Of course, as a photographer of a certain vintage, I am rather fond of Antonioni’s “Blow up” and lot’s of art house films with inspiring photography.
But, actually I love James Bond, not so much lately but the Roger Moore ones because they spoofed themselves better than any of the spoofs. I like “JFK”, because of the complexity of the plot, oh yeah “All the President’s Men”, same reason. I like “The Killing Fields” because it has photojournalists in it doing what I wouldn’t dare do and “Electra Glide in Blue” because of the fantastic photography and clever visual devices that are used. Probably the one I like most of recent years is “The Da Vinci Code”, not “Angels and Demons” though.
10.What advice would you give to aspiring photographers trying to make it in today’s market?
Do not look at other wedding photographers and don’t waste your money going to seminars that show you how to take photographs by numbers, you know? Pose like this, light like that, use this album, sell 10×8’s for this much. You have to find your own voice. Look outside of wedding photography for your influences.
Don’t go chasing fashions because as soon as you catch up, it will move on. Establish a strong style that will be timeless. A wedding is about now and all of the other vendors at the wedding need to be of the moment but wedding photography is for next year and 50 more. Imagine looking at your album of vintage style processing in 10 years time.
Establish a strong brand as well; wedding photography is a luxury purchase look at how the other luxury brands project themselves.
Be very careful how you set your price because if you get it wrong now it will cost you in the future. Charge £500 now and, when you get good everyone will know you as a £500 photographer, you’ll find it hard to get the £2,000 “ish” you will need to charge to maintain a sustainable business.
11. What advice would you offer to brides and grooms looking for a great photographer?
Almost a cliché but when the wedding is over you will have your rings and your photographs. Don’t skimp on either. You get what you pay for. Cheap photographers deliver cheap photographs, if they are in business long enough to get them processed for you.
Your photographs are going to be an important part of your life for a very long time. Not just memories of the day but memories of the people. They are not all going to be always with you, you want to remember people as they were, being themselves, not posing for a camera.
Choose a photographer whose work moves you. Don’t choose one just because their website is cool and their style is so now, because in 10 years time their style will be so then.
Huge thanks to Steven for taking part in today’s photographer interview. I’m sure you’ll agree it makes a very interesting read.
You can connect with Steven via the following:
Tel: 44(0)15394 45483
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