What amazes and impresses is the amount of fun and celebration that happens in so many of the events I shoot.
I’m sure that if I asked you, you’d be able to name a few typical events; networking events, black tie awards dinners, conferences and presentations. But did you know that a lot of what I’m asked to photograph is simply ….. well, fun?
Plenty of events are celebrations. Anniversary dinners, long service awards, or just team bonding evenings (often following on from a full day conference, seminar or brainstorming session). So, I’ve regularly been asked to shoot pub quizzes, pub crawls, nights out at the bowling, thank you dinners …. the list goes on. Increasingly, there are crafting events, in addition to the ever popular themed disco.
Whatever form they take though, the emphasis is always the same. The company wants to say thanks to its staff, to reward them in some way, and my job is to capture that. Not a bad way to earn a living to be honest – taking photos of people having the time of their lives
Of course, experience plays a huge part in capturing images like these. Not only do I have an intimate knowledge of my camera and how to set it to get shots in very different environments, but I’ve spent years honing the skills of people watching and anticipating moments as they develop. These are qualities that can only come through hours of practice, but they’re essential if you want to get the very best images. After all, so many of the examples above were over in seconds – with event photography like this there’s seldom a second chance.
