Children are great at weddings. They really are. They get so bored. That means you never know what they’re likely to do at any given moment. That makes for great photographs.
There’s a problem, though.
It’s too easy.
If you watch a child long enough at a wedding they’ll so something remarkable.
Cute and remarkable is a powerful mix. Tons of documentary wedding photographs rely on this. Lots of mine do.
Worse still, these pictures end up being entered for awards, where they do very well. I should know. Photographs of children (mis)behaving at weddings have been at the heart of much of my award success in the past 12 months. My two winning panels at the 2010 National Photographic Awards featured children almost exclusively.
Nice, but in a wedding category, shouldn’t the focus be on the bride and groom?
Yes, it should.
Don’t think I’ll be handing any awards back, mind. I haven’t won nearly enough to start being dismissive of them.
Instead, I’ve set myself a rule for this year’s entries into the heats for the 2011 National Photographic Awards.
Absolutely, definitely, positively, NO children in any of the photographs whatsoever at all.
Except this one:
(c) Roger Overall 2010
