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PHOTO: Dennis Reggie photographed
Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan's 1997 wedding to TV
journalist Andrea Mitchell. (Dennis Reggie, AP)
Wedding photos, hold the cheese
By Jim Hopkins, USA TODAY
SAN FRANCISCO — Popular culture and
technology are upending the $3 billion wedding photo industry
— turning traditional pose-and-say-cheese photographers into
paparazzi-for-hire.
Experts call the trend "wedding
photojournalism." It's a style that rejects photos of brides
gazing demurely at bouquets in favor of the edgier look of
news magazines. "A slip showing, or a hair out of place, or
maybe the little flower girl running across the altar in the
middle of the ceremony," says Denis Reggie, one of the
nation's most highly sought wedding photographers.
Statistics on the number of weddings that
get photojournalism treatment aren't kept. But experts say the
trend began in the early 1990s among the wealthy, then went
mainstream about 5 years ago. Elizabeth Beskin, a partner in
Sarah Merians Photography & Co. in New York, says about
90% of the 600 weddings her studio shoots annually include
photojournalism — up from 10% in the mid-1990s.
Wedding and Portrait Photographers
International, a trade association, recently boosted the
number of seminars on the subject. And an Atlanta company, the
Wedding Bureau, was launched 3 years ago to represent
photojournalists — including Pulitzer Prize winners — who want
to get into the field.
Wedding imagery is big business. As many
as 100,000 photographers compete for 2.2 million weddings a
year. Add a videotape, and the average cost is nearly $1,300
per wedding, about $2.9 billion a year.
Black-and-white photos in the manner of
Life magazine are hot. Videographers are adopting the
photojournalism style. And advances in digital photography are
bringing down costs, putting the style in reach of
budget-conscious brides and grooms.
Capitalizing on the trend, photo giants
Kodak and Fuji sell disposable cameras that brides give to
guests to capture candid moments — with interesting results
after the liquor flows. "You hear about some of the pictures
they get under the table," says Los Angeles photographer
Robert Evans, hired by Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston for
their $1 million wedding last July.
Kennedy style spreads
Reggie — who charges $20,000 per
assignment — says wedding photojournalism went mainstream in
1996. That was the year he was hired by the late John F.
Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette for their wedding.
Reggie's iconic photo of Kennedy
spontaneously kissing Bessette's hand was plastered across the
front pages and covers of more than 1,000 newspapers and
magazines — further spreading the style's popularity to middle
America.
Driving the trend:
- Popular culture. Today's brides
and grooms grew up in an age of People magazine, 60
Minutes and, now, reality shows like
Survivor and MTV's The Real World.
Couples demand a more authentic, less varnished look.
"Reality became king," says Reggie, who
photographed Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan's 1997
wedding to TV journalist Andrea Mitchell.
Robert Thompson, a professor of popular
culture at Syracuse University, worries the trend reflects the
latest stage in a media-saturated American culture. "You are
now not hiring a wedding photographer — you're now hiring
paparazzi," Thompson says.
- Technology. Digital photography
makes wedding photojournalism more affordable because it is
less costly to process and edit than conventional film. Many
photographers still won't shoot weddings with digital cameras
because quality sometimes suffers when shots are enlarged. But
manufacturers such as Hasselblad are introducing digital
cameras that make the large-format images professionals
prefer.
Beskin, at Sarah Merians, says digital
will overtake the industry in the next 5 years. Her firm,
where wedding photos average $4,000, stores customers' photos
on its Web site. Newlyweds give their guests and friends a
password, which lets them view the photos online and buy
copies.
Computer software also makes it easier
for Merians and other studios to touch up wedding photos.
Eliminating shiny foreheads and pimples, once prohibitively
expensive, is now routine.
And in extreme cases, a guest can be
digitally "moved" from one photo to another.
Technology also made the online Wedding
Bureau possible, says co-founder Michael Schwarz, who is a
contract photographer for USA TODAY. The firm couldn't exist
without the Internet, which allows couples to check samples of
photographers' work from across the nation.
The company represents 37
photojournalists, including four with Pulitzer Prizes. "We are
very demanding about who works with us," Schwarz says.
- Profits and respectability.
Kodak is encouraging traditional wedding photographers to
switch to photojournalism because it means more photos shot,
and an average 50% increase in profits. "We're definitely
shooting more film," says Evans, a consultant to the
WeddingChannel.com who charges up to $10,000 per
assignment.
The average U.S. wedding costs about
$19,000, excluding honeymoon, says Bride's magazine.
Photography and videography average about 5% of the total —
the third most-expensive item in the budget. Kodak wants
photographers to push for closer to 10%.
Capturing real moments
With consumers willing to take more
risks, traditional news photographers are drawn to a business
once snubbed as cheesy.
Gary Higgins, 41, a former TV reporter in
Lafayette, Ind., shoots videos in a style that combines the
reality TV shows 48 Hours and The Real
World — complete with interviews of family and guests.
Armed with the latest technology — a $43,000 camera — Higgins
says his work captures everything, including "the bumps and
bruises."
Amy Deputy, 38, quit her job as a picture
editor at the Baltimore Sun 2 months ago after snapping
her first wedding photo last year. Greg and Carol Howard hired
Deputy for their wedding last October in Columbia, Md. They
didn't want generic "cookie-cutter" photos, says Greg
Howard.
"We wanted somebody who had an eye for
that unscripted moment." | 
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