Original subtitles

Okay, the final lesson in the shooting and

setup module, get fit, get closer.

You may have already noticed how often I

mention the phrases such as, work the scene,

maximise every opportunity from every moment, keep moving,

keep shooting, and that's really because I see

every wedding as an opportunity.

It's an opportunity to capture the best images

I possibly can for my couple, the unexpected

images that may feature in my portfolio or

help raise my profile.

If I'm not completely focused and switched on

for every minute of a wedding day, I

risk missing those opportunities.

It is also worth noting that you can

be the most creatively minded photographer out there,

but without a strong work ethic, it all

goes to waste when you're at a wedding.

And that's why I decided five years ago

when I delivered my very first workshop to

make sure that I illustrated the importance and

benefit of fitness and generally just taking care

of yourself and how that can directly influence

the images you create.

Now, I know you didn't sign up to

this course to be preached to.

I'm not going to sit here and say,

get your ass in gear, start looking after

yourself.

If you don't understand the benefits of fitness

and diet on your mental health and general

wellbeing, where have you been for the last

15 years?

All I can do here and all I

plan to do is tell you about my

experience and how making a few adjustments to

my lifestyle positively impacted my work as a

photographer and in turn, the success of my

business.

So as of right now in 2021, I'm

37 years old.

I've never had serious health issues, touch wood.

I've been fortunate to always be very slim.

I have twiglets for arms, but for the

majority of my twenties, I was seriously unfit.

I never maintained any fitness level.

I may have a two or three week

spell when I'd go out running, but all

it would take was a big night out

or a bout of cold.

And that would soon stop for a few

months.

Then the cycle of feeling like I need

to get in shape would start over.

When I was 29, we had our daughter

Betsy and at 32, we had Buddy, our

son.

Now, sometimes having children spurs people on to

take greater care of themselves.

But for me, the trigger was a little

different.

I was focused on being busy, growing my

business and shooting as much as I could.

I was doing 50 plus weddings a year,

but in the summer of 2015, I was

close to burnout.

I had a weekend where I had the

dreaded triple header, a wedding on a Friday,

Saturday and a Sunday.

And it was at the Sunday wedding, I

realised something needed to change.

It was the sit down dinner and I

was told by the staff that I could

sit in this particular room and a dinner

would be brought to me.

Winner, right?

I sat down and I fell asleep.

I woke up with a plate of food

in front of me.

A member of staff had just left me

sleeping and placed the food on the table.

Now, nothing bad happened.

I didn't miss anything.

The bride and groom never knew, but it

was a stark realisation that I needed to

make some changes.

I was completely knackered.

I'd regularly wake up after a wedding and

feel like I'd been hit by a car.

My lower back was always sore and if

you've ever experienced back pain, you'll know how

debilitating it can be.

So at the start of 2016, I made

a conscious decision to make fitness part of

my job.

Like I do emails and social media, I

was going to make a commitment to make

it part of my day.

In the January, I booked a block of

10 sessions with this guy.

This is Craig, former British military and protector

of the seas.

He worked on cargo ships to police them

from pirates.

Anyway, he just so happened to be starting

his PT business in the gym below my

office.

And it is without doubt the best investment

I've ever made in myself.

Five years later and I still see Craig

every Monday.

You often hear photographers talk about new camera

releases and the marginal gains in technology that

buying the latest camera will get them.

We've already addressed that on this course, right?

But how many talk about the marginal gains

you get from fitness, the gains that allow

you to shoot at a higher intensity for

longer periods of time?

Very few, but it does.

It has a huge impact.

Weddings are physically demanding.

So I see Craig once a week without

fail.

He hammers me.

But unlike pre 2016, I have someone to

hold me to account.

I can't take three months off because I

see him once a week and I attribute

the success of my business to a few

key factors, all of which are addressed on

this course.

But this is absolutely one of them.

My recovery time is better.

I can maintain a high intensity of shooting

for 12 hours plus, not to mention just

feeling better.

The influence it has on my kids.

But here's the impact that I hope you

can start to recognize.

This is Josh and Elsa, a wedding I

shot in Puglia, Italy at the end of

the wedding season in 2018.

So usually this is a time we're all

completely burnt out, right?

It's been a long summer.

We all just want to stop and take

a break.

The editing pile is huge and it's another

wedding you've got to deal with.

Creativity levels are rock bottom.

You are done.

I've been there.

I've done that.

Well, that isn't the case for me anymore.

In fact, now it's quite the opposite.

I don't feel that slump.

This was a 9am start in Italy, a

crazy, crazy day.

And as you can see, absolutely hammered it

down.

It was frantic.

There were times it was so wet I

couldn't even see what I was shooting through

the viewfinder.

By dinner at 5pm, I'd taken about 8

-9,000 frames.

And remember that time I fell asleep during

dinner?

Not this time.

I used to take a full hour to

two hours break.

Now I eat my food and I'm straight

back to it.

Because this can happen.

Josh hugging his parents during dinner service.

This isn't an image that will win me

an award, but it's a powerful frame and

makes Josh and his parents feel something.

It makes me feel something.

And from the same position I took that

frame, over my right shoulder I took this.

This was that guest at a wedding who

would not for the life of me let

me get his picture.

Every time the camera was in his direction,

he'd turn away.

But with a crafty live view shot from

behind someone's shoulder, I have him with his

daughter.

Two very small moments, but to the people

in them, these are huge and invaluable frames.

If I was resting in another room and

scrolling Facebook on my phone, would I have

these images?

No.

Now it's gone midnight, the dance floor is

emptying and there's a frame of Josh with

his brother.

I don't have a frame of these guys

like this at any other point during the

day.

Relaxed, smiling, sharing a moment.

Just really simple, but very powerful.

Not every shot has to be a crazy

composition or technically groundbreaking.

Last frame of the night, 1.45 in

the morning, 12,000 frames, almost 17 hours

of shooting.

Four years before, that would have been me

six feet under.

But instead, I was at the post-wedding

barbecue 10 hours later, bright as a button,

buzzing about the previous day's frames.

For the second part of this video, I

want to start off with a quote a

good friend of mine, a super talented photographer

called Chantal Gribbon, shared a while back.

And it said, you've got to be brave

before you can be good.

It's a quote that really resonates with me.

I've always been one of those people who

isn't afraid of failure, even when I feel

out of my depth, which is often.

I trust in the process and I'm always

prepared to give anything a shot.

Now, this story does come with a slight

warning as it centers around baby loss, a

subject that I can absolutely appreciate, can be

very sensitive and difficult for some.

It certainly is for me to discuss.

I should note that there is nothing graphic,

but there's a very good reason I want

to talk about it and a hugely important

lesson I want to share.

And it starts with the amazing P and

Dean or Nicola and Dean.

She's called P because she's small, but don't

let that fool you.

This girl is beyond strong and an inspiration.

She's actually the person who actively encouraged me

to talk about this experience.

I've known these guys for the best part

of a decade and actually used them for

a shoot in 2014 to test out some

new lenses, but it's now October, 2015.

Buddy had just been born.

He was a month old and P messaged

me to tell me they'd just had a

baby boy called Winter, but that tragically Winter

suffered a cardiac arrest shortly after birth and

didn't survive.

But the reason for her message was to

ask me if I could come to the

funeral in a few days time and take

some pictures for them.

Now, I remember that message coming in late

at night and I said to Gemma, my

wife, there's no way I can do that.

I get emotional watching friends.

There's no chance I can hold it together

at a newborn's funeral, let alone take images.

I didn't respond.

I slept on it and thought I'll figure

out my response in the morning, but I

woke up the following day and just said

to myself, okay, you know what?

If this is what they want and it

helps them, then I'll get over it and

I'll step up.

Now, just to note, I never charged for

this.

P amazingly, quite incredibly asked me how much

it would be.

And I just said, there's no way I'm

charging anything you wanted to pay.

You can donate to your charity, but please

let people know I'm going to be there,

that you've asked me to be there and

that I'm not charging.

So I did.

I turned up at Winter's funeral without question,

the most difficult day I've ever had in

any kind of professional capacity.

As soon as I parked up and the

car started to arrive, there was a rainbow

over the hills and the opening 10 to

15 minutes were beyond difficult.

If you think taking images as a wedding

can be intimidating, try doing it whilst people

are mourning.

I naturally kept my distance.

I crouched in front of the pews almost

out of sight, a position where I could

observe and quietly document the people standing up

to talk.

But halfway through I found myself thinking I

shouldn't be hiding here.

If I'm doing this properly and I'm going

to get the images I know I can

get for these guys, I need to move.

So I waited for a break in the

service, took an inhale, got up and walked

across the room in front of a packed

room and went and stood next to Dean's

mum and to the side of Winter's coffin.

And I don't know if you can relate

to this, but when I would shoot weddings

there was always this invisible wall of fear

that I'd feel.

A sense of anxiety, I'd feel it in

my chest, it would always stop me getting

really close to people.

I'd feel like I was invading someone's space.

So instead, I'd often hang back.

But in the moment I walked across that

room, I didn't realise it at the time,

but that wall of fear disappeared instantly.

Because it will always be this sequence of

images that will stay with me.

I was crouched next to Dean's mum, I

was sobbing, I'm not ashamed to admit it.

I genuinely couldn't see what I was shooting.

Dean's mum was handing me tissues and checking

if I was okay.

But do you know what?

Going to a wedding after that became a

breeze.

That fear did not exist.

I was a totally different person because I

realised that that fear I held before, it

was all internal.

It wasn't a problem to anyone else.

No one cares what you're doing so long

as you do it with a smile and

have some respect.

And my work changed overnight.

It wasn't in a bad place before that,

but the small realisation had a profound impact

on the way I worked a scene.

No longer would I hang around the edges

of a crowd.

I suddenly wanted to be in the mix.

And I started to get close.

I wasn't fearful of stepping in to intimate

moments.

I constantly looked for connections and interactions.

The 135mm stopped being a lens that I

used to shoot from the back of the

room and instead I used it to get

in people's faces.

And something like this from 2019 on a

35mm.

I'm close enough to take that beer from

him.

And it's another frame that won't win any

award, but this became my bread and butter.

So to wrap this up, it's okay to

shoot the details, but never ever lose sight

of what's really important.

Shoot outside of your comfort zone.

Push through that fear.

Combine it all with taking care of yourself.

Feeling fitter and stronger and your work will

only go in one direction.

Finally, before we go, here's P and Dean

now with their beautiful little family.