Wedding photography has a long and interesting history . A special day. This traditionally involves photographs being taken before marriage, on the run up to (in the bride's case at the house before) the ceremony, during the ceremony of marriage and also afterwards during the wedding breakfast.
Technology and IT has evolved for the photographer over the last 100 or so years scince the first camera was invented, but weddings themselves have evolved and so too have the days events of marriage changed over time. Ever scince this art form was invented in 1826 the day of the wedding has been captured on camera as a memory and record of the days events. However in the early days most people did not book a wedding photographer to record the actual event itself. Its wasn't until the later part of the 19th century that most people posed for photographs during a wedding. In the late 1960's more people started to pose in wedding garments and also hired photographers to be there on the day of marriage.
It wasn't easy in those days for the professional photographer! Cameras were often huge boxes and lights were impossible to carry around and photography in those days was mainly done in a studio for portraiture of families . This changed as time went by but still there was only one photograph that was usually taken on a wedding day. It was not until the 1880's that wedding albums became more common place and it was only then that the photographer would sometimes include other guests in the wedding party. At the beginning of the 20th century colour photography was invented but this remained far too expensive until after the second world war. Photography was then mainly done in black and white. During the war was the invention of the flash bulb - which seems like a world away now from the modern DSLR cameras that are readily available today. In the late 1960's and 1970's cine film cameras where used to record actual footage of the wedding and during the 1970's photographers favoured colour negative film and medium format cameras like Hasselblad.
Today ofcourse photography is captured not only on modern DSLR cameras but also on a whole host of devices such as mobile phones. Who'd of thought back in the day of Joseph Nicephore Niecpe in the early 1900's That it would be possible to capture in colour a bride and groom on a device used to communicate with other people! One can only marvel at what tomorrow will bring ? 3D film images? virtual reality recording devices? who knows. The one thing that remains a constant however for the wedding photographer is the weather, this affects digital capture like it does film, after all light plays a large part in a great photo. I've often wondered how hard it must be for a photographer to work in such extreme conditions such as those in some parts of Australia for example where the sun is blinding down? This would be a much harder experience than say a wedding photographer in swansea.
Wedding photography styles have also changed over the years. We seem to be moving to a more modern reportage style which has become more and more popular; moving away from the traditional posed approach. One thing that hasn't seemed to change though is a love of black and white photography which still remains one of the favourite ways of displaying wedding photography in albums and photobooks. Today ofcourse its easy to convert into black and white and add a huge range of effects to the image after the event. Photoshop skills are everybit as important to todays photographer of weddings as the camera and camera knowledge is. Post processing of images in different formats from .JPG to RAW or NEF means that a lot of the work can be done and is done after the wedding, from basic cropping of the photo to colour effects and overlays and transitions. Other media also play a large part such as slideshows of the day that are cut to DVD or cd so that the wedding images can be shown after the event in the comfort of the living room and played out on large lcd and plasma screens to other family members.
Technology it seems not only drives the way in which we capture wedding photography but also the way it is displayed; It seems that only in the last few years the latest change has been towards photobooks instead of traditional albums. These are off the shelf printed coffee table hard back books designed in special graphic packages that look and feel every bit as stunning as a high quality book that you would buy from a bookshop. I find personally that these make great table top books for displaying Landscape photography to keep as a memento or give as a gift.