Shotgun Wedding!

[jamiewexler]

...or at least a shotgun bridal. My good friend (and awesome photographer, herself) Lisa, asked me to shoot a few bridals of her in her wedding dress. We started with the normal shots in her dress for the family:

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0025a.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0055.jpg


Then changed into a borrowed dress and moved on to a new locale...

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0117a.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0152a.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0166a.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0203a.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0254.jpg


http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0274a.jpg

[lostdoggy]

Nice work.

It would be silly of me to ask if she could shoot???

I feel for the Groom to be if he forgot where the altar was!!!

[g-money]

357 or 44mag? LOL these are definately differnet. Good Job

Greg

[jessiper]

1st one - makes her look a little bigger than she is, and it looks a bit over-sharpened (just a tad, but maybe it's just me), but beautiful colors and great smile
2nd one - beautiful eyes, nice pose.
3rd - really, really great. love it. very mysterious and moody.
7th - I like the composition. looks cool
I'm not too fond of the last one. The 5th one is interesting. She looks very lit up in that one, what did you use to light her? I think they're creative. I'm not a gun person, but I think she'll love 'em. :) (I do love dark and mysterious images, though)

[strmrdr]

finger off the #%%# trigger!
safety first.
totally ruins the pictures for me.

storm <--- gun nut, firearms instructor.

[jamiewexler]

I normally agree, Storm. But we left the shells at home, and ran through the full manual of arms for each firearm before I handed them off (i.e. the first thing I made her do was check the chambers). And she was very careful to watch the direction of the muzzle.

Jessiper, the light in #4 and 5 was a Sunpak strobe fired off camera with a radio slave. I really wanted to seperate her from the background by underexposing it a stop.

g-money - .357

[kampphoto]

Haha brilliant. Nice work Jamie.

[tim]

Nice work, love the colors too! Where's the groom?!

[strmrdr]

I normally agree, Storm. But we left the shells at home, and ran through the full manual of arms for each firearm before I handed them off (i.e. the first thing I made her do was check the chambers). And she was very careful to watch the direction of the muzzle.



Im not going to bust your chops too hard but I have had people come to me for training after a ND and they all swear they KNEW the gun was unloaded before it went off....

Another problem is that someone that doesnt know that much about guns looks at these pictures and says hey I want to do that...
BANG!

Anyway I like the other pictures where her finger isnt on the trigger.

[tony fanning]

Awesome work with the guns, great idea for a series of shots!

[Yella Fella]

haha nice one jamie, loving the shoot :D

[AmpedPhoto]

Great photo, when I see the title "shotgun wedding" I first think woops someone got knocked up....but then I look at the pics and it's literally shotgun. I love the series. Keep up the work. #1 is great cause she seams into it.

[Carzee]

Ummm, is this shot inspired by The Blair Hitch Project?

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y216/jamiewexler/Lisabridal0117a.jpg

[tim]

I do have to say, Jamie, this is some of your best recent work. Your composition and lighting are superb. In #1 the mouth bothers me slightly though she looks happy, in #3 i'd go easy on the vignette, in #5 the dark foreground I find a little distracting. #2 is a portfolio shot. I love the colors. I find the whole gun thing a little disturbing, but that's dependant on the brides personality.

[jamiewexler]

Thanks guys - we had a lot of fun. Two thing we had really going for us: 1) We had plenty of time since this was not done on a wedding day. The only thing we were fighting was the sunset. and 2) Lisa was a photographer, so she could easily envision our ideas and pose accordingly.

[sblais]

Lisa was a photographer... She shot herself accidently? :p

Seriously though, I like the pics! Very different and well done!

[rhys]

Looks like a load of fun. Pity you didn't have a Thompson 1911 with the drum magazine - lol.

I wanted my best man to come with a plastic shotgun to our wedding just so we could say it was a shotgun wedding but he didn't and that was probably all for the better.

[wseed]

Some great and unusual shots there. I love the attitude in the 4th one. Are there some shots of you as groom returning the favour as her model?

[madpup]

All good, but number one and five is my fav.

[DocFrankenstein]

Don't tell me the husband's name is Bill!

I like it.

[MagicallyDelicious]

Love em. Love em all!

[Tragerman]

Nice work, Jamie. Great perspectives and clarity where it counts. These are in a class by themselves. Did I see some tilt swing work?
-Mickey

[Wedding Shooter]

Great stuff Jamie - love the creative thinking behind these.

[islandphoto]

Nice colors and lighting... I really like the first bunch but I have to agree with Tim that the gun thing is a little disturbing. It looks like she wants to shoot her groom! Makes for some good humor though :)

[deadpass]

finger off the #%%# trigger!
safety first.
totally ruins the pictures for me.

storm <--- gun nut, firearms instructor.

that's the first thing I thought as well, I really like #4 since she doesn't have her finger on the trigger. Glad to know I'm not the only one that seeing poor firearm discipline ruins the shot.

[rhys]

I am reminded of an advert in Soldier of Fortune, some 15 years ago (they might be advertising the same stuff still but as I only ever read one copy...). There was a photo of a semi-clad busty model holding an assault rifle - she had her finger on the trigger too.

IMHO, guns should be concealed until they're ready for use; used and not played with as toys or props in photo shoots. As my dad always said "It's not a toy. It's not for showing off. If you feel you need a gun to enforce your will then you shouldn't display it or threaten with it - you should use it then having used it, return it to its concealed place".

[Exit]

I think both 1 and 2 make her look at lot bigger than she really is. The rest are very nice

[jbstudios]

I normally love your work. The lighting eveything is excellent i just find it disturbing. Mostly the one of her laying on the ground. Why would a bride honestly want to hold and gun and look so serious? just me i guess and everyone has a certain look on things. You did excellent job and i bet it was fun to work with someone who has a good eye. Number 2 is my fav with a great pose. so flattering!

[deadpass]

I am reminded of an advert in Soldier of Fortune, some 15 years ago (they might be advertising the same stuff still but as I only ever read one copy...). There was a photo of a semi-clad busty model holding an assault rifle - she had her finger on the trigger too.

IMHO, guns should be concealed until they're ready for use; used and not played with as toys or props in photo shoots. As my dad always said "It's not a toy. It's not for showing off. If you feel you need a gun to enforce your will then you shouldn't display it or threaten with it - you should use it then having used it, return it to its concealed place".


15 years ago there wasn't the wide spread push for firearms discipline like there is today, hell back then look at the H&K ads and you'll see guys dressed like SEALs with their finger on the trigger of a SOCOM.

As for concealed until ready to use? That makes complete sense for someone with a concealed carry permit, but it's hard to put an 870 express in your pant until you're ready to use it. I see no problems using it as a prop, as long as proper safety measures are taken.

[Arnie1]

Looks inspired by John Michael Coopers stuff...all this trash the bridal dress and anti bridal stuff just doesn't work for me at all. I just don't see the point in it.

Bride and guns....strange.

[Grace]

oh Jamie! Awesome! i love her eyes! I am trying to talk a friend of mine into just putting on her dress again and lett me have a go at it! These are very cool.

kp

[jessiper]

Jessiper, the light in #4 and 5 was a Sunpak strobe fired off camera with a radio slave. I really wanted to seperate her from the background by underexposing it a stop.

I really like it. :)

[Mark T]

Number 4 is my favourite, I think its great, the light is brilliant and what an expression on her face! It looks like the groom forgot to turn up and she's not one for being jilted, fantastic.

[chaosbunny]

thats honestly scary as hell

[rhys]

As for concealed until ready to use? That makes complete sense for someone with a concealed carry permit, but it's hard to put an 870 express in your pant until you're ready to use it. I see no problems using it as a prop, as long as proper safety measures are taken.

When I worked in Latvia for their National Defence Academy back in 1997-1998 I was given a Makarov 9mm and a TT9. I never bothered carrying them because they were just too darned big. For concealed carry one really needs something small or you end up with questions like: "Is that a pistol in your pocket or are you just really pleased to see me?" Hence my favourite for concealed carry is the Walther PPK 7.65. It's also a lot lighter than most of the rather large weapons I see around.

Regarding photos of people with guns, my opinion (whether it counts for anything or not) is that we really don't want to make guns look "sexy" or to make those carrying them look "hard". There are so many people out there that can be badly misled. Not everybody is mentally normal - look at the sub-normal children that go into schools and massacre other children. Most of that behaviour has been learnt from video games and violent films. Photography being a form of film, I'd say that we'd be best trying to avoid gun-toting photos just in case it helps some sub-normal idiot to decide to carry-out a massacre.

I'm happy with guns. I'm not anti-gun by any means. I just don't think we need to encourage the wrong people to carry them. You might argue that a single picture cannot persuade somebody to carry out a massacre or to believe that a gun is the way to solve an argument. Mostly that's true but when there's a constant drip, drip, drip of violence being portrayed as the solution to all problems and guns being shown as the tool of choice in film, literature and the media I feel it's just adding to an existing problem.

[DocFrankenstein]

Yeah...

The games and the hollywood are responsible for the degenerates.

Rhys - please explain who's responsible for rapes and wars.

[rhys]

The games and the hollywood are responsible for the degenerates.


There are degenerates in all societies. There were degenerates in the Mayan empire, the ancient Egyptian empire and so on. I did not say that Hollywood etc caused them to be degenerates. Hollywood and video games merely give direction to the feeble-minded.

There was a court case in Britain some years ago. Two children murdered a 12-year old girl, tortuing her horribly while playing audio of the devil doll, Chukie over and over again. Had they not seen the film then they would not have done what they did. Had they seen Rambo then I'm pretty sure they'd have attacked somebody with knives or obtained guns from somewhere. The fact is that feeble-minded people imitate. How many times have you heard children singing the songs in the adverts? How many times have you bought a product in a shop because you remembered it from an advert? It is all the same thing - video, film and video games all exert an influence on people.

As the influence exerted can be negative it is perhaps best to avoid making images that can have a negative influence. Would the cowboy in the adverts (who died of lung cancer) have remained in the adverts if they had not sold cigarettes. The vision there was rough, tough cowboy smoked brand X cigarettes. The feeble-minded saw that and being young and not knowing any better copied. That's just a photo on an advertising hoarding. All photos have influences - some for good, some for bad. With all our creative talents, let's make photos that have positive influences and let's avoid glamourising violence. Aside from being socially responsible let our consciences be clear. If we hear of a child that massacred other children and we have shown a photo of somebody smiling and holding a gun can we be sure they didn't see that photo and that that photo didn't influence them? Can your conscience ever be that clear?

[sapearl]

Super work Jamie - those are some pretty high caliber pix:D . I see your creative talents have been really triggered by the subject matter. The composition is #1 with a bullet! - Stu

[goforphoto]

Great shots Jamie. The first one though does look a tad over sharpened (Just my opinion). I ran a couple of PS actions to mellow it out just a bit, see what ya think.