Wedding Courses

[County Man]

I wonderd if any of the UK photographers had heard of or been on one of Len Batemans Wedding Courses http://www.photocourses.co.uk
I have done quite a few weddings but would like to move to the next level and wondered would this corse benefit me.
Let me know if you have any info or experience with len.

Thanks :)

[RobKirkwood]

When Ann and I were figuring out whether or not to go into doing wedding photography we looked at what courses were available and might be worth doing.

Len Bateman's was one of the courses we considered, but we decided against, largely because we felt we wanted something geared to us exclusively, rather than a group thing where you're battling with everyone else for attention and opportunities to shoot. At the time Ann was also new to SLR cameras, so we felt there was a risk she'd get left behind in a group situation (today is a different story: one of her photos from a wedding we did last year has just been published in a magazine!)

There's another place in the Peak District we looked at - but I can't recall their details ...and again it seemed to be group courses.

What we did in the end was go with Paul Brook in Poole - primarily because we were able to ask him to give a 2-day course with models and locations, exclusively for Ann and myself, and geared to our specific needs. It's an expensive way to do it (could have bought a 70-200 f2.8 IS instead), but it worked well for us, and, being an intensive 2 days where we were doing most the work, it was a great introduction to the pressure of shooting a wedding. Plus we came away with hundreds of images of non-ugly models. As a bonus, Paul was shooting a wedding a few days after our course, and he asked me to join him as second shooter - excellent opportunity & I snapped his hand off! Paul's website: http://www.brookstudio.co.uk

Choosing a course or tutor is a bit like choosing a wedding photographer - they all have their individual style, and way of dealing with people. The course Paul put together for us was great, Paul's style and approach is different to us, but the course gave Ann and me the opportunity to think through how we would want to do things. At the time Paul was also shooting with Nikon D70 (having moved to Nikon digital from Hasselblad), but it was quite funny to see him grabbing our Canon cameras at the slightest opportunity (at the time we had 350D and 20D).

Probably the biggest benefit for us in doing a course was the ability to stand in a church with a bride/groom and be able to take time to find out for ourselves what works and what doesn't ...this alone could take years and many weddings if you just dived straight in to doing weddings.

Rob

[Grace]

very cool - even if it did cost a ton!

[scott wiggins]

Also worth looking at are Experience Seminars http://www.experience-seminars.co.uk/ , based near Huntingdon. I haven't done the weddings course they offer yet but everyone I've spoken to who's done it has said they've enjoyed it immensly and found it good.

I've done their portraits and action course and found them both to be well run with good speaker notes given out and copies of the slides in PDF format for later study.

[County Man]

Thanks Rob,
It's great to have another to check out which I will do tomorrow.
I also would like something suited to my needs but working with small groups can sometimes be a benefit ( as long as they are small ) I will compare the pro's and con's of them both tomorrow. Thanks for the link.

Thanks Scott,
I have been told about these courses but feel they are more geared to the technicalitys of your kit. I am pretty comfortable with my 30D but feel I need to enhance my control of the event and I want to get those extra special shots of bride and groom. Will check out more thoroughly tomorrow though. Thanks for the link.

Anybody else from the uk have experiences of wedding courses?

[RobKirkwood]

Thanks Rob,
It's great to have another to check out which I will do tomorrow.
I also would like something suited to my needs but working with small groups can sometimes be a benefit ( as long as they are small ) I will compare the pro's and con's of them both tomorrow. Thanks for the link.Paul's forte is portrait photography - and that shows in the way he teaches 'bride-at-home' photography ...the main image on the landing page of our website was shot on his course - Laura was sitting in bay window of ordinary house, shot is exposed so that the voile curtain in the window completely washes out - the only lighting used on this shot is the daylight coming through the window behind her ...the result is dead easy once you know how, yet most people think it's an expensive studio setup.

Maybe one other consideration will be locations - I expect the surrounding countryside will be more attractive on Len's courses?

Peak Photo Centre was the other place I couldn't recall: http://www.peakphotocentre.com/

Rob

[puddinz]

I have booked up to go on a course in Newbury in February for wedding photoraphy. Its run by a chap called Wayne Capald that looks really good. Its a weekend course so I can let you know how it went when I come back.

[County Man]

I have booked up to go on a course in Newbury in February for wedding photoraphy. Its run by a chap called Wayne Capald that looks really good. Its a weekend course so I can let you know how it went when I come back.

I would appreciate that:) Do you have a link to the course so I can check it out?

[scott wiggins]

Thanks Scott,
I have been told about these courses but feel they are more geared to the technicalitys of your kit. I am pretty comfortable with my 30D but feel I need to enhance my control of the event and I want to get those extra special shots of bride and groom. Will check out more thoroughly tomorrow though. Thanks for the link.

Anybody else from the uk have experiences of wedding courses?


Well they try to help you learn to use the camera in an inutitive fashion so you can't change things quicker. The wedding course has hired in models in their local church and you go through a shoot with them.

[puddinz]

http://www.pictureweddings.co.uk/index.html sorry its taken a while i dont get a chance to get on much in term time.
Stevie