The portrayal of life

So I go to help dad with a wedding today (he's a photographer), and I take my trusty $10.00 yard sale Canon AE-1 (which actually works like a charm). So it's my job to walk around and get the casual, unposed, portraits of the usually unsuspecting people and the final product reveals a more relaxed and less stressed event than what it actually was. It works well.

Being a student of life, I study people like I would study...well...I've studied more people than I have anything else. So after a while of trying this new form of photography (new for me, because I've always been more old-school and set the shots up), I found that the ideals I have tried with still life and landscape, I could apply with people (except I'll have to shoot 3 times more than what I normally would to get what I want).

This revelation became apparent to me after following the bride and groom around for hours, and only snagging a few rogue shots. I'm sure they'll be ok, but I started watching a few of the kids play at the reception. Incredibly cute kids. The kind that actually make people want to have more. As I followed them outside the reception hall I knew that this was a good opportunity to test myself on this version of portraiture that I haven't tried very often.

What I saw was inspiring. There were 2 kids in particular (there were actually three, but the third played the part of the bratty bastard child that damn near ruined the event from the tantrums) that my lens couldn't help but follow. They were no older than 2+2 but what I watched through the view finder was like a Hallmark card in motion.

He politely opened the door for her to go outside. He quickly stepped in front of her, not to be rude, but to boldly clear the path of anything that might obstruct her way. He gently took her hand as they walked around the church. When coming across a small tree twig, he picked it up and handed it to her as if they were a dozen roses. When I asked (in that child photographer voice), "could I get a picture of the two of you?", you would have thought that they were the hottest couple on the Hollywood red carpet runway. They posed in the typical un-Anglina and Billy Bob way by standing close, but just far enough apart to tell that he knew the papparazi was there for her. Then after watching them walk away, hand in hand, talking in what I am sure is a language that exists that every human clearly grows out of, yet every child understands, they were over the moment of discovery and fan fare and they parted ways.

By this time I had taken many photos of the youth, and the last one I took I feel could be the top of my long forgotten career in photogrpahy. The little lady had walked up the grassy hill beside the church and simply parked it right there on the ground. She turned to me, propped both elbows on the knees and one wrist on the chin and did what I will forever call the "I've had enough of the adventure, so I am taking a break!" pose.

My theory about photography has always been that a picture is a picture, but a portrait is an image of life stopped in time. If I only get one portrait taken in my lifetime that can be looked at for years to come as the deepest, most personal portait of any one person...even if that is only understood by that one person, I will have lived a great life.