Hello Uncle Bob!

Not sure how many of you know this term “Uncle Bob”. For those who haven’t heard of it before, I’m so nice today so I helped google out the meaning for you. So here’s the meaning of Uncle Bob, lifted off from Urban Dictionary;

A term created by wedding photographers to describe a guest at a wedding with a SLR camera with big lenses and a flash gun.Uncle Bob has little understanding of his own equipment which is often better than the official photographer and likes to get in the way of the wedding photographer spoiling and directing shots.

There was a total uncle bob at last nights wedding asking me how many megapixels my camera had and he was constantly getting in my way!

So… yeah, something like that. Sometimes on a wedding shoot, we meet very enthusiastic family members of the couple who kept asking us questions and gear checking us out because they are also into Photography.

Also at some weddings, we have very enthusiastic family or friends of the couple armed with cameras slinged on their necks going around snapping photos. Some are ok, at least they know best not to get into Photographer’s way or frame. But we do have some whom I call the “shadow stalker”. Hahaha!! They love to stalk behind the main photographer, happily snapping away whenever the main Photographer is capturing some shots.

But the thing is, the shadow stalker doesn’t know that the main Photographer doesn’t use Flash in most of his shots. End up the main Photographer will get some shots which look really ugly cos of the flash (and bad flash control). Sometimes when the main Photographer have no choice but to use the flash, and then Uncle Bob’s flash happened to go off together at the same time, this is what happens;

Imagine if this was a super important shot which cannot be re-enacted because of some auspicious meaning and stuffs. And mind you, this file was shot in RAW, with 100% recovery in post processing, exposures tweaking and everything. Despite all the efforts, this photo CANNOT be saved. AT ALL. Sigh.

So, to all couples who are getting married, do your photographer a big favour, try to get your family/friends/guests to enjoy themselves at your wedding. Sit down, relax, have fun, and don’t shoot. In fact, we do enjoy photographing weddings more when we don’t see people snapping away on their cameras or phones. Hehehe.

Cheers! (:

Love,
Angeline