Weekly Discussion Thread: Multi Cultural / International Weddings

Agnieszka

Hi there.

So, I thought I'd try to shake up the board a bit during the winter months, and start a weekly discussion tread :thumb

Thought our first theme could be multicultural / international weddings.

• Did you have any fun experiences / stories you'd be willing to share?
• Any particular customs that surprised you?
• Are you a big sucker for some certain cultures?
• Do you have any fun photos to share?
• Did your customers invite you to travel abroad to photograph their big day? If so, how was your experience?

Let's get it rolling! :clap


>> Shhhhhhht. Wanna see the other weekly threads? Click HERE.

Moogle Pepper

Being Vietnamese I have been to plenty of Vietnamese weddings. Pretty simple really, parents talk and exchange tea and presto! It's still akin to the very customary custom where the parents pretty much give the bride away. One of the cool things, though, are the Ao Dais that they wear! Really colorful!

Here are some ex:




The colorful and details in the dress is pretty up there along with the custom dresses for Indian, Pakistani, and Middle Eastern weddings! Really colorful! You can definitely spend a good time photographing just the details of the dress, though they will wonder why you are always shooting under the chin.

I really want to photograph a traditional Japanese wedding! Being that I love Japanese culture and history, it is only right that I photograph one!

Agnieszka

I'm a HUGE sucker for asian weddings, haha ... it's not even funny. But I get generally all excited when I see an email from a "funny looking name" But asian weddings always mean lots of pretty details, col

I've shot a fair number of different weddings by now, and I don't want to generalize, BUT some things

• Indians. Awww, I loove Indians. It always means a beautiful dress, pretty colors, interesting faces and some FUUUN dancing
• Cambodians. I think they are my favorites, even though their weddings last a couple of days. But they are very welcoming, and by the end of the event you are part of the family. I love all their little ceremonies & all the gorgeous outfits. They are to die for ... but boy, I'd not want to be in their shoes. Looking *that* pretty & smiling all the time must hurt at some point.
• Chinese. Shot a few Chinese weddings. Very respectful people, always strong family bondings & structures. I love it when they do tea ceremonies, unfortunately they don't always do them these days ... BUT I have to say, I don't get their Coke culture
• Russians. Boy they know how to party. Love it when they have a Russian violin player during the party. Fun stuff
• Greeks. an other strong contestor for a BIG party. Fun, fun stuff ... the ceremonies might be hard though. The 2 I've been to were held in Greek (and no, I did not get a heads-up), so ... I was a bit lost in the space, but we had a happy ending ... One of my *dream* weddings to shoot at would be on a Greek Island ...
• Koreans. The ceremonies & receptions I've been to were somewhat similar to the chinese ones ... I love their outfits / one-bows, so pretty.
• Italians. Oh, their weddings are big. And when I say big, I mean HUGE. Wedding parties with up to 32 people .. scary stuff. But they are always fun & also know how to party ... I'm still waiting for my first wedding in Rome though ... anybody?? Please???
• Irish. Being from Boston, almost all the weddings are somewhat either Italian or Irish, that's how it feels like anyway. If you're lucky you'll get a bagpiper. The ones I've been to were very catholic, 1h full masses.
• Jewish. They've been all sooo different it's so hard to say. It also always depends where the couple is originally from; from Israel, from Russia; if they just grew up in the US or elsewhere. I'm not a big fan of the chuppah (photo wise), it's somehow always in my way + I've run into some Jewish priests that didn't allow any photos what so ever during the ceremony, ... but I like the Hora, always makes up for some fun photos.
• I also shot a Argentinian, a Puerto Rican & an Uruguayan wedding, but they were half-international-half-American ... so they are hard to describe.

I love international weddings though, but you should definitely tell the couple to let you know about all the important parts of their culture, otherwise you'll be in the wrong spot at the wrong time ...

mmmatt

Agnieszka wrote:

I'm a HUGE sucker for asian weddings, haha ... it's not even funny. But I get generally all excited when I see an email from a "funny looking name" But asian weddings always mean lots of pretty details, col

I've shot a fair number of different weddings by now, and I don't want to generalize, BUT some things

• Indians. Awww, I loove Indians. It always means a beautiful dress, pretty colors, interesting faces and some FUUUN dancing
• Cambodians. I think they are my favorites, even though their weddings last a couple of days. But they are very welcoming, and by the end of the event you are part of the family. I love all their little ceremonies & all the gorgeous outfits. They are to die for ... but boy, I'd not want to be in their shoes. Looking *that* pretty & smiling all the time must hurt at some point.
• Chinese. Shot a few Chinese weddings. Very respectful people, always strong family bondings & structures. I love it when they do tea ceremonies, unfortunately they don't always do them these days ... BUT I have to say, I don't get their Coke culture
• Russians. Boy they know how to party. Love it when they have a Russian violin player during the party. Fun stuff
• Greeks. an other strong contestor for a BIG party. Fun, fun stuff ... the ceremonies might be hard though. The 2 I've been to were held in Greek (and no, I did not get a heads-up), so ... I was a bit lost in the space, but we had a happy ending ... One of my *dream* weddings to shoot at would be on a Greek Island ...
• Koreans. The ceremonies & receptions I've been to were somewhat similar to the chinese ones ... I love their outfits / one-bows, so pretty.
• Italians. Oh, their weddings are big. And when I say big, I mean HUGE. Wedding parties with up to 32 people .. scary stuff. But they are always fun & also know how to party ... I'm still waiting for my first wedding in Rome though ... anybody?? Please???
• Irish. Being from Boston, almost all the weddings are somewhat either Italian or Irish, that's how it feels like anyway. If you're lucky you'll get a bagpiper. The ones I've been to were very catholic, 1h full masses.
• Jewish. They've been all sooo different it's so hard to say. It also always depends where the couple is originally from; from Israel, from Russia; if they just grew up in the US or elsewhere. I'm not a big fan of the chuppah (photo wise), it's somehow always in my way + I've run into some Jewish priests that didn't allow any photos what so ever during the ceremony, ... but I like the Hora, always makes up for some fun photos.
• I also shot a Argentinian, a Puerto Rican & an Uruguayan wedding, but they were half-international-half-American ... so they are hard to describe.

I love international weddings though, but you should definitely tell the couple to let you know about all the important parts of their culture, otherwise you'll be in the wrong spot at the wrong time ...

Wowza you have shot the gammit there girl! One tip on getting the Jewish priest's to play ball. They like it when you call them Rabbi. Ha!

Nice job of shakin' it up, good idea for a topic. Now lets get some examples from some of those fun sounding events!

matt

Agnieszka

mmmatt wrote:

Wowza you have shot the gammit there girl! One tip on getting the Jewish priest's to play ball. They like it when you call them Rabbi. Ha!

Nice job of shakin' it up, good idea for a topic. Now lets get some examples from some of those fun sounding events!

matt

Ha! Good point ... that might help ... might have to try that one next time!! (been a long day)

Will have to dig around in my archive ... but in the meantime .... anybody else offering some fun stories??

Agnieszka

Wow. First of all thanks for sharing your stories, Glort. That's some crazy stuff!!

Boy-oh-boy .... an anti-priest, huh?? Never had one of those before, though I had a handful of priests that did not allow any flashes during the ceremony ... but boy, that doesn't even come close to your story

And wow also about the Indonesian wedding, !! That must have been quite something. Aw. I love Bali, my favorite place on earth!! (Though it changed quite a bit in the recent years). What are their wedding customs there like? Oh, how much would I wish to ever shoot a wedding there ...

entropy07

Let's see... I've done mostly Asian weddings! Next year I'll have an Indian, a couple of Vietnamese under my belt. Apologies for the various different watermarks, I'm still working on my branding!

One of the Vietnamese ones I did last year included the gift giving (which happens at engagement) as part of the wedding ceremony. The roast pig was yum! The gift giving and tea pouring turned out to be some of my best shots from that day.



The paebaek ceremony in a Korean wedding (where they throw the water chestnut and the groom carries the bride back) is always really fun. I only did one as a second shooter yeaaars ago, I love the colors in their hanboks.



Though I'm based in Boston simply the client base I have right now I haven't encountered any Jewish or Italian weddings, although one bride did casually add in a glass-breaking thing at the end. One of my photog friends did a Celtic hand fasting ceremony which was really poignant.

l.k.madison

Wow, what a story!!
Glort, that's one interesting story you have there. I let hubby read it and he just died laughing, not at the tragedy but at the very last sentence.

Just goes to show that karma does eventually come back to get you.

fcorin13

One of my first weddings was a 1/2 American/ 1/2 Kenyan wedding. (The bride was American, the groom Kenyan). It was so fun, but a total drain on my energy! First it was long- I started shooting at 7:30 am & finished around 8 pm. :S The main thing about it (and luckily I was warned by the groom beforehand!) is that apparently Kenyan's are huge about family & traditions, but have no concept of time. I found that to be very true! The bride didn't even *get* to leave the house she got ready at until about 45 minutes after the wedding was supposed to start! There was family everywhere- it was great! They did a whole thing before the bride could leave for the church- the parents of the groom came & "petitioned" the bride's parents for her to marry their son. They had to offer gifts (some where quite valuable, too!) & apparently if the bride's parents let her go "too cheap" the groom's family would refuse her, but if they held out too long then they would leave, too! Lucky for them, they valued her just right. There were a few differences in the ceremony- there were several "traditional song" times & an amazing "blessing of the bride & groom" by the mother of the groom & the father of the bride. The reception was a little different that my norm, too. The bride & groom had to serve all the guests the cake to show that they valued their friendship. They also had to feed their parents most of a piece of cake as well. It was interesting.

My advice to anyone else considering shooting one: be very flexible, be ready to run all over the place, and most of all- get paid for every hour you work (because it will definitely be *work*!!!).

mmmatt

Actually, I guess I should log my jewish wedding thread here, as it has some good insight on shooting a Jewish wedding http://dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=149992

Matt

Agnieszka

Here are a couple from the Cambodian Ceremony I did last year ... It was really fun, but it took *way* longer than the couple told me (the first day did) ...

1:


2: They had the ceremony at their house:


3: Groom arriving at the bride's house ... well, they lived together already ... it was haaaarsh mid-day sun, not my favorite part of the whole wedding ...


4: Then back inside again. The hair cutting ceremony.


5. And one of the finals of the day. The Tying the Knot ceremony. I was *exhausted* by that time, and did not want to imagine how the couple is feeling ... That was the first day out of 3 (I was shooting their American Reception the day after + had a Indian wedding 2 days later ... it was a looong but fun weekend)



6. And one of the beautiful bride in one of her outfits ... just ignore the scribbling ...



7.

Agnieszka

Oh, and here are a couple of ...

1. A Chinese Tea Ceremony. Really love the shot of Grandpa in this one ... sorry it's so small, I'm stealing pics off my own blog



2. And a couple of pics from a Greek wedding. As much as I loved it, it was really hard to not be able to understand one thing during the ceremony ...


3. And some from their reception:


4: My this year's BIG Italian wedding: ... told you ... HUGE wedding parties ...