The groomsmen were relaxing before the ceremony.

Rhonda gets a preview of the reading her friend will give during the ceremony.

Joe and his assistant take some bridal portraits. Note the odd bowl-shaped flare. This happened a few times with the Voigtlander when shooting against the sun.

Rhonda and Matt did a first look before the ceremony.

Matt is anticipating the ceremony.

Chucking shells into the sea.

This may be one of my favorite pictures I’ve ever taken at a wedding.

To those that don’t know, shooting with a Leica M6 is a completely different experience than a standard DSLR. It’s small, the shutter is barely audible and it’s manual focus. It allowed me to get closer and yet be unobtrusive, and as a photojournalist that is of utmost importance to me.

I hated loading film into the camera. I had rented it for a week and hoped that I could get used to it by the time of the wedding, but this was the one thing with which I was still struggling. Focusing during the reception was really difficult, and I missed digital for its high iso capabilities at night. I like shooting with available light.

Even with the limitations I loved shooting with this camera. My photo heroes include Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Frank, and it is in that spirit that I captured that final black and white image above. Its mystery is something I feel I never would have caught with my dslr.

In the end I’m quite happy with my digital gear and will stick with that for now, but shooting film with a rangefinder has its special allure. I do offer film camera coverage for those couples that want something a little different, and besides my 4×5 a Leica may make its way into that coverage too!

*All images shot with a Leica M6, Kodak Portra 400 and 160 film as well as Ilford Delta 3200 developed and scanned by Richard Photo Lab, and Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 and 75mm f1.8 lenses.

The images are 3 exposures stitched together. Due to the size requirements for submitting the full panoramic will be too skinny to submit, so I also included cropped versions for you to check out. They’re subtle in their differences, so check them out and vote in the poll at the bottom of the page!

Image 1

Image 1 cropped

Image 2

Image 2 cropped

Image 3

Image 3 cropped

Isaac is my friends’ dog, and I want to steal him for myself.

Dax, mid-laugh.

Getting our lanterns ready.

Trevor looking spooky.

Cornell “Sugarfoot” Coley had a drumming station with various instruments to make a grand racket.

I’m going to make a huge print of this!

We were going for an 80′s afterparty vibe with these shots.