Thanks for everyone chiming in on my last topic. Sorry I couldn’t answer everyone individually.

I had another challenge recently.

I shot a real quick wedding (due to Covid). There were only a few shots of a quick ceremony.

The bride didn’t like the photos.

You see, the place was not well lit and my camera does not handle noise well so I used an 85 mm 1.4 lens at 1.4 but not for every shot just most of the shots.

I was creative about it showing the groom in focus with the bride out of focus in the background. Also shots like the bride holding out the bouquet with the flowers in focus and her out of focus. The bokeh was very nice. There were several shots with a different lens where everything was much more in focus.

She was upset because the pictures were “blurry and out of focus”. What I suddenly realized was that she was very left-brained so to speak and for her everything had to be in focus or it was a bad picture.

What do you do with people who don’t understand art and things like bokeh. My website shows plenty of shots with bokeh. But I’ve run into people who don’t understand things like soft focus and creative shots showing things like just the back of the dress or just their hands holding or his face cut off showing just his chin with her head leaning on his shoulder out of focus. Stuff like that.

I did not get a chance to sit down with the bride and groom and get a feel for them because he called me at the last minute and there was no time. I had served him before by photographing everyone in his office. He’s a great guy.

He liked the bokeh but she did not. She saw my website so she got a feel for my style.

I was really nervous because he is a lawyer. But he is the nicest guy in the world and he said he understood that it was a difference in artistic interpretation.

I remember another left brained person like that one time I fully decorated my studio and it was beautiful and I asked one of my clients how she liked it and everything was beautiful and she looked around and she said one of the ceiling tiles was out of place and that was her whole impression of everything. That was her comment about how beautiful the studio looked.

Left brained people?

Dear Friends: I am a huge fan of Africa. I will be headed back when Covid 19 is under control.

I am putting together a list, perhaps an article, on planning for a trip to Africa with an emphasis on photography. I am asking my fellow UHH friends to write down one (or more) tip that they learned or did that might they would like to see added to the list. The tip does not have to be photography related. For instance, our travel advisor had us arriving in Johannesburg and leaving the following morning to Zambia. My wife intervened and planned a few days in J'Burg to see the Apartheid Museum, Soweto, learn more about Mandela, etc. We stayed in a lovely B&B. It was an excellent addition to our trip.

Might be a fun and enlightening conversation.