Not that many years ago, wedding photographers were known as “weekend warriors; they were wedding photographers on wedding days and worked at other full-time jobs the rest of the week. The status of the wedding photographer— both among other photographers and the public at large—was very low. They were often insufficiently equipped to provide first-rate photographs of the wedding and photographed almost everything with oncamera flash. In some cases, not only was their photographic technique suspect, so were their business practices. The phrase “fly by night” often described the struggling weekend warrior.

Of course, there existed the reputable studio photographers who also offered expert wedding coverage, but it was markedly different than the wedding coverage one sees today. These photos—90 percent of them anyway—were posed, and if they weren’t posed, the people in the photos were aware of the presence of the photographer and often “mugged” for the camera.