all images on this site are © 2010 Lorne Chesal & Monique Campbell - [hamilton 905.296.3057] [toll free 1.877.410.4599] [info@passionateaboutpictures.ca]
creative wedding photography by Lorne Chesal & Monique Campbell - serving Hamilton, Burlington, Milton, Oakville and the entire GTA

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see the love || see the difference

Lorne Chesal is a Hamilton wedding photographer

It’s fun, life-affirming and incredibly challenging.

Probably no real need to embellish on the fun part...

Even though well publicized stats tell us half the marriages we photograph are at risk, we don’t see that on the wedding day. We see and capture the love and hopes of a couple and their friends and family. We see fractured families come back together. We see hope. We see tension. We see stress. We see love. We are fortunate to have been invited to capture the results of months or perhaps years of planning and the hundreds of tiny decisions that go into a wedding celebration.

We take that responsibility seriously.

Photographing a wedding is simple but not easy.

When I (Lorne) was studying photography, I didn’t have a lot of money. While other students were hiring models, buying clothes and doing shoots that cost them a fortune, I would shoot local sports. Hockey, baseball, football, soccer, lacrosse, didn’t much matter to me. Why sports? It was free! : )

I eventually discovered this approach helped make me a better photographer than some of my fellow students. I could never ask my subjects to “do that again please” if I missed the shot. If I missed, I missed. Everything I was photographing happened only once, and then never again. Every play from the line of scrimmage was unique in some way. Hitters would adjust their swing at the same time the pitcher was adjusting their delivery. My subjects stood where they pleased. They cared not that the light was less than ideal for my purposes. High fives and other such rituals were performed for them, not me. I *had* to become a better photographer.

I had to pay attention, anticipate, think and constantly improve.

>>> more...


So, I learned photographing sports was challenging. And rewarding. And that I loved it for those very reasons.

Top sports shooters in the world will tell you without fail that a key to success is knowing the game they are photographing. Knowing it very, very well.

Photographing a wedding is very similar. With few exceptions, moments go by and are never heard from again. We control very little of what happens in front of us, but are expected to catch it all. Perfectly. Every wedding. A wedding day is like a perpetual motion machine that is started in the morning and goes where it wants and when it wants the rest of the day.

Just like a football game.

For this reason, weddings are never boring to a good wedding photographer. Between the dynamics of the people involved and a photographer’s desire and need to constantly raise the bar for themselves, it *never* gets old.

We can’t subscribe to the saying- “why is it, there’s never enough time to do it right, but there’s always time to do it over”

We are more subject to that great line from the Apollo 13 drama, “failure is not an option”


And that’s why we do this.

It is a bit odd, but many great photographers won’t photograph weddings for the very reasons we love to photograph weddings.

It isn’t easy. It can be incredibly stressful. You can’t have a bad day.

And neither of us can imagine doing anything else.