Throwing Shade
So you come to France to get married! An idyllic Chateau with amazing wines and sumptuous food, and the light, My god! that light that inspired Degas, Monet not to mention van Gogh , in fact a whole school of painting in the South of France.
So where better to have your open air ceremony in the sunlit grounds of a French country Chateau?
Well yes , sort of…
Is it possible to have too much of a good thing?
I’m not sure who it was, It might have been Kodak that drilled into us the fact that to get the best pictures you had to have the sun shining directly at the subject, preferably over ones left shoulder.
It all made sense, Old films were not as sensitive and the simple cameras had slow lenses with not much in the way of exposure control so that was that.
So what’s the problem?
Well in my view two things,
The first is not the light but the sheer strength of the Sun. It gets hot, and unlike the UK the heat tends to build up during the afternoon , so it can still be in the thirties at five-o-clock
The second is how bright it is. When I started shooting weddings here in 2009 ceremonies would be 1 or 2 pm, lately the trend has been for later with ceremonies now more likely to be at 4 pm than 1.
You can get married in full sun but it’s not ideal, it’s super hot and even with Linen suits and the floatyist of dresses it will be a lot hotter than you were prepared for.
Get your guests in the shade, They’ll love you for it.
It’s not just your guests that will appreciate the shade. You will look better in the photographs. Modern cameras are able to capture amazing detail in full sun but some of the nuance it lost.
All that thought that went into choosing those lovely dress details, the hair, the make-up , everything… How much better it is if you can capture all those details that would otherwise be difficult to see.
No don’t get me wrong. I love the light here in France. That’s one of the reasons I live here.
I look forward at every wedding to that special moment “Golden Hour” where we can control the light
Golden hour at Chateau Clauzade
Where?
Venues with shady places for brilliant ceremonies
What
What a wedding in a shady spot looks like.
How
An excellent wedding planner in the South West ( Agen, Toulouse)
