The key is that the couple have confidence in Kevin's abilities and his ideas. "When I teach, photographers always ask me, 'How do you get your couples so relaxed, so natural?' I tell them it's all about self-confidence. You can't be shaken by anything. I'll often suggest something and the couple will say, 'You want us to do what? Lie down in the grass? Run around over there?' You've got to be confident in asking them to do it; you have to know it's going to work. A lot of photographers won't even try it, thinking the clients won't do it. Or maybe they suggest it and then back off if the couples don't seem to get the idea. But you've got to believe in yourself even if everyone else is laughing at the idea. Generally those are the shots that come out the coolest."

Kevin's background has a lot to do with the way he works. He's been a wedding and portrait photographer for a dozen years, but before that he provided fashion-oriented photographs of models and actors for their portfolios. Today he sees his wedding photography as influenced more by the breezy look of fashion photography than by photojournalism.

While style is important, so is content. "I look for the little storytelling details," Kevin says. "People ask me why I'm taking pictures of a hand or a gesture or part of an embrace, but if that picture conveys the feeling of the moment, it's an important picture."

Kevin says that anticipating those key moments, looking for the cues and clues to emotion in the scene, is a big part of being a good wedding photographer. "The other thing is that you have to know your equipment so well that you're not even thinking about it when you need to capture that moment."

Weddings are his main work—he photographs about 40 each year—but as you can see from the images here, portraits are also part of the business. And so is teaching.

Kevin, who has been shooting his weddings with digital cameras since 1999, runs Kubota Workshops, which he calls digital photography boot camp.

"The workshop is a week-long intensive session that covers everything about converting a wedding photography studio to a digital operation."

Though his workshops are designed for working professional photographers and photographers with pro aspirations, Kevin's belief in the advantages of digital may benefit amateurs as well. "The main advantage of digital," he says, "is that it enhances creativity. People always talk about the cost saving and the instant gratification of digital, but I've found that the most important thing is that it makes you a better photographer, a more creative photographer, simply because you can step outside the box and try things that are a little different.

"With digital, there's no need to hold back. You never worry about the cost of the shot or whether it's going to work. You just try whatever comes to mind. You'll shoot more because you're experimenting, and you instantly see what you got so you can analyze what you did right or wrong. And what you did right becomes part of your repertoire immediately. That's the long-term benefit of digital photography."

And digital also means going beyond the camera into the digital darkroom, where Kevin can control color or add a bit of light to faces—"I call it digital fill-flash"—or darken the edges of a frame for dramatic effect. "Digital enables you to do so much more."

Ultimately, though, the technically perfect image isn't his goal. "I want the image that has some emotion, some impact. Those are the images that the wedding couple loves to see, and the ones I love to do."

By Design

You can see more of Kevin's wedding and portrait photography at his website, Kubota Photo/Design, at www.kkphoto-design.com. Information about his digital photography workshops for wedding photographers is at www.kubotaworkshops.com.

Kevin Kubota has been an NPS member since 2000.