This is my first time here, and I'm printing out articles like crazy,
because there is a lot of helpful advice to be had. Thanks!

My question has to do with a wedding that I'll be shooting for a friend
of mine next weekend. I did some test shots with the couple today, and
found out that the groom has a reaction to the shutter that makes him
close his eyes when he hears it, even if the flash is turned off. Does
anybody have any advice for what I can do to minimalize his reaction?
I'd hate for all the shots of the "happy couple" to be with his eyes
closed.




Not likely to be from the sound of the shutter, probably he sees your finger
tense on the shutter.

One remedy would be to use a long cable release and hold your hand behind
your back. A lot of pros use a flash bracket with a handle on the side and
a pistol grip with a shutter release, with all the cables and stuff on the
bracket handle, as well as the tilt of it, you can hide or obscure the
trigger finger's flex.

How often does he do this? half or more of the exposures?

I've run across this problem several times, usually with (possibly) abused
kids and some women (again possibly abused as kids) Never a guy. Frankly
it sounds like latent assholism. You know, a weasel control freak.

Use a tripod, you can stand and look at the couple's eyes when you shoot and
see the reflection of the flash in their eyes, the catch lights. You can
see if this guy is a jerk or just has a psychological problem.

If its the former you can bash the guy upside the head with the tripod and
then tell the bride (I'll bet she's the one you're friends with) not to
marry this creep, she won't listen, they still won't be a happy couple but
at least you won't spend the rest of your life knowing you saw your friend
walk in front of a moving train without saying anything.

If its the latter, then work with the guy, wait for a blink and then shoot,
blinks are fast if you see one and shoot your finger will be slower than the
blink, though some people do have a double blink (I think they are the
aliens among us but that's another post.) If that doesn't work then tell
the guy what the problem is and ask his help. Just look at me and don't
blink, hey, that worked.

Oh, direct flash can be painful for some people, use a tripod and bounce
your flash off a side wall, use as wide a lens opening as you can, cause
bounces wastes a lot of the light.

to salvage what you can, have the guy look at her, shoot a close up, say her
looking at her ring, he's looking right at her, nose bumping her cheek or
ear, even if the guy is trying to be a jerk, he will still look romantic or
at least his wife will think so. (that works with crosseyed subjects too.)
There is an example of this posted in the photos section of the z-prophoto
mailing list at yahoogroups.com

Also, since you are shooting some digital, you could find the one shot with
his eyes open and head swap with the other groups. again another reason to
shoot with a tripod, you can cut and paste from one image to the next
without doing much if any work to line up with the background. When I shoot
I usually set the bride up, fluff her dress and leave her there, the groom
gets posed next to her, and for most of the shots he can stay in that one
spot too, bring in the parents, add the brothers and sisters, grandparents,
the wedding party, his folks, now the office workers, old friends. blink
blink blink, swap swap swap. with most photo editing programs you can
draw a circle around the head, feather the selection, cut and drag it righ
on to the closed eye shot. He'll have the same dopey expression in 9 of ten
shots but you will have beaten him at his game, or helped him with his
embarrassing medical or mental problem. If you hand hold you can find a
lot of changes between shots that make it difficult to cut and paste from
one to the other. so find one spot, one pose, don't zoom, if you have to
crop then do so, or just leave some space, you can have one zoom or camera
position for couples and another for the groups. then you'll need two shots
without blinks.

if he also kills shots by hidding smiles, either by turning his head (oh no
wait) or quickly deciding his hair is out of place and running his hands up
in front of his face, or frequently looking at the floor or anywhere than
where a normal person then you know you have a guy with a serious
personality disorder. If you think you have this problem already from the
test shots then walk away. Tell the bride you can't, heck, buy the bride a
wedding gift and hire someone to shoot the formals. (any photogs you don't
really like?)