Patina Photography(New Zealand)
Michelle and Hemi have loved photographing weddings together since they got married in 2012. Before this Michelle studied photography and got a start photographing her friends weddings; Hemi was doing architecture and was keen to start a creative business – so when the time came they formed Patina and decided to see where this journey would take them.
Through this passion Hemi and Michelle have had the chance to travel the world and feel so lucky that they get to work with such creative, trusting couples. They love meeting new people; from hot pools under the stars in the Nevada desert, to magical snow-falls at Tongariro; the places and experiences this job has introduced them too, have been some of the best they’ve ever had.
Hemi and Michelle have won various awards for their photography – including winning both wedding categories at the NZ Institute of Professional Photography Iris awards and being recognised by Junebug weddings as one of the ‘best of the best’ wedding photographers in the world.
Our first experience with the Fuji X system; we were travelling through the US and wanted a small light travel camera with great image quality. After countless hours researching online, we settled on the Fujifilm X-T20 paired with the 23mm f1.4. The images we got from this little combination blew us away, and the size was everything we could hope for. However the real unexpected gamechanger was the EVF (electronic view finder).
Coming from Canon's DSLRs we had learnt to work with an OVF (optical view finder), I even believed no EVF would be good enough - but playing this camera, this little EVF screen was prefectly responsive, no lag at all, and with Fuji's beautiful film simulation, it felt like everywhere I pointed the camera I was looking at a potential finished image. It changed the way we shoot.
In the past, we used to shoot and wait until we were back at the computer to see how an image would process-up, now shooting and selecting felt more closely linked than ever. We can see flare exactly how it is, we can see the dynamic range in any situation, and we don't have to fight with screen glare on sunny days.
Once we got back into the swing of our wedding season, and back to our clunky Canon DSLR's, knew we had to change. We purchased two more X-T2's and a full range of primes to suit our style and we haven't looked back. Switching to the Fuji system has made working and traveling so much easier, with no sacrifices in image quality or colours, and it we actually feel excited to get out and shoot more than we ever have before.
