This is something I’ve been meaning to post, but I lost the booklet I needed until now.  It’s hilarious.

On my last trip to Nigeria, I experienced quite the contrast in lodging.  On one end of the spectrum was the Protea Hotel Ikeja in Lagos.  It’s nothing short of stunning.  I stayed there on my last night there, and it was kind of a bizarre experience after living the ‘typical’ life for over three weeks.  Anyway, I picked up a Protea Hotel guide and set on my way.  They have an amazing portfolio of hotels.  So, on with some more pics of this room.

So it turns out the folks at Protea have quite the sense of humor, all the more funny if you’ve actually experienced what they are poking fun at.  Here is another hotel I stayed in on the trip.  I have no idea which hotel this is, but maybe folks familiar with Owerri will know from the window shot.

Just Precious, right?  :)

I was going through the Protea guide book and stumbled on one page they inserted about a fictitious property of theirs.  Hilarious.  Read it for yourself!

LOVE it!

I’m so happy to FINALLY get the other images from Nina and Efiom’s white wedding on the blog!  This was the second of Nina & Efiom’s wedding ceremonies.  This one followed their Igba Nkwu ceremony.  Their white wedding was held in Calabar where they lived.  I really wish I could show these images HUGE because they are insane!

I have to admit something here.  One of my criteria for making the trek to Nigeria to cover a wedding is that, when it’s all said and done, it can’t look like I shot it here in the States.  What does that mean?  Well, if it’s shot in some church or hotel, and the resulting images don’t have any kind of different feel from a church or hotel you’d see here, I’m not as excited about the opportunity.  It’s a huge pain to get there and to work there.  I want the real deal if I’m going to go through all that, yeah?  When we were planning this coverage, things were starting to look like I’d only be able to cover the white wedding.  I wasn’t too keen on that.  The prize for me was their traditional wedding, so I was resistant to covering just this one.  

It all worked out, and I’m so happy.  I really thought the church wedding was going to pale in comparison to my coverage of the traditional ceremony, but once I started shooting this one, it became apparent that would not be the case.  I got some of my strongest work from the trip for this wedding.  It’s definitely not like any church you’d see here.  That’s for sure.  But the whole thing, the light, the people, the vibe really brought everything together for me.  I’m *so glad* I was able to shoot this wedding as well.  It was unbelievable.  Pictures, right?!?!

Getting ready at the hotel.

First look!

Running late.  Let’s get on with it!

Nina’s mother and grandmother prepare.

The completely and totally amazing choir warms up.

This shot of the two guys has got to be one of my most favorite images from the entire trip.  Much love.

Nina is kept in the air conditioning as long as possible.

LOVE the gesture on the right, barely touching the door.

How much do I love this location?  Look at the above image.  I love it, lots!

Nina getting out of the car and getting ready to enter with her dad in the background.

The weight of the ceremony starts to settle in.  You can see it throughout the ceremony.

Anticipation!

Oh my word they were amazing!  Goosebumps.  Seriously.

Don’t even get me started on these guys, haha.

This B&W is just so freaking hot.

This abstract jumped out at me.  I like.

Proud daddy Bassey.  

Look how he is holding her hand.  It says so much.  

Check out Efiom’s brother’s reaction to Nina and Efiom hugging rather than kissing.  Cute.

The deed is done.  Contentment sets in.

Love love love the motion of the robes by the fan.

Time to celebrate!

Seriously, they spray Holy water with a garden sprayer.  How wild is that?

I’d say the choir is 110% into their job, no?

This place just photographs sooooo well.

The choir receives communion.

The signing of the register, surrounded by loved ones.  

Beautiful, huh?  Congrats once again, Nina & Efiom.  I’ll never forget the wonderful times I had on this trip.

Ok peoples, this post is a long one!  128 images!  Finally, here are Nina and Efiom’s Igba Nkwu Nwanyi preview images!  They were married in the village of Dikenafai, Nigeria.  I was there for three weeks in order to cover both their traditional (or “Trad” as they call it) ceremony as well as their Catholic ceremony.  This post is long enough, so I think their church wedding will be better off in another post.  Anyway, here we go!  Hold on!

We start with the days leading up to the traditional ceremony.  Local clothiers in Calabar are making Nina & Efiom’s traditional attire.  It will ultimately be a mix of Igbo and Efik attire, all of which are really amazing and beautiful creations.  Here is Efiom and Nina trying things out for one last alteration.  It’s late in the day, and these are all at 6400 or 3200.  I loves me some Nikon D3!

Detail of the shop.  Love love love this shot.

Poor Efiom has reached his limit!  
 

These are from the very final fitting a few days later.  They are there to pick everything up just before the trip to Dikenafai.  It’s getting close!

There was quite a bit of trash talking about who would show up the other when the dancing began at the “white wedding” reception.  Nina had a little surprise in store, and Efiom was none the wiser.  

Nina tries on her Efik attire.  She would ultimately wait until the Thanksgiving Service at the church the day after the wedding to wear it.

Getting really close to the wedding day, Nina & Efiom make their final planning and preparations at Efiom’s apartment before leaving for Dikenafai.

We stop at Efiom’s parents’ house for one last marital counseling session before the big event.

And in the small world department, I found out Efiom’s dad (left) had trained through the Nigerian military at Ft. Benning in Columbus, Georgia and had lived there a few years.  Isn’t that crazy?

Nina and Efiom practicing their wave for the Igba Nkwu.

No sooner did we pull out of her dad’s driveway, then this.

Finally, we arrive at Nina’s parents’ place in Dikenafai.  Some details about the house.  It was so very quiet out there, really peaceful.  No power, no traffic, no craziness.  Oh, and I find out in walking around that pineapple grows in the wild there.  SO JEALOUS.  I think fresh pineapple is my favorite fruit.

Me and Nina in a tea pot!

Nina’s sister, Amuche arrives, greeted by sisters Nina and Kelechi.

Nina practices some of the important steps in the Igba Nkwu ceremony with her grandmother.

Nina’s grandmother whipped these headdresses out like it was no big deal.  Amazing.

Getting the place ready for the big ceremony!

Many problems with the tent company.

Nina and her brother, Chukwudi, check out the progress of the ceremony site.

People start to arrive!

An Owerri based music troup arrives.  They totally rocked it out.  It was amazing.

Nina’s mother!  High five!  I like!

Efiom arrives all ready to roll!

Efiom’s brother, Ekeng, helps him with some last minute details.

Attendees pay respect to Professor Ejezie, or “Prof” as they called him.

This guy was cranking out the High Life music.  It was wonderful.  That music sounds good whether it’s coming out of a badass stereo system or one beat up speaker hanging out of the door of a car.  Seriously.

Nina’s mother, decked out and ready to go.

There are no guest lists for these.  People know about it, and then they show up.  It’s as simple as that.  You never really know how many will be there.

Efiom waiting patiently to go over and start the ceremony.

One of Efiom’s sisters are giving him a bit of a hard time.

I can’t say I’ve ever experienced anything quite like this at a wedding.  I’ll just add it to my list!  I think his/her name was “Cynthia” but we just ended up using sha-he when referring to him/her.

I didn’t know Andre 3000 was going to be there!

Some of the guys buying candy to help “Cynthia” with her college education.  I kid you not.

All that and a bag of chips, huh?

Nina starts the walk!  Things speed up pretty quickly now!

Some moves.

And there’s that wave!

Nina’s parents are introduced.

Guests honor them and the occasion with piles of Naira.

The dance troupe keeps everyone entertained.

Efiom goes incognito.  He is supposed to hide while Nina is supposed to seek him out when she carries the palm wine.

Just before she goes out, Nina breaks into a little dance.  This is one of my favorite images from the trip.  The print is just SICK.

Nina takes the palm wine for a walk!  Look out Efiom!

Spotted!  Look at all those cameras.

Efiom has accepted Nina as his bride!  It’s business time!

Prof blesses the marriage.

Then they go over to Efiom’s father for another blessing.  His father is quite animated when it comes to these things.  

The two dads.  Success!

More music to cap off the ceremony.

Another blessing.

Here we get into some of the Efik traditions.  Up until now, most everything has been Igbo from what I can tell.  Here is the arrival of the Ekpe Masquerade.

So, Ekpe Masquerade dude smacked me with that cane of his.  Apparently I got a little close at some point and didn’t have the proper attire.  Or so I was told. 

Another Efik tradition is that the groom’s family gives the couple a trunk full of things the couple can use in their new life together.

Some after ceremony portraits.

Awwwwww… What a sweet couple.

For these, I had told them to get comfortable with each other, forget about me, and just get into each other.  And then I added “But stop before you get pregnant!”  They erupted in laughter.  It was pretty funny.

Stay tuned for the “White Wedding” in a future blog post!  I got some really amazing stuff from that one, too!

This post comes from my trip to Nigeria to photograph the Igba Nkwu Nwanyi and Catholic cereomony of Nina & Efiom.  I think Nina’s grandmother’s smile is permanent and infectious.  We visited her on our first trip to Dikenafai to prep the house for the traditional ceremony.  She was just beaming at the sight of her family.  She made us some really good food! 

I *love* this photo.  I just love it.

Look at the years and years and years of life represented here.  It’s really something.

She may be a grandmother, but she sure doesn’t sit around!  She is busy busy busy.

Just a little vignette in her sitting room.  I could have photographed this house and Nina’s grandmother for a good while.  

I promise there are wedding pics coming!  Stay tuned!

Meet Efiom.  Efiom Married Nina twice!  Once in the village of Dikenafai and once in Calabar.  This portrait was made after their Igba Nkwu ceremony at Nina’s parents’ place in Dikenafai.  Most of what I’ve photographed in Nigeria has been of the Igbo tribe, which Nina is a part of.  Efiom is Efik.  His attire was a little, um, different than traditional Igbo wedding day attire.  It was explained to me that some their attire is influenced by early European colonialism.  The first outfit he wore really kind of reminded me of something you’d see at a Mardi Gras celebration.  Know what I mean?

In order to do these after-ceremony portraits without the many hired and spec shooters ruining everything, we had to sneak out the back of the house and take some back pathways to this location.  Seriously, it’s nuts with the photographers.  They are all over the place.  Getting used to them makes dealing with the occasional “Uncle Bob” a piece of cake.  Here is a shot of JUST A FEW of the photographers and videographers there who, according to one of them, was going to “show me up” in the photo department.  This doesn’t make for a great environment to do really great work.  It’s tough, but possible.

These photographers and videographers very much behave in a vulture/pack system.  They are always right on top of the action, shoulder to shoulder, and that makes it very difficult to vary position and get different shots without getting them right smack in the middle of the shot.  I can’t begrudge them their work.  They are welcome at these ceremonies, and they are just trying to survive like everyone else there.  I just have to be more vigilant, aggressive and on-point when it comes to shooting these.  I’m always amazed at how much I do come away with without having all these photographers front and center in these photos.

This was my first experience with Efik folk and their customs.  Part of what comes with this group is the very interesting Ekpe masquerade as seen in my photo below.  Seriously, it was right at 100ºF the entire time I was there, and I cannot imagine how hot it is in one of these suits!

Handsome dude, gorgeous bride.  They are going to have some seriously good looking kids.  I hope they can one day come to Atlanta so I can see them again, or one day I can go back and meet up with them.

Nigeria is a place where true apprenticeship is still appreciated.  At least from what I saw, one of the noblest careers there is to be a quality tailor.  I tagged along to all kinds of tailor and seamstress and clothing design shops while I was there, and there were always young apprenticed workers soaking in as much experience as they could.  It is nice to watch someone with decades of experience work.  Everything is second nature, and they are so comfortable in their job in a way that is just so impressive.  Things are still done there the old way, with little or no power, lots of manual tools and procedures, but what they turn out is some really amazing work, craftsmanship that is so lacking in our mechanized world, proof that if you have what it takes, you don’t need much to create something beautiful.

Tagging along for 3 weeks all around Nigeria for Nina and Efiom’s Igba Nkwu, we paid a visit to Nina’s grandmother, who lives near their village of Dikenafai.  Her grandmother is fantastically and infectiously happy, and her house had all these great little vignettes going on.  What fun!

This image is from the first of two wedding ceremonies Nina and Efiom had in Nigeria.  This was her Igba Nkwu held in her family’s home village of Dikenafai.  We had a few minutes between ceremonial happenings, so we did a quick portrait session inside.  I can’t tell you how happy I am with this image, the color, sense of movement, happiness, grace, everything.  That perfect shadow just puts it over the top for me.  The color is just insane, and it’s straight out of the camera.  Unreal.  Ye Nikon D3 and your insane low light skills, I couldn’t have done it without you!

I feel so honored that people will go through all the trouble and expense of hauling me to such remote places to help document these very important family rituals.  And I’m so happy there are people out there who see above the mindset of “it’s just pictures” and go through the trouble of making photography a priority.  These images will outlive everyone involved in creating them, and I’ll have been forgotten the soonest, but my stamp will be on these images forever.  And best of all, in two trips to document weddings in Nigeria, I’ve made many great friends I’ll never forget.

So I’m buried in production and shoots and all manner of things and have not really had time to assemble any blog entries about the most recent trip to Nigeria to cover Nina and Efiom’s Igba Nkwu ceremony and their “white” wedding.  I’m really looking forward to dropping some hot images on this thing.  It’ll happen soon enough.

The photo above pretty much sums up what it’s like for a power hungry American to try to get by in a country that basically runs without power.  So much of the stuff we need to get the job done assumes a stable, on-demand power supply.  Well, after two trips to Nigeria, from Lagos to Owerri to Arondizuogu to Nri to Enugu to Abuja to Calabar to Dikenafai, I can tell you that if you plan on working there, you’d better assume you’ll never have power and bring enough to get by without it.  And when the power or generator is on, you drop everything and jump all over it.  

This last trip was for three weeks.  So what did I bring to assure I got by being able to shoot and keep images safely?  Like many international destinations, good luck finding something if you are in a pinch and lost or forgot something.  Camera batteries have long since stopped being a problem in how many shots you can take per charge, so five batteries for two cameras would have safely taken me through the entire trip if need be.  The most important thing was to bring enough cards to never even have to think about having to erase and shoot over them.  In this case, I took a little over 200GB of cards.  I also take a Jobo GigaVu on these trips so I can easily download cards and view images without having to fire up the laptop.  This is great because it also acts as an external drive so I can work on images directly on it, or I can drag files to the laptop.  When the power or gen is on (usually only for a few hours at a time), I’d get as caught up as possible in downloading shot cards to as many devices as possible.  As I get further in the trip, my focus will change from safeguarding equipment to safeguarding images.  Before everything is shot, equipment is paramount.  After everything is shot, all I care about are those files.

As far as camera gear, I travel both as light and as redundant as possible.  Generally this will mean 2-3 bodies, about 6 small/light primes ranging from 18mm to 85mm.  If I lose/drop a prime, I still have a few others that would be in the range that would be gone if I brought, say, one 17-35 zoom.  I will bring two Speedlights, a couple of TTL cords and lots of AA batts.  The rest is ancillary and non-critical, like Pocket Wizards, etc, etc.  If it doesn’t fit in a ThinkTank Airport International roller comfortably, I don’t take it.  Take too much stuff, and you’re constantly worrying about corralling and tracking gear.  Take too little, and you put yourself at risk of one equipment failure knocking you down for the count. 

Flying all over to these kinds of places looks like a vacation to the outsider, but it comes bundled with a whole lotta constant worrying, logistical nightmares, run-ins with “officials” wanting to know why you’re traveling with so much equipment and are you a “photojournalist” and “where’s your ID?”, and so on.  Once you take on the job, you cross a line which makes the trip all the more difficult, but in the right situation, still very much worth the trouble.

Once again, Chichi and Emeka’s wedding continues to be profiled.  This time it’s Destination Weddings & Honeymoons magazine’s online Wedding of the Week.  Be sure to check it out!