your
wedding
day
You hired your wedding photographer so that you can relax, be present and let your day unfold naturally. We are here so you can live in the moment and have beautiful photos to look back on for years to come.
After months of preparation and hundreds of hours of meticulous planning, your wedding day will finally come — then it will be over. If time flies when you’re having fun, it travels at light speed on the big day. You will want to remember it forever and one of the best ways to do that is to have good documentation.
Here is a list of tips and tricks from a photographer’s view point on how to get the most out of your wedding day photography package.
THIS IS Y O U R D A Y
Whether photography or videography or both, your creative team is there to capture every tender moment as the day goes whipping by.
As wedding days are almost always hectic and sometimes stressful, why add to the pile? This guide is a way to ensure that you get the maximum quality out of your wedding photos while also reducing some of the stresses that brides tend to encounter on wedding day.
Simply by considering the following ideas, tips, and tricks, you can put the camera to the back of your mind and enjoy your special day.
tips to
get the most
out of your
wedding photography
planning your day
1.) Schedule the post-ceremony photos during the best lighting. The post-ceremony photos are some of the most important shots of the day, especially the ones of just the two of you. Therefore, the closer you can time this session to the hour before sunset the better.
2.) If you are having a large wedding keep your photographer in the loop in regards to your timeline. The sooner we get a comprehensive timeline of the day, the better. It allows us to prepare for the day and to build our own strategy.
3.) When forming your timeline, it is always a good idea to leave plenty of wiggle room. If you have ever been in a wedding before, you know that things hardly ever adhere perfectly to plan. Events go long. People run late. Anything can happen. Leaving fifteen to twenty minutes between each event can make the day run so much smoother and help you avoid that rushing around feeling.
4.) Hire a wedding coordinator. Wedding coordinators can be instrumental to keeping everything together on the day of the wedding. They will execute your timeline, wrangle guests for photos and activities, and most importantly, make sure the ceremony flows perfectly. Coordinators can take a huge load of stress off of your shoulders and allow you to better enjoy your day. If you need wedding coordinator recommendations feel free to reach out and I will be more than happy to help!
5.) Get together a shot list of family members you would like to have in the family photos. The post ceremony pictures can be hectic with everything that is going on, especially if you have a lot of family members that you would like pictures with. A shot list can be a good way to keep everyone in mind. It also never hurts to recruit a friend to help you wrangle together and organize the people on the list day of. The aforementioned coordinator can help with that duty as well.
morning
of your
wedding
5.) Be comfortable! While you are getting your hair and makeup done try not to wear any tight fitting clothing or undergarments. You want to avoid any skin imprints that tight clothing may leave. If you are planning on wearing a low back or strapless dress, this one’s for you. You don’t want any skin imprints showing when you are ready to put on the dress.
6.) Get all the details that you want photos of in one spot before your photographer arrives. This may be your dress, shoes, rings, jewelry, invitation suite, any special elements items that are important to you.
getting
ready
7.) When looking at venues, hotel rooms, or Airbnb’s try to pick a preparation room with a lot of natural light. The preparation photos set the stage for the entire collection of photographs. Natural light is always preferable over artificial illumination. It brings out the colors and makes the setting more vibrant.
8.) Plan enough time for hair & makeup. The process can take longer than you expect to complete. Setting aside ample time for this part of the day will make sure you do not have to cut into other portions or deviate from your timeline.
9.) Pretend that we don’t exist. Forget about the camera. As wedding photographers, unless we are posing you or getting the important shots, we like to largely go unnoticed. The candid shots throughout the day can be some of the most important as they capture the mood and feeling of the day. So unless you are being posed for pre and post ceremony photographs, just go about your day as if we are not even there.
ceremony
10.) Consider having an unplugged wedding. One of the biggest obstacles for a wedding photographer is navigating and avoiding all of the phone-ographers trying to get shots of their own during the ceremony and first dances. A simple request to the guests asking them to be present and to keep their electronic devices put away can go a long way. Trust that the photographers you hired will get all the shots you want.
11.) Handwrite your wedding vows over reading them off a phone or device.
12.) When exiting having dried flowers, rice, or lavender for guests to throw makes for a beautiful moment to be captured.
At the end of the day, all of these tips are merely suggestions to help your day go smoother and by proxy get the most out of your photos. So breathe. You’ve got this.
After all the planning and stressing, this magical day will be over as fast as you can blink. If any of these tips allow you to soak in some of that magic and increase your overall enjoyment, we have done something right.
Let’s go get married!
Xx
Bri
be
married
Get in touch!
