10 Wedding Day Photography Tips for the Rest of Us
Guide on How to Improve Your Wedding Day Photo Results
(Article by Wedding Photographer: Glen Johnson)
There is truth to the saying "Leave it to the professionals", but professional wedding photographers are limited to work around your wedding day shooting schedule, locale, and weather. Even with their own assistant, wedding photographers often admit they could still use your help from time to time. You might be surprised at how much contribution you could provide to improve the final outcome of your wedding day photo quality. Throughout my professional wedding photography career, I've compiled a "Top Ten Photography Related Tips" of all the little things you could on your wedding day to assist your photographer to get that photo-perfect result.
1. Organizing Your GuestsGetting everyone into the shot takes planning. While you're thinking about groups and portrait sessions - make a list of who is in each shot. Tell all your relatives (in advance) that they should be there at a certain time. Create a wedding day shooting schedule sheet, email it to your party days in advance, and pass it out again at your reception. Leave contingency reserve for potential late comers (yes, you know who they are).
2. Choosing Outdoor Location If you wish for an outdoor shot, do your research and scope out the area. If you can’t do it, assign a trust worthy friend or relative for this task. Choose a location with sufficient shade to cover all the members.
This is especially true if you are getting married in a location that has a variety of different locations for the photographer to move about and experiment. Dramatic backgrounds are great for this type of photo shoot, but many things will work.... a forest, field of flowers, old buildings, barns, rocky riversides, meadow, city streets, college campus, city park, etc.
3. Decorate the Bride's Dressing RoomThis almost always gets overlooked in the planning and decorating phase. First start by picking a room with enough ROOM; one with lots of natural light. And use light gauzy fabrics over the windows instead of thick curtains or shutters that obstruct illumination.
Don't keep it too neat! Natural is the way to achieve the a documentary style look. Decorate appropriately. Cover up any unpresentable objects with curtains or drape cloth. Messes are ok if they are wedding messes. Empty boxes and bags should be placed somewhere outside the dressing room. It looks wonderful to have all the dresses hanging and shoes lying around on the floor, but they look awful if they are still in the boxes or if they have piles of plastic wrappers and cardboard boxes lying next to them. Flowers also look better in a vase instead of the cardboard boxes the florist packed them in.
4. General Photography Lighting Tips- Indoor Window Lighting
If you want to have an indoor shot, warn your photography days in advance. Keeping your wedding photographer well informed will ensure he/she brings the necessary extra lighting equipment.
Avoid direct sunlight streaming into the windows. If you have direct sunlight, keep some curtains at hand that are a little thicker to diffuse it. You can assist your photographer to put light cotton cloth over the outside of the window in order to cut down the direct sun. Or better yet, pick a room location with windows facing north.
- Reception Lighting
Think romance! Get creative. Try lots of candles or little Christmas lights placed on and under things. Christmas lights, hanging bulbs, and rope lights all look good in the background especially if you hang them just above head high.
If you are having an outdoor reception, placing your dance floor under a tent will make a world of difference. Your wedding photographer can bounce the flash up into the tent roof, and provide a much more even lighting condition than direct flash. A tent also gives you a structure to hang the small lights in the roof which create a mellow warm background.
- Moving Light Concerns
If you hire a DJ who uses moving spot lights, every place the spot light hits will be much brighter than the rest of the area. Due to this rapid moving nature, light becomes near impossible for your photographer to calculate the correct exposure. Translation: this leaves no options for the photographer but to shoot a strong flash to overpower the disco lights, which results in a missing black background.
The solution? Ask the DJ in advance about their lighting setup. Inform them you wish to cut the disco lights at moments notice, or ask them if they could use constant stationary colored lights instead. Lights that throw colors or patterns on the wall or roof are great, but ideally you would not let them hit the crowd directly.
5. Photographing in the Dressing Room
This is a touchy subject, especially if your wedding photographer is male. If you are self conscious or modest, you may ask your photographer to leave the room whenever you ask. However some of the best images from the entire wedding happen in the dressing room, especially when the dress is going over the bride's head while all the bridesmaids are helping to get it on.
If you have your photographer wait outside when this is happening, you will miss out on one of the most spontaneous photo opportunities of the entire day. Remember, with photography, it’s easy to delete things later, but it’s impossible to turn back time and do it again.
Under professional photography ethics, a wedding photographer would never show inappropriate photos in his/her portfolio, or on the web. If you are concerned about this issue, be sure to review and discuss the contractual obligation and portfolio usage rights with your photographer. Also pay keen attention to your intuition, and trust your instincts.
6. How to Work with Your Photographer throughout the Day
During the formal dances like the first dance or the father daughter dance, you should ignore the photographer completely. However, late in the evening when your photographer comes around to shoot the fun dancing shots, it would be wonderful if you and your wedding party would occasionally turn and dance facing a little bit towards the camera. With this in mind, your dancing photos would look more natural.
Did you also know it is customary to feed your photographer? You may not feed some wedding vendors that are only there for a short time, but your photographer won't survive a nine or ten hour day without dinner.
Photographers don't normally shoot constantly during mealtime, but they do have the camera close at hand in case anything interesting happens. If you could seat them about 20 feet from your own table that would be the perfect distance to get candid shot. If the meal is buffet style, your photographer may eat near the end of the line. If you want to run off and shoot portraits while your guests are finishing dinner, make sure to warn your photographer in advance.
7. The Correct Way to Put on the RingsThis is one of the most difficult shots to get for a wedding photographer. Most couples are not aware of the fact that they are blocking it either with their hand positions or with their bodies. To turn this moment into a great photo opportunity, all you need to remember is that as you are putting the ring on, position your fingers on the top and bottom instead of on the sides of the ring.
One more tip is to avoid extending your free hand out to grab your partner's wrist so that you can push that ring on there better. If you feel it is necessary to do this, try putting your hand UNDER your partner's hand and grabbing on from below. This approach prevents your wrist from blocking the shot. Practice this couple of times, and you will see that it is possible to put the rings on while keeping your ring visible from your guests’ view, and photo capture.
8. Throwing FlowersDon't rush through this part... take a minute to play with your crowd. This gives your photographer time to get a shot of you holding the flowers and looking back over your shoulder at all the gang getting lined up. Before you throw, try chasing off all the little kids because they often beat your bridesmaids and friends to the flowers. Now look up and make sure you don't have anything low like lights and ceiling fans that are going to intercept your flowers before they get to the crowd.
When you throw, be ready to call for a do-over if it doesn't go as planned. I have seen it gone badly many times. One time I was standing beside the groom, he somehow managed to turn far enough around to shoot me in the back of the head with the garter. As soon as it fell to the ground, a little kid snatched it and ran off.
9. VideographersVideographer and photographers are like cats and dogs; we often don’t play well together, and we fight for our spots. Some inexperienced videographers will occasionally get right up in the middle of the altar area during the ceremony. If you don't want their backside to show up in all your pictures, please tell them to stay at least 15 feet away during the ceremony. I've actually seen these guys standing right between the bride and groom during the whole ceremony with a wide angle lens. They could get the same shot from 15 feet if they used a telephoto lens.
I've also seen videographers that would watch to see what I was shooting. If they liked it, they would step in front of me to get their own shot. Make sure to tell them to watch for where the wedding photographers are so we don't get in each other's way. It's probably also best to specify very clearly as to which one of us has the highest priority for you.
And if you don't want to worry about this at all, ask your photographer to recommend a videographer that he/she has worked well with in the past.
10. Common Sense
There are no extra time to spare on your tight wedding day schedule. Everything unexpected could effect your wedding photography timeframe. Things rushed are things improperly done. Keeping your common sense will ensure your wedding and photography sessions progress smoothly.
Even small details anticipated will benefit you, such as sunburn. You should be extremely aware of staying out of the sun before the big day. Save the sun tanning until after the wedding. All too often I've seen brides that got burned in the week before the wedding and were extremely upset to have peeling skin or bright red tan lines on the wedding day.
Dress properly for location shoots, and check the weather! I've seen grooms that looked like they were going to pass out at any second, and brides that refused to budge from in front of the air conditioner. Dressing light should be foremost in your mind when you plan your wedding for a hot climate.
About the Author:
Glen Johnson Wedding Photographer - OR, Oregon
John's love of photography began at about 6th or 7th grade, with camera he "borrowed" from Dad. Today John works exclusively on wedding photography. His work has appeared in numerous publications. He is also the author of the book "
Digital Wedding Photography: Capturing Beautiful Memories".
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