How I Shoot Your Wedding Photography
(If your uncle Albert is doing your wedding photography, you can ask him to follow this roadmap. You'll be glad you did.)
There are several things you should understand clearly about wedding photography and wedding video. The first and most important is that:
Your wedding day is a great photo opportunity.
But, it is not a photo session!
If you allow anyone to turn your wedding into a photo session you will regret it later--even if many beautiful pictures are taken. A photo session is totally under the control of a photographer. The photographer carefully arranges everything in order to get high-quality, striking, or even beautiful pictures. You may have been at a wedding where the photographer took control of everything right away and posed everyone at every step for the entire wedding. Thousands of weddings have been done in just this manner Beautiful wedding albums can be created with this method. Actually, beautiful and boring albums might be more accurate. Set-up pictures (pre-planned poses), never capture the charm and fun and excitement of your individual wedding. There is a lot of spontaneous activity at every wedding, and pre-planned canned poses do not capture any of it. Carefully planned poses copied from a manual on how to shoot wedding pictures all have this in common--after you have seen them three or four times they become completely meaningless and very dull.
Here is the key item.
Your wedding day is your day. It is not the photographer's day. This is the day that almost every bride has dreamed of and planned for and fantasized for most of her life. It is a day you want to experience completely and fully. It is a day for you to cry and laugh and play and be solemn and serious and giggle and whoop and scream and kick up your heels. In plain and ordinary terms--this is the day you want to have a ball! This is not the day you want to spend much time posing under the direction of some stranger with a camera and a list. It is your day and your guy's day and by golly, this is a day to live--not pose endlessly according to some list of “ideal” wedding pictures. If you allow your wedding to become a photo session , here is what will happen. You will arrive at your wedding excited and happy. You will be ready for a great and exciting day. Then you will pose for pictures according to a list for five minutes (or maybe fifteen). After this little photo session you will be slightly less excited and happy. The flow of your wedding has been interrupted by the list. Soon, you will be directed into another posing session for another five to fifteen minutes, again going down this list. Once more the flow of your wedding has stopped. After the third or fourth photo session--still long before the actual ceremony--you start to get tired of this stuff. After all, you want to be with your friends having fun. Right? But the posing doesn't stop. On and on and on your wedding is directed by the list.
By the time your wedding is over, you will wish you could wrap that list around the photographer's camera and hit him over the head with it. After you and the groom depart you will realize that you didn't have nearly as much fun at your wedding as you expected, and you're just relieved to get away. That will be because you really did not have a wedding--you had a photo session. Worse, when you get the pictures, you will have a book full of pictures that are well-composed poses that are mostly pretty to look at--but--these carefully posed pictures shot from the same list that is used at every other wedding--make your wedding look just like every other wedding. No list captures the fun and happiness and excitement of your wedding. So, what is important? Somebody's list….or your exciting, happy, tearful, hysterical, funny, wonderful wedding.
Which do you want?
What I do at your wedding:
- ARRIVAL: I arrive 90 minuets before the ceremony. I like to be set up and ready so I can take pictures as soon as the you arrive. If the cakes are set up at this location I like to get pictures of them immediately. If there are any unusual decorations I get pictures of these as well. When you arrive I begin taking pictures of you immediately. You have no idea what it will be like when you arrive at your very own wedding. But whatever happens when you show up---it will make for a great picture right away. This is a fun time. After months of preparation, it's really happening. It's exciting and it's chaotic. It's smiles and tears all jumbled together. My job is to capture some of this excitement and chaos. I can't get it all, but I get all I can. I do not stop the bride or the groom and try to get posed pictures at this point. I just shoot what's there and happening.
- GETTING READY: Soon the bride and her maids disappear into the bride's room to get ready. The tempo is picking up now and the bride's mother and others are usually racing against time as they get the place ready for the ceremony or the reception or both. Again, I don't pose people doing these things, I just get pictures of whatever they're doing.
- PORTRAITS ON THE RUN: I do get what I call portraits on the run. They are not organized sessions, just “Hi, look here, click, thank you” and it's done. The groom's dressing room can be bedlam or solemn. I shoot it the way it is. Plus: a few more quick portraits. When the guys come out I shoot them as a casual group after they get their flowers. At this point I go for a good portrait of the groom.
- BRIDE IN HER DRESS: By now the you will be ready for the photographer. In the bride's room I get small group shots. If your father comes in and puts a penny in your shoe, that will be a posed shot. Even so, if you (or your dad) start crying I'll get that for sure and it will be fantastic. Don't think that doesn't happen. Remember, the things that are not planned provide the most spectacular and moving pictures. The ones you treasure later. Promise. BRIDE AND BRIDESMAIDS If there is space in the bride's room I get casual group shots of you and the bridesmaids. BRIDE AND PARENTS Pictures of your mother helping you with your veil or hair as you are doing the finishing touches. Suddenly, it's time. It's really really really time….NOW!
- THE CEREMONY This is a good time to make a point about churches and photographers. Most churches have been forced to establish restrictions for photographers. I always ask what the rules are. I do not violate any of their rules. The bride needs to find out what her church's rules are so she is not terribly disappointed later. I have been to churches where one rule was that there would be no pictures of any kind taken during the ceremony. I had a priest tell me that he didn't want to see me in the church during the ceremony. Other churches require that the photographer stay in the last pew (farthest away). In a large church, that's a long, long way from the ceremony. Find out what your restrictions will be. If you are told that the photographer must stay 150 feet away from the ceremony, immediately tell them your photographer is very discreet and will not disturb the ceremony and needs to be closer to get the pictures you want. Most restrictions on photography can be eased if you confront the issue when you book the site (before you pay the money). It's too late after the wedding starts. Check this out.
- AFTER THE WEDDING--THE FORMALS I am not trying to get a monopoly on the negatives of your wedding pictures. Feel free to tell everyone to bring their cameras and their camcorders. Your family and friends are welcome to take pictures as I shoot the formals. The only thing I insist upon is that they take their pictures after I get my shot. I will be happy to step aside and let your family and friends get any shot after I have taken mine. It is common for 8 to 10 people to be standing right behind me and each one getting everything I set up. I encourage this--let them know. After the ceremony the families on both sides want a variety of family pictures. Tell your mother and your groom's mother that they don't have to be bashful. Have them tell me what they want and we will get the pictures. We will get the following pictures for sure. You and your parents will have ideas for more. We'll get them all. Bride and Groom. Bride and Groom and Minister. Bride and Maid of Honor. Bride and Bridesmaids. Groom and Bridesmaids. Groom and Best Man. Groom and Attendants. Bride and Groom and all Bridesmaids and all attendants. All family groups on both sides. All specialty shots wanted by bride, groom, and their parents Group shot of everyone on all sides It does not take that long to get all the pictures you want. Usually, I'm done in less than 30 minutes. Unfortunately, there is often someone there who feels that it is their job to rush everyone out the church. Assign your father or anyone who can be polite yet firm to handle all discussions with anyone trying to cut your time short. You do have to pay for the place, right? If you can't get someone who is polite, yet firm--just get someone who can be obnoxious, and really firm--if you have to go that way don't hesitate. It's your wedding and you are paying a lot of money. Do not allow anyone to interfere with your wedding for their convience. Period. Lots of funny and touching things can happen while we shoot the formals (also called wedding party pictures or altar returns) If something happens--I try to catch it. Actually, this goes for the entire wedding and reception. When I have taken all the pictures I can think of, I ask you, your mother, and your husband's mother if there are any other pictures of their family they would like to get. When you say enough--we're done. If there is a formal departure, like in a limo, I shoot that, then race to the reception if it is at a different location..
- WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY AT THE RECEPTION:
At the reception there are lots of opportunities to get pictures of family and friends. The main events are presented here not as a list but as the key points I develop with a variety of pictures. Lots of things happen that you couldn't have planned. I try to get whatever shows the fun and flavor of your day.
- CAKES AND PRESENTS (if not taken already)
- BRIDE PORTRAIT AREA/SIGN IN AREA
- INTRODUCTION OF THE NEW MR. AND MRS. NEWLYWEDS
- THE BUFFET
- WEDDING PARTY TABLE (S)
- TABLE SHOTS
- FIRST DANCE
- BRIDE AND FATHER'S DANCE
- GROOM AND MOTHER'S DANCE TOASTS
- CAKE CUTTING
- BOUQUET TOSS
- GARTER TOSS
- DEPARTURE
As you depart, your wedding day begins slipping into memory. It's hard to believe that at the moment, but it's true. It is the job of the wedding photogtrapher, to have captured some of the excitement, and confusion, and chaos, and beauty of this very short and passionate day. That's what I do. And I love to do it. And, if I do my job well you will love the pictures, your daughters will love the pictures, and your great, great, great, great….granddaughters....will love them too.
Carl Platt
(512) 825-5227