Focus on Wedding Photography – the Timeline
Tuesday, July 22, 2008 @ 01:59
Great wedding photography is a very skilled craft and it should always be treated as such.
Admittedly every wedding you shoot will be different, but the below guidelines will provide at least a starting point for working out an ideal schedule for the bridal party.
Of course, you will want to request a wedding day schedule from the bridge and groom at least a month prior to the actual date of the wedding. This schedule will give you an idea of what you will need to bring along, and what your schedule will be like. For example, if this is a big wedding, you may wish to bring an assistant along who can keep the equipment at the ready and help position folks for the various wedding party group photos, especially if the wedding party will be a larger one.
Just in case the bridge and groom are scatterbrains and really never even thought to compile a schedule, here's what generally happens at the "average" wedding, beginning about one hour before everyone is due at the church:
1. Putting on makeup and getting dressed.
2. Hairdressing
3. Putting on head dressings and veil.
4. Final check
5. Leaving for ceremony ... everyone getting into limos, etc.
6. Arrival at church
7. Actual ceremony and all the standard photographs that go along with it.
8. Leaving the ceremony venue
The wedding party will generally stop at some venue for photographs while everyone else heads to the reception. As an experienced photographer you should have some ideas for likely spots for these photos; i.e., a nice park, a local college campus, etc.
Once everyone arrives at the reception there will be some standard photos the bride and groom will expect you to get:
1. Arrival.
2. Photo's during various toasts, etc.
3. First dance of wedding couple, as well as bride dancing with her father, groom with his mother-in-law, etc.
4. Cutting of the cake and all the horseplay that may go along with that.
5. Various candid shots of the party and everyone having a great time.
6. Possibly some photos of the bride and groom leaving the wedding reception and heading off to the venue where they will spend their first night together as husband and wife.
