Wedding & Portrait Photography

No matter how much you prep and plan for building in time for  wedding portraits on your big day, your wedding day is totally out of your control and things happen! More often than not, we wind up crunched for time and have to work rather quickly. While this may be inevitable, here are 5 tips on how to help create time for wedding portraits.

1. Brides, don’t be the last to get your hair and makeup done! Your stylist and makeup artist want to make sure you are looking absolutely flawless on your wedding day. This will take some time (sometimes, a few hours!) so if you are the last to get attended to, it may delay your prep and departure for your ceremony or first look. While the last person is getting beautified, we can get you dressed and take time for your bridal portraits.

2. Have a First Look. Having a first look (especially if you are getting married at the venue) will allow for time before your ceremony for portraits. Read more about why you should have a first look.

3. Provide a detailed bridal party/family shot list. We like to take bridal party/family portraits before portraits of the bride and groom. This allows your family and bridal party to enjoy cocktail hour or relax before the ceremony so we can focus on the two of you. Providing full names in a shot list in advance of the wedding day will allow us to roll call your family into their portraits which helps speed up the process. If all goes well, family portraits should not take longer than half an hour.

4. Build in 1 1/2 -2 hours for all portraits. This includes family, bridal party and newlywed portraits. Where you place this block in your day is completely dependent on a number of factors that we can discuss when it comes time for your timeline meeting.

5. Be Open to Night Shots. It’s hard to pull you away from your reception but in the event we did not capture a full variety of portraits during your earlier session, we love to bring our couples outside for night shots at the venue. We prepare for these in advance so you are not missing your party for more than 10-15 minutes.

These are just a few tips on how to create time for your portraits but we can go on for days on how to make sure your timeline is set up for success. We will prep in depth with you at your timeline meeting and work diligently on your wedding day to make sure we capture great photos of you newlyweds!