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Day-Of Planning Tips: Surviving the Wedding Day Photo Shoot

No matter how you break down your wedding day schedge, there’s almost definitely going to be some time that is solely dedicated to photography. For some camera-shy people, this is a nightmare, but a necessity if you want to have a Christmas present for Grandmammy this year.  For other people, posing for photos is a fun side adventure on the wedding day where you can circuit through nifty locations and explore unique photo setups.  For complete lunatics, like your humble blogger here, posing for photos is a fun way to spend a random Saturday afternoon.  My insane hobby of amateur modeling gave me a huge advantage in organizing and executing the photo shoot portion of my wedding day, and now I pass that wisdom on to you.

Logistics, logistics, logistics

The first thing you need to figure out is your timetable.  How much time do you have to devote to posed photographs, and at what point in the wedding schedule will you be taking these pictures?  Talk to your photographer about how many shots she thinks she can get within this time.  Once you’ve worked out time, you need to work out your shot list.  Again, talk to your photographer about her usual shot list, and sit down with your partner and make a list of every iteration of family and bridal party you want together in photographs.  Is the number of must-have shots you have way over the figure your photographer gave you regarding your timetable? If so, begin the brutal cutting process (no, you don’t need solo picture with every single member of your wedding party, especially if there are eleven of them).  Or are you lucky and have oodles of extra time?  Well you, my friend, can start to think about LOCATION.

If you are going on a photo tour…

Brides who hate the idea of a wedding day photo shoot, brides who don’t have a lot of time with their photographers, and brides who like keeping things simple can all ignore this section and move on to the next.  For the lunatics who remain, who are planning on being photographed in multiple locations on their wedding day, I have one suggestion I URGE you to follow: Do a dry run of the whole location circuit.  On the same day of the week that your wedding is, at the same time of day.  Get a feel for the traffic.  Actually driving from place to place will give you a much more realistic idea of how many places you can go in your timeframe than the Internet will.  Figure out where everyone will park.  Assess the crowds.  Will you spend a lot of time waiting for the background to clear before the shutter can click? Are you going to be one of five bridal parties vying for time in front of [insert photogenic landmark here]?

Here’s another pro tip: pay attention to the sunlight.  This is where doing your dry run at the same time of day you will on your wedding day becomes important.  The weather was fantastic on my wedding day, and I’m not complaining, but boy was the sunlight intensely in our eyes when we went to the Mount Washington overlook.  It was basically impossible not to squint, and when our photographer suggested we close our eyes until the moment he took the picture, the results were even more terrifying.

Enlist a whip

Ok, so you’ve worked out a realistic, doable schedule of shots and locations.  Now you need someone to keep you on that schedule.  Depending on your photographer’s personality, it could be him.  But some shooters get lost in their art and forget that you have, you know, your own freakin’ wedding ceremony to get to soon.  You need someone to make sure that things keep moving.  If you have a wedding planner or a day of coordinator, they’re an ideal candidate for the job.  If you don’t, get someone in the bridal party to be the task master.  Just don’t leave it up to yourself to keep things going smoothly.  It’s too much stress to take on, and few bridal ensembles include a watch.

Even with a whip to keep things moving, you should be prepared to cut locations or shots if things run long for reasons outside of your control.  Which means you need to take care of the most essential shots first!

Keep it light

Ok, so you know the ridiculously ubiquitous wedding shot of the bridal party mid-jump?  I have some strong love-hate feelings about the jump shot.  But something that must be said in its favor is that it gets people laughing and loosened up.  This makes them look better in photos, and it also makes the photo shoot portion less of a drag than it would otherwise be for your less hammy bridal partiers.  You don’t have to accomplish this by making everyone jump for a photograph, but try to break up the monotony of “Mom you stand with the Groom. Ok now Groom and Dad. Ok now Groom and Mom and Dad.” ad nauseum with some goofy and irreverent photos or even just with JOKES in between the posed pictures.  It’s your wedding day, have some fun!

[Photos by Lou Stein]

Do you have any tips for how to make a wedding day photo shoot go smoothly?

-Robin