when do you all get those great posed pictures

MissB · December 30, 2009

with my first two weddings I had very limited time to get shots of the bride and groom.. So when do you all find the time to get these creative shots with so much going on during the day.. .. do you make your bride and groom budget time between ceremony and reception?? How much time do you use up?? I don't mind investing time on them of course.. but Its the wedding party posing stuff that gets a little crazy and eats up that valuabe gap.. and thats what I felt like I spent the most time on the last wedding.

eh? help?

WillCAD · December 30, 2009

I'm not a wedding photographer, but I have been the 2nd shooter a couple of times, videographer a few times, and I've attended dozens of weddings in my life as a guest (and as an altar boy in my youth).

Every single wedding I have ever been involved with had one thing in common - the wedding party, including the parents of the bride and groom, all stayed in the church after the ceremony for posed pics. Duration of the shoots varies, but all are at least 20 minutes, and sometimes go as long as an hour.

The posed shoot time is budgeted into the day's schedule as a matter of course. It allows all of the guests to clear out of the church; some of them choose to go directly to the reception venue, while others wait outside for the bride and groom to emerge so they can throw bird seed at them as they get into the limo.

Some wedding parties choose to have a receiving line following the ceremony; the shoot always occurs after the receiving line.

Some wedding parties choose to stage the departure of the bride and groom, allowing the guests to throw bird seed at them as they enter the limo. In these situations, the limo will circle the block and return the couple for their shoot while the guests (minus the full wedding party) proceed to the reception venue.

Regardless of how it's scheduled, the posed shoot is a mandatory part of a wedding photo package, at least in my experience. Of course, some of the new "photo journalist" style photographers eschew the shoot in favor of candids. If the clients choose that, more power to them, but frankly, I'm a staunch traditionalist when it comes to wedding pics, and I prefer to have the posed shots, always.

In most weddings that I've attended, there are additional posed shots of just the couple done at the reception venue, if there is a suitable backdrop. I've seen it done at fountains, gazeebos, in front of gift tables or the cake table, and I did one myself in front of a large picture frame that was signed by all the guests instead of a guestbook (pic didn't turn out, though; thankfuly, I was just a guest at that wedding, not the photographer).

As with anything, the clients' desires win out, but you should always budget time and plan with the clients for a posed shoot with the full wedding party between the ceremony and reception.

bmoreshooter · December 30, 2009

I'm not sure that was the question. I felt that wc was referring more to the creative stuff not the formals. Shots of people walking down the street, looking into each others eyes with their reflections in a lake, etc. A well organized, experienced wedding photographer will shoot the formals in about 20-30 minutes after the service or at the reception. The other stuff gets squeezed in on the fly. Sometimes, if your really lucky the bride will allot several time slots for you to get what you want. They need to be informed that what they receive in photos is directly proportionate to the time they spend. Some weddings take all day while others are done in a few hours. It all comes down to communication with the bride and groom.

MissB · December 30, 2009

got it.. so I pretty much need to ask for them to budget some time for formals... thats perfect. From my expierence weddings are so time budgeted that if that time isn't alloted in there..it may not get done.

tenoverthenose · December 30, 2009

Here's the reality I learned long ago: Higher end brides will make more time for photos.

The clients that I work with put an extremely high value on photography, so we will take as much time as possible to make it happen. I also will make myself available at any time to make the shots happen. The day of the wedding I work as fast as possible to maximize my time. But the best thing to do is communicate with your bride what you want before the wedding. If you explain that you need an hour to get the shots she wants, then the ball is in her court to spend that much time. If you say that you can get it all done in 20 minutes, in reality you will get 15 minutes and be kicking yourself.

Agnieszka · December 30, 2009

tenoverthenose wrote:

Here's the reality I learned long ago: Higher end brides will make more time for photos.

The clients that I work with put an extremely high value on photography, so we will take as much time as possible to make it happen. I also will make myself available at any time to make the shots happen. The day of the wedding I work as fast as possible to maximize my time. But the best thing to do is communicate with your bride what you want before the wedding. If you explain that you need an hour to get the shots she wants, then the ball is in her court to spend that much time. If you say that you can get it all done in 20 minutes, in reality you will get 15 minutes and be kicking yourself.

+1

heatherfeather · December 30, 2009

Most of you know this, but I use scheduling like crazy. It is built into my contract pricing and is adjusted for each bride... if they are seeing each other before ceremony or not...with the photo list customized to exactly what the bride wants.

If they are seeing each other before hand, (and I encourage this very strongly) most of the photos are finished before the ceremony. If not, then 3/4 of them are... and just don't have both the bride and groom in the photo. I hate to have guests waiting, so we do our best to get all the work photos (ha ha... the fun ones) done before the party starts.

I design up a custom schedule (with their colors and theme) and email it to the client and also snail mail a couple of hard copies for them to have on hand. The email one is great because it can be sent out to the wedding party and family on their iphones... and the hard copies are great for the scrapbook and the grandmas without iphones.

Here is a "seeing each other before hand" one:

And a "not seeing each other before the ceremony" one, though not a typical wedding schedule:

Hope that helps a bit. The schedule timeline is totally customized for each bride and situation, so these are just examples of a couple of them. But I got to tell you, brides love them because they know when to schedule their hair appts and what time to begin putting on the gown ect. I also schedule quite a bit more time for each thing to make up for folks running late. But if we actually GET that much time, then I consider it a huge bonus!

zoomer · December 30, 2009

My hat is figuratively off to those of you that schedules work for.
For me someone is always late and the schedule goes in the toilet.
In order to get 10 or 15 minutes to create those really cool photos you will need to be assertive and take the time.
When I see my window of opportunity I remind the bride why she hired me and that now is the time I need to make photos, if she says yeah lets go then the photos happen, if she says no, then the really cool photos have to happen one at a time here and there.
I get them regardless, one way or another.

Darren Troy C · December 30, 2009

MissB wrote:

got it.. so I pretty much need to ask for them to budget some time for formals... thats perfect. From my expierence weddings are so time budgeted that if that time isn't alloted in there..it may not get done.

Not being rude here, so please take this with a grain of salt. Of the METICULOUSLY SCHEDULED events I have attended (photographed)..... exactly NONE, ZERO...of them have lived up to the billing. Closely yes, but second for second, minute for minute, NO WAY!

IF YOU MISS THESE SHOTS you are opening yourself up to some very serious consequences! It is YOUR JOB to make sure they get the images they have asked for, regardless of issues at hand. Make sure someone knows that you "have tried/are trying" to get them completed. At least that way you have a witness as to why you missed some of the most important images a bride will ever have!

Darren Troy C · December 30, 2009

zoomer wrote:

My hat is figuratively off to those of you that schedules work for.
For me someone is always late and the schedule goes in the toilet.
In order to get 10 or 15 minutes to create those really cool photos you will need to be assertive and take the time.
When I see my window of opportunity I remind the bride why she hired me and that now is the time I need to make photos, if she says yeah lets go then the photos happen, if she says no, then the really cool photos have to happen one at a time here and there.
I get them regardless, one way or another.

EXACTLY !!

MissB · December 30, 2009

Darren Troy C wrote:

Not being rude here, so please take this with a grain of salt. Of the METICULOUSLY SCHEDULED events I have attended (photographed)..... exactly NONE, ZERO...of them have lived up to the billing. Closely yes, but second for second, minute for minute, NO WAY!

IF YOU MISS THESE SHOTS you are opening yourself up to some very serious consequences! It is YOUR JOB to make sure they get the images they have asked for, regardless of issues at hand. Make sure someone knows that you "have tried/are trying" to get them completed. At least that way you have a witness as to why you missed some of the most important images a bride will ever have!

I've given a "must have" list in the past.. and asked for specific family shot combonations that keep me organized and on track. I think that being a creative mind can be hindering sometimes when it comes to organization. I guess what Im trying to figure out... im not worried about the "important shots" those will get done come hell or high water.. its the fun.. creative bride and groom portraits... I'd like to focus on my next wedding. with the madness of family/ party portraits and sceduling around that. If the bride and groom don't want to see eachother until after the wedding ceremony...how is that worked in? How long to make the guests wait at the reception to get these done??? Do you ever take the clients away from the locations to shoot?

I dont know.. could be redundant. I just didnt want to give the vibe that that I hadn't recognized the importance of the must have shots.

WillCAD · December 31, 2009

MissB wrote:

I've given a "must have" list in the past.. and asked for specific family shot combonations that keep me organized and on track. I think that being a creative mind can be hindering sometimes when it comes to organization. I guess what Im trying to figure out... im not worried about the "important shots" those will get done come hell or high water.. its the fun.. creative bride and groom portraits... I'd like to focus on my next wedding. with the madness of family/ party portraits and sceduling around that. If the bride and groom don't want to see eachother until after the wedding ceremony...how is that worked in? How long to make the guests wait at the reception to get these done??? Do you ever take the clients away from the locations to shoot?

I dont know.. could be redundant. I just didnt want to give the vibe that that I hadn't recognized the importance of the must have shots.

Most of the weddings I've attended have had at least an hour between the end of the ceremony and the beginning of the reception. The time is used for the guests to get settled in the venue, and for the photos. Guests expect that wait time; they know that the photographer is taking the posed shots at the church. The delay gives the guests time to use the bathroom, make phone calls, get some refreshment (the bars are usually open at the venue during the wait, and sometimes there are snacks provided).

And I have seen remote locations used for the shoot, too. It's a fairly common thing in downtown Baltimore for the wedding party to detour to Federal Hill Park between church and hall for a photo shoot. Here is an example from a local photographer's blog:
http://www.studiomathewes.com/blog/2008/07/hot_june_wedding.html

Again, delays between ceremony and reception for photos are common, and expected by both clients and guests. How long a delay is entirely up to the clients, but I've never seen a wedding party that seemed so impatient to get to the reception that they wanted to cut the photo shoot short. This time is built in and completely normal; I've never been to a formal wedding that didn't have it, and most of the informal quick weddings I've seen have had at least a few minutes delay for pics. Heck, I've been to informal quickie weddings where there was no pro photographer, but the wedding party still stopped for posed shots taken by their friends and relatives between ceremony and reception.

It's vital to do these posed shots before the reception, because when the party starts, the music plays, and the alcohol flows, the jackets come off, hair gets mussed, people get tipsy, and dancers get sweaty, all of which looks bad in formal posed photos. It's important to get the posed shots of bride and groom before they get sweaty, tipsy, or spill anything on their gowns and tuxes. The best time for that is immediately following the ceremony, before the reception begins.

FYI: Most of the time, some relatives and friends will hang around with the wedding party and take their own pics as the photographer poses the group. Photographers don't have a problem with that, so long as the relatives and friends don't block their shots.

Darren Troy C · December 31, 2009

MissB wrote:

I've given a "must have" list in the past.. and asked for specific family shot combonations that keep me organized and on track. I think that being a creative mind can be hindering sometimes when it comes to organization. I guess what Im trying to figure out... im not worried about the "important shots" those will get done come hell or high water.. its the fun.. creative bride and groom portraits... I'd like to focus on my next wedding. with the madness of family/ party portraits and sceduling around that. If the bride and groom don't want to see eachother until after the wedding ceremony...how is that worked in? How long to make the guests wait at the reception to get these done??? Do you ever take the clients away from the locations to shoot?

I dont know.. could be redundant. I just didnt want to give the vibe that that I hadn't recognized the importance of the must have shots.

Gotcha! Sorry, I may have misunderstood.

For me personally, everything after formals is pretty much "off the hip" stuff unless the bride and groom step away with me for some time of their own. I try to assure that for every event but sometimes they want to cut loose and enjoy their family and guests. Ultimately, preparedness is key I suppose.

bmoreshooter · December 31, 2009

It seems that everybody keeps wandering back to the "formals". I don't think that is the question. I believe that this post is about the creative photos that make some weddings a little more attractive than others. I think there are two distint schools of thought when it comes to shooting "specials". The first is usually seen at higer end weddings where the b&g are paying for more creativity. They will tend to provide more shooting time since they are the ones looking for something special. At the other end of the scale you usually have to catch special shots on the fly. Every wedding that you book will be different based on the client and what they expect. This can be a problem when you present your best wedding samples that were taken at a wedding where you had everything going your way. The next wedding may only allow you a few minutes to take pictures but still expect what they saw on your web site or proof album. Many photographers have a clause spelled out in their contract to cover this.

zoomer · December 31, 2009

WillCAD wrote:

.
but I've never seen a wedding party that seemed so impatient to get to the reception that they wanted to cut the photo shoot short. This time is built in and completely normal;

Really!!!???
I see it all the time. They want to get to the party as soon as physically possible most of the time and the family and friends are dragging them there.

When the schedule does work I shoot the special shots of the bride and groom after formals before they do the reception.
Best case scenario the bride and groom see each other before the wedding and then (if some family member didn't show up an hour late) there is lots of time to get their special pictures.

Usually either the bride and girls spend to much time getting their hair and makeup done, sometimes two hours, or a family member shows up VERY late. Don't know why it is but almost always someone from the brides family. Then I am left to scramble...which I do so often I expect it anymore.
I try to pick moments when the bride and groom are having fun and appear unstressed then I will just grab a quick special shot here and there...

MissB · December 31, 2009

bmoreshooter wrote:

It seems that everybody keeps wandering back to the "formals". I don't think that is the question. I believe that this post is about the creative photos that make some weddings a little more attractive than others. I think there are two distint schools of thought when it comes to shooting "specials". The first is usually seen at higer end weddings where the b&g are paying for more creativity. They will tend to provide more shooting time since they are the ones looking for something special. At the other end of the scale you usually have to catch special shots on the fly. Every wedding that you book will be different based on the client and what they expect. This can be a problem when you present your best wedding samples that were taken at a wedding where you had everything going your way. The next wedding may only allow you a few minutes to take pictures but still expect what they saw on your web site or proof album. Many photographers have a clause spelled out in their contract to cover this.

yes.. this is exactly what im talking about.. thank you!

WillCAD · January 1, 2010

MissB wrote:

yes.. this is exactly what im talking about.. thank you!

Okay, I get it now. I was on the wrong subject entirely.

Getting specials is a major hassle. Once the party starts, dragging most cients away from their guests for even five minutes is like pulling teeth. I've seen photographers take as much as 30 minutes to coerce the clients out of the hall into another area for five minutes of specialty shots.

What seems to work best is to actually budget some time for the specialty shots between the formals and the reception. The couples I've seen do this were very enthusiastic about the idea of spending their first 15 or 20 minutes as husband and wife alone, with only the photographer there, posing for some specialty shots. One of my cousins did just that at Federal Hill Park (same park as the blog I posted earldoer mentions). He and his wife went to the park with their primary photographer while their guests enjoyed cocktails at the reception venue. The second shooter stayed behind as well, and shot a few candids of the guests.

On a wedding where I worked as second shooter, we took the clients outside to a gazeebo for some specialty shots. This didn't take long, since the location was just outside the hall, and the clients were happy to have some breathing time between the formals and the reception. They were also eager to see the specialty shots and were very happy with them.

MissB · January 1, 2010

WillCAD wrote:

Okay, I get it now. I was on the wrong subject entirely.

Getting specials is a major hassle. Once the party starts, dragging most cients away from their guests for even five minutes is like pulling teeth. I've seen photographers take as much as 30 minutes to coerce the clients out of the hall into another area for five minutes of specialty shots.

What seems to work best is to actually budget some time for the specialty shots between the formals and the reception. The couples I've seen do this were very enthusiastic about the idea of spending their first 15 or 20 minutes as husband and wife alone, with only the photographer there, posing for some specialty shots. One of my cousins did just that at Federal Hill Park (same park as the blog I posted earldoer mentions). He and his wife went to the park with their primary photographer while their guests enjoyed cocktails at the reception venue. The second shooter stayed behind as well, and shot a few candids of the guests.

On a wedding where I worked as second shooter, we took the clients outside to a gazeebo for some specialty shots. This didn't take long, since the location was just outside the hall, and the clients were happy to have some breathing time between the formals and the reception. They were also eager to see the specialty shots and were very happy with them.

Perfect...I think the one bride I have in mind would definatly be game for scheduling some specialty time in as she really appreciates the photography.

joshhuntnm · January 2, 2010

heatherfeather wrote:

Most of you know this, but I use scheduling like crazy. It is built into my contract pricing and is adjusted for each bride... if they are seeing each other before ceremony or not...with the photo list customized to exactly what the bride wants.

If they are seeing each other before hand, (and I encourage this very strongly) most of the photos are finished before the ceremony. If not, then 3/4 of them are... and just don't have both the bride and groom in the photo. I hate to have guests waiting, so we do our best to get all the work photos (ha ha... the fun ones) done before the party starts.

I design up a custom schedule (with their colors and theme) and email it to the client and also snail mail a couple of hard copies for them to have on hand. The email one is great because it can be sent out to the wedding party and family on their iphones... and the hard copies are great for the scrapbook and the grandmas without iphones.

Here is a "seeing each other before hand" one:

And a "not seeing each other before the ceremony" one, though not a typical wedding schedule:

Hope that helps a bit. The schedule timeline is totally customized for each bride and situation, so these are just examples of a couple of them. But I got to tell you, brides love them because they know when to schedule their hair appts and what time to begin putting on the gown ect. I also schedule quite a bit more time for each thing to make up for folks running late. But if we actually GET that much time, then I consider it a huge bonus!

how do you get them to keep to the schedule? In my experience everything but the ceremony itself is notoriously late.

heatherfeather · January 2, 2010

joshhuntnm wrote:

how do you get them to keep to the schedule? In my experience everything but the ceremony itself is notoriously late.

It is really no problem... in fact it solves many of the problems of leaving the planning of the day to the bride. The beauty of the schedule is that it gives a foundation for the bride to be on time. Since I backwards schedule from the ceremony, we first make a list of combinations and then put them in the order that makes sense. Note that most of these are NOT formals. These are scheduled moments for creativity with the clients and their wedding party. It is a rare client that wants to have them all in the "line em up" style. before the photos we schedule all the things the bride has to get done first. If she knows that she has to get up at xx and be to the salon and have her hair done by xx and then get to the venue and get her gown on by xx than she is far more likely to give me the time that we plan for. The brides that I work with LOVE having a clue about when that stuff needs to happen, and the security of knowing that they can have a wedding that starts on time AND make the most of their photography coverage.

Oh and one other thing... I always schedule an additional 45 minutes for bridal prep if the gown is lace up

Elaine · January 2, 2010

heatherfeather wrote:

It is really no problem... in fact it solves many of the problems of leaving the planning of the day to the bride. The beauty of the schedule is that it gives a foundation for the bride to be on time. Since I backwards schedule from the ceremony, we first make a list of combinations and then put them in the order that makes sense. Note that most of these are NOT formals. These are scheduled moments for creativity with the clients and their wedding party. It is a rare client that wants to have them all in the "line em up" style. before the photos we schedule all the things the bride has to get done first. If she knows that she has to get up at xx and be to the salon and have her hair done by xx and then get to the venue and get her gown on by xx than she is far more likely to give me the time that we plan for. The brides that I work with LOVE having a clue about when that stuff needs to happen, and the security of knowing that they can have a wedding that starts on time AND make the most of their photography coverage.

Oh and one other thing... I always schedule an additional 45 minutes for bridal prep if the gown is lace up

From a non-wedding shooter...Heather, I love that you do this. The fact that you make the schedule attractive, personal and accessible to the entire party is great. I so wish someone had done that for me when I got married. We had an evening wedding and didn't want to make the guests wait and wait for the reception, as that would have been very late. So we chose to get the photos done before the wedding. But nobody thought about making it special in any way for us. And...we somehow ended up with NO photos of just the two of us. I had some special bridal shots, and we had one quick one right after the ceremony when my dress had already been bustled up, but we had nothing special of the two of us from that day. Of course, you get what you pay for...we allowed a friend to shoot our wedding as a gift. If I only knew then what I know now. We ended up going to a pro, three months later, for some special shots at the beach.

I've read that a lot of higher-end photogs encourage their B&Gs to have a first look shoot, where they see each other before the ceremony, but it's private and special and the photog gets some time with just the two of them to be creative. That's what I wish we had had. It seems that if there is a wedding coordinator involved, they could also be a big help to make sure this happens in a timely manner (if they're good).

when do you all get those great posed pictures

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