Timings on Your Wedding Day – Advice for Brides and Grooms

Something that most people don’t have much experience with, especially if you’re doing a DIY wedding and don’t have a wedding planner or coordinator, is figuring out how long everything takes on your wedding day and fitting everything in that you want.

Here I aim to share my advice on timings from a photography perspective to make sure you get the most from your wedding day photographer.

I usually share my advice and go through all the timings with my clients a week or two before their wedding (keeps it all fresh in the mind!) but it helps to think about these things in advance. Hopefully this information is useful to both Brides & Grooms, as well as other photographers.

Getting Ready

If I’m photographing the bride getting ready in the morning before the wedding, I’d usually arrive 2 hours before the ceremony. This is usually enough time to photograph the hair and make-up artist doing finishing touches, get some detail shots of flowers, shoes, jewellery etc, and do some lovely portraits before everyone leaves for the ceremony.

Things to think about:

Be ready early than late, and that goes for the bridesmaids too! Bridesmaids need to be completely ready before the bride has started putting on her dress, so that they can fully help out with doing the dress up and any finishing touches. It helps if the bridesmaids are there fully ready, to keep the atmosphere relaxed and make the photos more fun. Don’t be afraid to tell the hair and make-up artist the time you want to be ready, to make sure all hair and make-up is done to time, not just the time you need to leave for the ceremony. The worst thing is when either the hair and make-up artist, or bridesmaids, make the bride late and there’s no time for any portraits.

Bridal portraits – Everyone needs to aim to be completely ready AT LEAST half an hour before you need to leave, if not before – this is a good time to do portraits of the bride and her bridesmaids, and also photos with the brides parent(s).

Why not do some bridal boudoir photography in your wedding underwear before your dress goes on (shut everyone else out of course!) – it will give you a big confidence boost ready for being in the limelight! It can easily be done if you allow enough time – I’d recommend allowing at least half an hour (although I’ve done it before in 20 minutes) to get some beautiful, relaxed, and  gorgeous boudoir images – that will make your new husband’s eyes pop out when you get your wedding photos after the big day!

Groom getting ready – If you want photography of the groom and his best man, ushers getting ready, morning banter or some handsome groom portraits, book a second photographer! This is included with my Diamond Wedding Package, or is just £250 extra

After the Ceremony, Before the Wedding Breakfast

In this time, people aren’t always sure of what they should be doing or worry about their guests getting bored. The best thing to do if budget allows, is to organise some form of entertainment, like live music for people to listen to, or if there’s lots of kids, a magician goes down well with all ages. But trust me, once people get nattering time flies by and they won’t even notice you’ve gone off for photos.

Things to think about:

After the ceremony – If you’re having a church wedding or doing the legal bit at a registry office and going onto a reception venue, it’s always good to allow at least 20 minutes after you come out of the ceremony for people to congratulate you, and then organise everyone to throw confetti. Possibly even do a few family group photos if time allows, to break up the time everyones waiting around for group photos.

Group photos – don’t go overboard on group photos (if you want any at all). Think carefully about who you would like to see grouped together in your wedding photos. Small family groups can be done informally throughout the day – tell family members to just come up to the photographer and get a group family photo at some point in the afternoon when everyone’s just standing around chatting.

Group photos that normally work best are bride & groom with: bridal party (bridesmaids, best man, ushers), parents, immediate family, all family, everyone, all friends. Any more than that and people start getting bored hanging around waiting for photos, and there will always be an Auntie Anne who’s gone to the loo just when she’s needed, or an Uncle Bob who’s nipped off to the bar! I do think people should have a say in which groups they want though, because everyone’s different, and by rule of thumb try to keep it to 2-3 minutes per group.

Bride & Groom photos – this is the time to chill out for a bit away from your guests and absorb the fact that you are now a married couple. I LOVE it when brides and grooms want to spend lots of time just on their photos. This allows me to get really creative because I love to create a beautiful mix of images – some close up, some from afar, some fun and happy, some thoughtful capturing a moment. I don’t like to over-pose though and like to just let the bride and groom be themselves, whilst giving a bit of direction when needed.

I usually spend at least half an hour just with the bride and groom before the wedding breakfast. If the reception venue doesn’t have anywhere particularly inspiring or much in the way of grounds where we can wonder off, we could go for a short car journey to somewhere nearby or on the way from the ceremony, which will obviously have to allow a bit of extra time. Sometimes unfortunately the weather isn’t on our side, in which case we could either take some white umbrellas out and still do the photos in the rain, or just do some inside in the bridal suite or elsewhere in the wedding venue.

Receiving line – This is what family members try to insist on having so they can congratulate and receive congratulations on the newlyweds. I generally advise people to avoid a receiving line because it can get a little tedious for everyone, especially if you’ve already spoken to most of them already. During one wedding, I had a bride who nearly fainted because she just needed to eat and drink something, and a groom who abandoned the receiving line to go and get a beer! However, if timing is tight and it’s really important to you that everyone is photographed, then this is a good option to capture each individual congratulating the happy couple…

After the Wedding Breakfast:

If you’re having the whole day photographed up to the first dance (assuming you’re having a first dance) then there’s usually a gap of an hour or two after the meal and speeches. This is a good time for people to socialise, and get some more photos of friends and family getting more merry!

Things to think about:

More bride & groom photos! It’s a very good time to get some evening / sunset photos of the bride and groom if you’re up for it, especially if we didn’t get much time before the meal. You may not be too bothered at the time but you’ll thank me and yourselves afterwards once you see the images!

Evening Entertainment – photos of friends and family talking to each other are made even better and more animated when they are getting involved with some kind of entertainment, whether it be a photo booth with silly costumes, a magician amazing everyone with card tricks, Singstar on the Wii, giant Twister… lots to think about!

First dance – not everyone loves to dance, but if I’m there to photograph it you may as well make the most of it! Think about maybe learning a dance to your chosen song, or get some dancing lessons, rather than just shuffling round in circles for the first few minutes (and please don’t stop dancing before the end of the song) – it makes for much better photos and gets better reactions from your friends and family.

Hopefully I’ve covered everything and as and when I think of any more helpful info I will add it to this blog.

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Do get in touch if you’d like a full wedding pricelist and to check my availability.

Thanks, Ginny x