First posting
This is for wedding professionals. DJ, Photographer, Videographer, Hair & Make-up, Florist, Venue, Justice of the peace (any one performing a sevice at the wedding). Don’t steal the thunder from the newly married couple. Let them have first posting in regards to the beautiful photos i’ve just done. I explain myself better in the blog vs. this little summary.
Imagine if it was your wedding and the photographer, dj or make-up artist got to announce to all your friends and family (that night or the day after) that you got married and share the most iconic photos (the professional ones) with everyone before you got to announce it?
One of my favorite things to do with my photos is to share them. That means with bride & groom, venue, dj, florists, hair & make up. But i’ve found that I have to provide a little context of how and when to share these photos. I’m making this post because I have had vendors take the initiative and post anywhere from a single photo to dozens of my professional photos of the bridal couple before the bride and groom have had a chance to arrive home and unpack from the wedding day.
Give the bride & groom (groom & groom, bride & bride) first posting (explaining further). That doesn’t mean you can’t post photos of the wedding day or night. This just means that you don’t tag them the first few days or so. You want to give the bridal couple a chance to announce to the world (friends, family) that something big went down (their wedding). When I make my initial posting about the wedding day i’ll usually post one or two of my favorites and tag the venue, quick little excerpt from the day and that’s about it to start. Once I see the bride and groom are posting days later or a week later thats when I allow myself to tag them on social. Remember that due to some social media privacy settings if you do tag them then all of their friends and family will see it in their newsfeed before they’ve made it public.
The night of the wedding they will expect their friends and family to post photos of where they are, tagging the lovely couple and including selfies and shots of the two at the alter. The following day they’ll still receive photos from friends and family on their social media, they’re riding high with all these posts. The two might make a post thanking everyone (sometimes vendors, I love it when this happens), this is when a formal photo is uploaded of their choosing or dozens of photos put up. The two have spent months, a year or two planning this big day and now they get to revel in all the likes, praises, congratulatory talk that one expects and accepts for just a tremendous day; don’t ruin it for them by taking away any of that thunder.
So now that the official photos are up and the bride and groom (groom & groom, bride & bride) have made it clear the they’re married, now you should tag them. I usually like to wait until after I see posts on their end dying down. I like to give them their due fifteen minutes of fame. I know that it won’t get lost amongst a sea of cell phone photos during the week of the wedding. This is a post i’ve wanted to make for awhile. It’s hard to explain to someone in person about when they should post and why. I’ll summarize it briefly below in simpler terms for ease of use.
If I’ve given you the link to the teaser photos for the wedding, it’s because I want you to have them, I want you to use them. You don’t even have to tag me in them (although I do love it when you do. You don’t even have to ask permission beyond this point).
Wedding day: Thank the bridal couple, tag your business, maybe a selfie with them or a cell phone photo
Following day: Thank the bride couple, tag your business, maybe a selfie with them or a cell phone photo. A professional photo without tagging them, tag your business, venue, other vendors
After you see the newly married couple posting the professional photos: You’re golden, post whatever you would like at this point and tag them.
Hope you’ve enjoyed this post and will take it into consideration when you make posts in the future. I only put this together because it’s really hard to explain to someone who might be in the same room as the bridal couple about how they can use my photos (I give everyone the link to the teaser photos, I want everyone to win)
This is not a post dictating what to do with my “art” (shudder). I don’t have enough time to police all of my photos and patrol Facebook for infractions. This is just me saying “let the bridal couple enjoy their fifteen minutes of fame”.
Who steers the ship
You've hired a wedding photographer but on your wedding day you decide to direct them instead of enjoying the day, that's fine. But... how many weddings have you shot and do you have a method to get all the formals done in twenty minutes?
If you decide that you know more than the photographer it may cost you. That's not meant to sound like a threat, it's more of a small rant that will help put some of your wedding day into perspective. It's a fast paced day with lots of moving parts and lots of different vendors who do not want to mess anything up, this means everyone is making sure they perform exactly what they were hired for.
Most weddings will go off without a hitch, there are the small little hiccups which do happen. People arriving late, corsage mishaps, wrong colored shoes, missing socks. But most photographers have been to a few hundred more weddings than the bride and groom they are tasked to take photos of. This means if you decide to intervene throughout the wedding with ideas and direction it can cost you time and photos. One of my favorite parts about a wedding is guiding a bride throughout the day because i'm with her the entire day. I'm able to say that we're running on schedule or we're going to head back here and you're going to have a little break and then get introduced into the reception.
On your wedding day a wedding photographer will never argue with you, you're the boss. We've been hired to take photos and not to negotiate/argue on how you want it done. I totally understand the intervention that may happen when a bride thinks she needs to. It's a high stress day for the bride because she wants everything to be perfect. In my experience most brides don't relax or breath until after they've sat at the reception. My goal is to get amazing photos and maybe jump through a few hoops doing so. I also want to keep the bride and groom happy throughout all this. If your face shows stress on your wedding day it's going to show in the photos. You may not even remember doing this or ever see those photos because I will make sure they don't make the final cut.
During formal photos I have thirty to forty minutes to get the photos that you'll be hanging on your wall and passing down to future generations. I have a method, a path that I follow and a flow. We start off big, break it down, switch it up and eventually end up with just the bride and groom. If you decide you know better then the photographer we're going to let you do so. I've had brides direct formal photos before and we started with family and then bridal party and then back to family and then back to family and then the bride and groom and then bridal party and double the time. I write this as a warning to other brides to let the photographer steer the ship at certain key points. You've hired us for a reason. I certainly wouldn't be offering suggestions to a plumber or mechanic. I want to get you as many photos as possible.
On your wedding day, relax, enjoy, experience it. You don't have to keep track of everyones whereabouts, put someone in charge of that. Consider the day a stack of dominos, line them up and let it happen. You wouldn't start the line of dominion by tipping them and slowly readjusting them as the dominos fell. If you look worried or like you're yelling at people in your photos it's going to look just like that in your photos. I really want the best of you on your wedding day. It's not just a paycheck or an honest one if I don't think i've done everything possible to get you the best photos. So pucker up, smile and let your wedding day happen and enjoy your friends and family. No guests will ever notice the mistakes, I promise you.