Photographing your wedding preparations is about letting the day unfold and capturing some of the best moments with your Bridesmaids and Groomsmen. The morning of your wedding day can be a little chaotic, so I’ve put together some helpful tips that you (or your Bridal party) can organise before your photographer arrives.
SHOWER AND HAVE LUNCH
Do the essential things like shower and have lunch nice and early. If you only have a short window of time with your photographer for Groom’s preparation photos, make sure everyone is showered and has their outfits ironed and ready to go.
If you don’t feel like a big lunch, have some nibbles laid out for you to snack on. I’m obsessed with platters and these look nice if they’re in the background of your photographs (rather than a plastic bag of potato chips, as much as I also love potato chips).
PUT YOUR SUITS AND DRESS ON DISPLAY
Photographers love details. Take your suits and dresses out of any protective laundry bags, cut off any tags and unpick any temporary stitching on the backs of suits. Hang your garments on a curtain rail or a ledge. Try and do all of this before your photographer arrives so it’s not something you need to worry about later on while you’re in the middle of having photos taken.
AVOID SMALL AND DARK HOTEL ROOMS
Often the Groom and his Groomsmen will get ready at a separate location to the Bride and ceremony location. If preparation photos are an important part of your day put some thought into the location for these photos. A cramped hotel room with minimal natural light isn’t going to be the easiest space for your photographer. Instead, look into booking an Airbnb or something similar which has more space and style.
OTHER DETAILS
Gather other items like shoes, the rings, a wedding invite, buttonholes, etc and place them somewhere obvious for your photographer, so they can create more detail images for you.
PLAN THE LOGISTICS
Know what time your photographer is arriving and plan any important photos around this. I recommend a maximum of 2 hours for the girl’s preparation photos. Preparation photos often look better once the Brides makeup (or hair) is complete, you can then get some touch-up photographs and the most important part which is putting on the Brides dress.
The guys don’t tend to need as long for preparation photos, I recommend 1-hour max. Make sure the Groom and his Groomsmen hold off getting fully dressed until the photographer arrives, they can leave suit jackets off and wait to pin the buttonholes. Sometimes we have arrived and the guys are fully dressed and ready to go which leaves us with no authentic and natural moments to photograph, which often means we have to stage photographs that the guys don’t tend to enjoy doing!
