For those of you that love photography and are asked to shoot your friends wedding! This may help.

So, You have a nice camera and a friend asked you to take their wedding pictures…Well, I hope this article will give you some good ideas no matter what decision you make or how much you were forced to do it. First of all, the bride and groom will tell you the following:
I understand you don’t do this for a living, but you have a nice camera and I have seen the pictures you take and they always look so great and sharp. I know you would do a great job at my wedding. We don’t have a lot of money and we would pay you for film and perhaps some cash for you! We really don’t expect too much and what ever you do is fine with us…Please!
Well, you just read one of the most common lies by a bride. They do care. They care more than they are willing to tell you!! This is the single most important day in the couple’s life and you have been asked to take pictures so that they can reflect on them and share them from generation to generation. There are many things to consider for a photographer covering a wedding. Did they ask you to take pictures in the bride’s house getting ready? Did they consider that the groom also needs pictures with his family before the wedding? How can you be at both homes at the same time two hours before the wedding? Once the ceremony is over you have to group families together and take post ceremony portraits of the families. Do you know the order of how to take the pictures? How much time will you need? Even simple things like dragging the shutter of the camera to get the altar shots with better depth and color. Bouncing the flash, bringing additional lights with umbrellas, tripods or fast lenses. Things like not shooting the large group shots with the wide angle lens to avoid distortion and to avoid head sizes to look dramatically larger and smaller from end to end of the group. There are so many other details that are standard procedures and requirements to successfully capture a wedding in pictures. Also keep in mind that if they ask you to cover their wedding, you may have two duties. The first is to cover the wedding and everything that happens. Your second duty is to be a friend. After all, if they ask you for help photographing the wedding, you must be a good friend and close enough for them to feel comfortable to ask you for this great favor. So, you may be approached by friends and family and asked to dance, eat, talk and visit with them while at the wedding. Things that you will not have time to do because you need to cover a wedding, and if you do “mingle with friends” you will miss important shots and special moments. Moments like when Grandma kissing the bride and looking at her ring. When the father of the bride and the groom sneak in one corner and talk man-to-man and gave each other a big hug. The bride will dance with her mom, siblings and friends. All these will come with no announcement or warning. They happen out of pure love and emotion. Moments that will need to be photographed and kept for ever.
Many other things to consider. Fast flash recycling times. Plenty of batteries for both camera and flash. How about if you are shooting digital. Digital is the best way to go nowadays. Today’s professional digital cameras produce better color and more control of your pictures and the resolution of a 6.0 megapixel camera will produce perfect 8X10 prints suitable for an album and display.I believe with no doubt that weddings should be done in RAW format. Tiffs will also do a pretty goood job. J-pegs however are of lesser quality and do not hold well when editing. If you compare an image taken in Raw or Tiff to a Jpeg, you will see a huge difference. J-pegs are lousy for wedding and important things. But, what if you have a digital camera that is too slow recording continuous files. What if the flash is not powerful enough and you can’t override settings to drag shutter and spot meter. All these points are vital for a wedding photographer. For all these reasons is that photographers charge their fees to cover a weddings. When you consider equipment, preparation, driving and the pressure of the wedding, any price is well worth it!
Following is a brief guide to covering a wedding.


If you are reading past the previous part, you were talked into photographing your friends wedding. These are my recommendations, so here we go:








The day of the wedding is about to start. For sake of a schedule, let’s say the wedding starts at 2:00. You should start by photographing the groom at his house or church. Where ever he agrees to be ready with his family and wedding party. Start at 10:30 and be done by 11:00. This will give you about one hour to pack, drive and make it to the brides location by 12:00 or so. The bride will take a little longer to get ready and she may run late. If you start on time photographing at 12:15. You should have plenty of time to photograph her with her parents and siblings, wedding party, additional family members and of course, by her self. They may ask you for pictures of her getting ready and you can pose and re-enact some of those. Now you are done by no later than 1:00. Just in time for the limo to arrive and you can take a couple of pictures of her inside the limo. If you use a “strobo frame” like bracket for your flash, you can swivel the flash to the side and take a picture from the passenger side of the limo through the small retractable window. This technique can also be done at the end of the ceremony or reception when the bride & groom drive away in the limo.
Now, you will be one of the last individuals to arrive at the church or wedding hall since you may be a couple of minutes behind the limo after you load up and organize your equipment.
Now you are at the wedding. This is the usual photography procedure. Bride’s maid coming down the isle, flower girl and bride with dad. At the end of the runway, you will photograph dad as he gives away the bride and gently kisses her on the cheek and maybe shakes the groom’s hand. This is what you need to know. Find out the order of events at the altar. Rings exchanged, vows, lighting of the candles, special flower presentations to the parents, first kiss. For some of these things there is no particular fixed order. Make sure you know so that you are ready to capture the moment. Then they come down the isle with a big smile waiving and laughing with everybody. The wedding party will follow right behind and they should be photographed as they walk in couples. Camera and flash recycling time is a big factor for these images.
The next part is the post wedding portraits. This can be the most challenging part of the day. I have a system that works pretty darn well for me. I hope it works for you.
I like to have everybody’s name that needs to be in the post ceremony portraits and I call them by their names. I ask for this list days before the wedding. Everybody in the list is asked to sit until they hear their name. I then do this with a smile and I thank them for their patience! I start with the bride’s parents with the bride & groom. I continue in this order: Brides Parents & siblings, Brides Parents, siblings and extended family. Grand parents and uncles as requested to mix and match.
Then I bring the ENTIRE matching group from the groom’s side. This is the GRAND GROUP SHOT of both families! After this series of pictures, I you dismiss the bride’s family with the exception of those family members in the bridal party and you reverse the process with the grooms family: Grooms Parents, siblings and extended family, Grooms Parents and siblings, Grooms Parents and now you are ready for the bridal party group shots. Standard procedure. There are plenty of mix and match with a lively group. Some of the bride and groom with both sides of the wedding party, some with just the groom’s men, with the bride’s maid, and so on. Make a plan and consult with the bride ahead of time. Then, once you are done with this series of shots, dismiss everybody but the bride & groom. You have their undivided attention. Perfect, No distractions! Start with pictures of the bride alone at the altar, Take a couple of the entire dress with the train fully extended. Take a couple of different angles and lighting patterns. Move in close for tight head shots and then bring the groom in. Take portraits of the couple in tight head shots, ¾ body shots and full body shots. Remember that in some of these pictures, you may need additional strobes & umbrellas and drag the shutter to light the background-back of the church or hall. This makes a huge difference in image quality. Believe it or not, it takes me about 20-30 minutes to take all these shots. Now I am ready to follow them to the limo for the pictures of them stepping into the car. Remember to take a picture of them sitting in the back of the limo from the driver side of the car. The retractable window of the limo should be down. Flip the strobo-frame to the side and have a picture of them kissing. Now you are ready to pack your stuff and drive to the reception.


You will be the last to arrive. Try to find parking at the reception hall and be ready to photograph them as they are introduced into the reception hall for the possible first dance or toast. Catch your breath!



At the reception hall, talk to the D.J. Make sure you know the schedule of events. This is what you should look out for at the reception:
Couple’s court introduction ,Bride & Groom First Dance, First Dance – parents, Toast, Cake, Garter, Bouquet, Table candid, Going away. There are many more pictures to take. The bride, groom and family will pull you aside and ask you to take pictures of them with their friends and long lost relatives. Funny things will happen. The groom will dance with his best man. The bride will dance with all her friends to Cyndi Lauper’s Girl just want to have fun! They will do the YMCA, Electric Slide, Chicken Dance and many other fun moments that make the wedding a fun lasting memory. And you were asked to help them capture this day.

Do your home work. Go to the wedding with a “game plan” and be ready for delays, batteries dying on you and running behind the couple all night. You may or may not get a chance to sit down and eat, so have a big breakfast and snack any time you can. Wear comfortable shoes and be dressed like a guest. Suit & Tie is my choice. I blend in and do not stick out from the rest of the guests.
Other things not covered in detail are flash photography at the church. Many times is not allowed to use flash during the ceremony and the church in nothing short of a bear cave. If they hired a Videographer, you will need to learn to share space.
Delivery of the product is another complicated subject when photographing a wedding as a favor. If you shoot film, your cost for film, developing and an album will exceed $150.00 even if you take the film to a drug store photo lab. Take about 10 rolls of 36 exposure film (35mm) or 20 rolls of 120 film (645 or 6X6). They may offer to pay you back for this expense. In that case, purchase professional film and take it to a pro lab for the best results and less chance of damage to the film.


I hope this sheds some light of what’s expected. There are more, way more things to consider. Posing, light and schedules should be planed. Once again, I wish you luck and I hope you enjoy photographing your friends wedding as much as I do my customers. After the flowers die, the wedding cake is gone, the tuxedos returned and the first mortgage payment is sent, all they have to remember their wedding is the photography. It should not be taken lightly!



Best Regards,


Gil