Traditional Wedding Photography Group Shots
I recently stumbled over a great tip from wedding photographer extraordinaire Jasmine Star. I thought I would share it with anyone reading this blog as it’s a real scorcher. Granted, not a resident in Bristol, but she writes a great blog and regularly shares her inspiring work. I’m always after tips to improve the efficiency of photographing weddings, especially the formals. Formal shots can be fun to shoot and Bristol has some great traditional wedding locations. When you mix this with my modern style of photography the results are always great to look and make long lasting memories that I am proud of.
That said formal shots aren’t traditionally a fun thing for the bride and groom or the guests. Understandably they would rather be spending time together rather than looking at me behind a black box! The one thing that slows the process down is the organisation of people. Up until now I have always started with the Bride and then worked my way up to the whole wedding party. This has worked well and I can get the whole thing done in about 30-40 minutes. My assistant ticks off the shots as we go and lets me know which shot comes next.
Jasmine recommends you do the opposite. Start with a big group. Pose them well and then strip away the guests, friends and then the family with each shot. This saves people hanging around who are not needed until the end. It also saves a lot of reposing with every shot taken. My next wedding has an unusually large number of formal shots. There are about 25 as the bride has a large number of relatives coming from overseas. It’s going to take a long time whatever method I use but I’m hoping this method will shave a few minutes off what will be a long session.
Doing new things is sometimes a bit scary but I’m relatively confident this will work wonders.
