Anyone have their wedding pictures done before the wedding?

Question

I want to have my pictures done before the wedding and no one I know has done it this way. My FI and I are going to be 30 and live together so we are not worried about "seeing" the bride thing.... we much rather get our moneys worth eating shrimp puffs and sipping champange at the receiption :) Plus our guest will be able to go straight to the ballroom with no wait or inbetween time!
How did it go- like how much time did you need before the wedding and then after the wedding for pictures.
Any suggestion would help!!
Thanks!

Answer 1

There are three basic ways of doing wedding pictures. I have done several weddings like you are talking about.

You need to do the math yourself to get the correct answer but I will give you the formula that I use.

How many photos do you want to take
How many people in the photos
How organized are the families

I then come up with the number of minutes needed.

For example, the last wedding I shot I did 56 individual shots before the wedding. Not counting retakes for blinking and such.

It took about 90 minutes.

Everyone was told what pictures they were going to be in so they knew to wait
Everyone was ready to do the pictures and not off with other guests
Everyone had been given a card letting them know which pictures they were in and all I had to do was call out the image number we were taking. They would then look at thier card and either step out of the way, or come up front.

I actually like it this way better as when done before the wedding I do not have to wait for people to show up, take their own pictures, etc. All of which is fine but often the church only gives you so much time.

If you have further questions feel free to email me and I can give you more details

Answer 2

Well my fiance and I were just deciding on times two nights ago. We are marrying next May 20 at 3:30 pm and then having some cheese and fruit presented before the meal while we have our pics taken. We plan to then return for this little reception and mingle with guests a bit before eating supper between 6 - 8 pm. During the meal we will do the toasting thing and give speeches after everyone is done eating. Then the dance will go from 8 pm - 1 am. As far as having pics taken prior, and we are older than you two - I'm 51 and she's 49 and both have previous marriages, I think it would take away a bit of the excitement of the day. I have also seen my fiance's dress and don't tell anyone but was there when she bought it and so have sen he in it also. Ha! But do whatever makes you two happy. I have never heard of anyone doing this before but suppose you could put pics up for guests to see also. My preference would be to go the traditional way and have pics taken after ceremony. Have a fantastic wedding and great life together as Mr. and Mrs...

Answer 3

Almost everyone I know had pictures done before the wedding so that the pictures could be displayed at the reception. As long as you aren't wearing your COMPLETE wedding outfit, then the whole "not seeing the bride before the wedding" thing doesn't count according to superstitions I read online, so just leave something off and you'll be fine. Besides, I think that has more to do with the day of the wedding than anything else. And it's just a superstition! It's your wedding, take charge and do things the way you want to do them, or you will regret it. I got really busy with decorating and my mother-in-law decided to go ahead and decorate my arch without my consent. I absolutely HATED it, it was nothing like how I wanted it, and now I'm determined to have a vow renewal just so I can decorate my own arch and say "SEE, THIS IS HOW IT WAS SUPPOSED TO LOOK, NOT ALL TRASHY LIKE BEFORE"! But then that's my issue, not yours.

Answer 4

There is nothing like the look on your faces on the actual day of your wedding, so as a photographer, I would suggest that you have your photo's done before the ceremony. That way, you can include brides maids, groomsmen and family and friends. With a good photographer, it shouldn't take more than an hour and a half.

Then, of course, have photo's taken during the ceremony and at the reception as well.

I don't know of anyone that has done it prior to the wedding, but if that is your wish, so be it. It's just kind of a pain to get all dolled up and such twice, don't ya' think?

Answer 5

My wedding was at 4:00 with cocktails starting at 6:00 so we had no choice but to do the pictures first. I wanted a 4:00 wedding because I hate it when people get married at 1:30 and then you can't go to the reception hall until 5 or 6:00! I got married October 9th so the sun goes down earlier, we had the best light at 1:00 and did all the pictures with the parents, siblings, wedding party and grandparents.
We also lived together in our house and let me tell you that it is not a big deal seeing eachother beforehand.
Actually, my hair and makeup was fresh-I hadn't cried yet, he had not seen my dress either up until the photoshoot and I got to stop in at the hairdresser's one more time before the reception and we all got to toast and get pumped up together as a group with the wedding party and parents...It was awesome like going into the superbowl or something.

Answer 6

It's becoming more common for people to do the pics before the wedding. I wish we would have done that. Guests do get kind of annoyed waiting for the bridal party to arrive at the reception so that the party can get started. Since you don't care about the groom seeing you before the ceremony, then do the pics first. Another option would be to do the pics of you and your bridesmaids and him and his groomsmen first and do the ones of you and him after the ceremony. Just a thought, but I see nothing wromg with doing them all first. As far as the ring pics, you can do those after the ceremony. Then it would just take a few minutes for you guys to hit the reception. Good luck and remember it's yours and your fiance's day, nobody elses.

Answer 7

First -- of course you can get your pictures done before the wedding. I would suggest still doing pictures the day of the wedding though. If you want to see each other before the actual ceremony, go for it. It is your day.

Second -- Our pictures went well because we gave our photographer a list of the pictures that we wanted and who we wanted in them. This prevented the "missed" shot that we so badly would have wanted after the fact. We just put together a spreadsheet of who, where, title, etc. and the photographer called it out. It didn't sound like a roll call of names either ...

Third -- We did GIRL pictures and GUY pictures and then we did group shots. Both groups had 45 minutes to shoot. For group shots we did the bridal party and then family pictures. This took about 2 hours. Let me explain that it took forever because we had a HUGE wedding party. Nine on each side, 2 ushers, 1 flower girl, 2 ring bearers (twin 4 year olds -- so cute!), Godparents, Bride's family (my parents are divorced), both sides of the Bride's family, Groom's family (all of them ... my Husband is 100% Italian).

Lastly -- I had prepared the entire party to know that pictures were going to be done efficiently, that I had a checklist, and I told them before hand that no one was allowed to start drinking or eating until after their shots were done. We didn't want boozed up pictures with stains on the clothes.

Check out page 58-64 of the link below for questions for your photographer plus a ton of photographic poses:

http://www.blissweddings.com/wedding_planner/mini-planner.PDF

It was great and we love our pictures. Good luck!

-EZ

Answer 8

Actually it is very common in the asian community. Most of the people I know had their wedding picture's before the wedding so that they could have some of the pictures blown up and framed at the reception. Just ask your photographer how much time he needs to get it all set up and calculate how many pictures he needs to take during that time span

Answer 9

I'm doing my pics the same way, I would prefer him not see me, but I absolutly hate having a long wait time in between wedding and reception, so I refuse to do that to my guests, esspecially since we are having an off site reception. If guests get impatient, they will leave before we even get there, and their goes the huge chunk of change my dear ol' dad spent on food! I'm totally with you on it! My weddings at 6, and my photographer wants us there at 3:30....we can take our time and not have to rush this way, and we will be totally done before guests start arriving. I would rather have my photographer taking her time and doing things right rather than her rushing through to get us to the next place in half the time. I would stick with your plan, it sounds like it works for you, and it definetly works for me!

Answer 10

This was done at my wedding. Took about an hour of extra time before the wedding, but it worked out really well because we had an excellent photographer. He raised an interesting point. If you're worried about that superstition, why would you get married in the first place?