Bride’s Prayer – Things Wedding Photographers Shouldn’t Forget About

You think you’re a super professional photographer with a minute-by-minute plan of your work? That’s great! Probably, you’re a god of wedding photography and couples in love should be super happy to be your customers.

But, you know, it happens that people keep silence about some aspects of your cooperation. And you’ll never know that there’s something wrong in your relationships until some honest bride or groom put you up to some moments.

So here you can find 7 suggestions for wedding photographers which are worth thinking about (from my point of view). And that will be great if some of these tips help you to improve your work. Ok, let’s now start!

1. Men Don’t Like To Be Photographed

Photo by Two Ring Studios

Grooms are crazy about their beautiful brides and they are ready to pull up many trees for them, but…they can hardly bear several hours of being photographed. It’s not so easy to be in the spotlight for men.

Yeah, men pay photographers for taking great shots of their wedding day, but they are not ready for long photo sessions. Wedding brings strong emotions and many stressful moments to everybody and no one wants to be overloaded with a photographer who’s too obtrusive.

Nobody probably knows how a good wedding photographer should act to create a friendly and pleasant atmosphere. I mean, there is no rule of thumb for all cases. You just need to take care of your customers (first of all the bride and the groom) and give them short respites during a celebration. Give them a chance to feel like the king and the queen of the day and try to help a groom to at least withstand this day.
 

2. Constant Stress is Tiresome

Photo by Andy Guyton
 
When the wedding day will pass the young husband and wife will gladly look through hundreds of photos and remember precious moments of the day. But when a photo session lasts for several hours, everybody gets tired. Brides’ make-up melts under the sun, feet are chafed with new fancy shoes and the mood goes down.

So dear photographers, please remember that ordinary people aren’t used to hours-long photo races. It’s something new for them and they need several minutes to catch their breath. Really, it’s a hard work to smile for the camera.
 

3. Know When To Stop

Photo by GoodKarmaHippieMagic
 
You probably know that too much is not good. Everything should be within reasonable limits, even your photography skills.
 
Have you ever noticed that brides, grooms, bridesmaids and all guests want you to disappear? No? Then you’re a very lucky and a very professional photographer. I’ve been a guest in a wedding where a photographer was present everywhere at the same time. All day long he kept bugging all guests. Yes, I understand that he worked for money and waned to make hundreds and hundreds of shots, but the bride and the groom had to actually hide from him. That’s not ok. The worst thing was that everybody saw this situation and I doubt that somebody of the guests wanted to hire such photographer. And it didn’t matter if his photos were bad or good – there was too much of him (but I have to say that eventually his pictures were not bad).

4. People Fear the Camera

Photo by Manuel Orero

Probably, every experienced photographer knows that there are many people who don’t like cameras (or even are afraid of these infernal photo machines). Women think that the cameras take bad pictures of them while men don’t know how to act in front of the camera. When it comes to wedding guests, it’s ok, they don’t have to pose you all the time. But when a young beautiful bride fears the camera it can create big troubles for you as a photographer. That’s why some tips on how to relax newlyweds are must have.
 
There is another aspect of the problem: brides are not used to wearing magnificent long white dresses. They need some time to practice to move. Moreover, they can be very tense because of a general fuss, a necessity to smile all day long or inconvenient shoes.
 
For example, in the morning of my wedding day I was too quiet and those early photos were boring and lifeless. I couldn’t understand what all those people want from me and our photographer irritated me very very much. But it was at the early beginning of the day. A single sip of wine (only one and very small one) made a miracle – I realized that it’s my wedding (probably it sounds very strange). I don’t encourage you to drink, no. I just want to say that it’s very important to build a kind of an understanding between a photographer and his clients. We are all humans and we all need some incitements.
 

5.Take Care of the Equipment

Photo by Renaissance Studios

Maybe, this suggestion sounds a little bit silly. As a professional photographer, you know perfectly well what you need and nobody dares to give you suggestions. But still, you have to be ready for unforeseen circumstances. For example, put several memory cards (more than one) into your bag. It’s a big fail to find out that the camera is filled when a celebration is in a full play. And an excuse like “Oh, I didn’t expect to meat such an artistic bride” will not improve the situation, really. Think it’s an imaginary story? No, it’s not. I faced such a misunderstanding on my wedding and I was quite confused.

6. Know Your Customers

Photo by Eduard Stelmakh

Surely, you know your clients’ names and more likely you’ve seen them when getting a prepayment. But do you really know them? Do you know how to make a bride smile? Or maybe she doesn’t like to smile because of 2 lines of big sharp teeth? Yeah, it’s a joke but what if it’s true?

On the wedding you’ll spend much time with the bride and the groom and it’ll be better to know in advance what to expect from them (and what they can expect from you).

A young couple searches for a good photographer very captiously, but you can also choose people to work with. I don’t think that a 30 minutes tea break with potential clients can spoil your day, but it can definitely help you in future.

7. Make Right Emphases

Photo by Wil Bloodworth

A wedding day is a great event for both a bride and a groom. Everybody wants to congratulate them and to express their appreciation of the celebration. But for photographers in most cases the bride is the center of everything. The entire day depends on her mood and you should be very attentive to catch her beauty with the camera.

Do you think that she will recommend you to her friends because group photos look good or because her handsome husband kisses her softly on the shots? Definitely no! She’ll take a close look at every detail of the bridal appearance and she’ll praise you to the skies if she looks awesome on photos. Believe me, every bride will do her best to let friends and relatives know how good her wedding photographer is.

Have you seen the “Love Actually” movie? There is a moment when Juliet watches her wed video and finds out that it’s the best video ever because she looks super charming, her dress sparkles and colors are very natural without strange tones. I guess it’s the best example of art of a perfect wedding photographer (and videographer). Surely, you can oppose me by mentioning that this operator was in love with Juliet and that’s why the video was so great. But all brides are quite beautiful to fall in love with for several hours during the ceremony. Don’t you think so?

Ok, that’s it! I hope I haven’t hurt you with this post. I just tried to interpret some misunderstandings which can happen in relationships between photographers and the newly married couples. Please don’t judge me too strictly. Let’s improve our understanding of each other and let’s make the next wedding super-duper (it doesn’t matter if you’re a wedding photographer, a bride or a groom)!