THE MJS EXPERIENCE
TIPS FOR MAXIMIZING THE PORTRAIT SESSIONS
]The portrait sessions on your day will have you feeling a bunch of emotion – from elation to frustration. We will go over ways to limit the latter but there’s no way to eliminate it unfortunately.
The couple session will be similar to the engagement session so try to remember the tips and tricks we taught you and we’ll knock it out of the park. The bridal party session will be quick – wrangling up everyone can be a task, but overall it should be fun! The family portrait session is where things get stressful.
Our best advice for family formals would be to have a list prepared ahead of time (we’ll help you with this) and send a google calendar invite to all family members. This allows you to set alerts which can be set around timing and location. We’ll go over that in bit.
COUPLE PORTAITS
Let’s start with the easiest – you and your new spouse! Depending on whether or not you opted for a first look, we’ll either start with the couple portraits or end with them. The thing to remember with couple portraits is that the more time you give us, the better.
If you think about the engagement session, we had about 2 hours for portraits. If we only had 30 minutes to shoot, think about all the photos you wouldn’t have received had we cut the session after 30 minutes. We know we can’t expect 2 hours of photos on your wedding day, but try to allocate enough time so we can get you all the photos and video you want to remember your day by.
We’ll take the ‘camera aware’ photos – those staple shots that even if you feel you don’t want, your parents or grandparents will definitely need. Plus, a beautiful traditional portrait is a perfect framed print on your desk at work. Then we’ll move to more creative shots.
If you hired us for only video, we’ll work with your photographer to make sure we get a few minutes of our own time – either at the end of the photo session or jumping in whenever we can to get what we need. Most of the time photographers have no problem with us interjecting every now and then to get the shot but if they do for some reason, we’ll ask to get 10 minutes at the end where it’s just us.
WHAT IF IT RAINS?
[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]Do you know the story behind the belief that rain on your wedding day is good luck? Well the story goes that back in the day when the tradition of marriage included tying a knot (hence the term ‘tying the knot’), couples would literally tie rope together to symbolize the bond of two becoming one. So when it rained, the ropes actually get stronger because wet rope holds together stronger than dry.
As much as rain on your wedding day may not be ideal, we can actually use it to our advantage. Some of our favorite images we’ve ever taken have been from getting our couples out in the rain. Before you step out into the wetness however, you should probably get an umbrella or two. We recommend clear ones or plain white or plain black ones. Try to stay away from any busy patterns or colors.
BRIDAL PARTY PORTRAITS
Depending on the size of your bridal party, this part of the portrait session should be pretty quick. Where we sometimes see a delay is getting everyone in one location on time. Once we have everyone and depending how cooperative they are, we should be able to get all bridal party photos done in 15 minutes.
We’ll most likely start with the hardest shot to get – the creative group shot. We’ll pose each person to make sure the photo looks balanced and everyone is seen.
From there we’ll do a more traditional shot where everyone’s in a line. This is much easier to direct since we can speak to the group as a whole!
Once the full bridal party is done, we’ll move to Groomsmen and Bridesmaids group photos. These are photos of you and your bridesmaids and your groom and his groomsmen. There’s a chance these might have been completed during preps. If so, we won’t be shooting them again.
We’ll also want to capture you with each bridesmaid and your groom with each groomsman. The trick to these photos is keeping you stationary and having your bridesmaids/groomsmen step in and out quickly.
We do get the request sometimes to have the bride with the groomsmen and the groom with the bridesmaids. If this is something you want, please be sure to bring this up to our attention!
Now that you’ve narrowed down your list, it’s time to get everyone on board with the plan. There’s no easy way to manage everyone without having them download special apps or jumping through hoops. That’s probably not going to happen. But most people do have a smart phone with a built in calendar or app that manages events in their life.
We recommend creating a calendar event and sending it to everyone on the list.
