One important thing I like to encourage my couples to do before their wedding date arrives is to gather all of their wedding day details together in one location. Each couple can easily have a box or a bag they can keep everything in, that way once the photographer arrives he/she can jump right in to photographing those details. Making sure your details are gathered and photographed first-thing on your wedding day does several things:
- If you choose to have a wedding album printed your detail images will help tell the full story of your day by tying in similar colors together, therefore creating gorgeous spreads and layouts for your album.
- Having all of your details gathered together before your wedding will help ensure you’re not running around trying to find things on the morning of. It also helps us save time!
- If you’re hoping to get your beautiful wedding published, the more details you have the better! Editors LOVE details and so do other brides who are reading these publications in search of decor ideas and color theme inspiration.
- You’ve put a large amount of thought and financial investment into choosing your details, so we need to make sure we carve out time to create beautiful images for you to remember these by.
- Giving your photographer time to photograph your details at the very beginning of your day helps us “warm up” and get into our groove. Styling your details for beautiful images will oftentimes require us to use our creativity and this is such a fun and easy way for us to get prepped to photograph you and your soon-to-be-husband.
Bride’s dress & Groom’s Tux/Jacket
We like making sure these items are gathered together before we arrive so we can photograph them quickly and get them back to you right away. This typically means you and your fiance can be partially dressed when we arrive so we can also capture images of you two getting dressed. Guys are MUCH easier to photograph during this portion of the day because a lot of these moments can be staged and/or recreated if need-be. There’s also a bit more involved in getting the ladies into their dresses. Before the bride climbs into her dress, we will make sure the MOB and her maids are dressed and ready to go! This creates a beautiful setting for getting ready images.
Jewelry Pieces – Including all THREE rings
We will take some time styling and photographing all of the jewelry pieces. This is a great time for us to extra floral pieces you might have available from your bouquet or centerpieces. If you don’t have any of that handy, don’t worry! We are masters at grabbing some greenery from trees outside or even using shoes or your veil to beautifully style your pieces. We’ll also photograph all three of your rings together! And don’t fret, we’ll make sure the rings get to who needs to hold them for the ceremony.
Invitation Suite & Programs
Gathering together any paper goods that are not bent up, with matching envelopes and RSVP cards, as well as any programs or place cards allows us to photograph them in soft window light during a key point of your wedding day. Some of my brides tell me they would rather not have them photographed and it hurts my heart when I hear this. Times change so quickly and there’s no better way to remember every last detail of your wedding than with your photographs. Photographing your paper goods also ties your whole design together (think about that wedding album)!
Bridesmaids Dresses & Groomsmen’s Details
Providing us with an easy way to gather all of the wearables together to photograph at once will help the start of your wedding photography experience go so much smoother. We’ll be able to style together all of the men’s details including cufflinks, socks, ties, and shoes. This will help fill up the frame of your images and give each photograph interest and detail. And personally, there’s nothing more that I love than a beautiful image of the bride’s dress with her maid’s dresses hanging next to them!
Florals
Don’t forget the florals! Bouts, bouquets, floral hair pieces, gather it all together. They act as fresh, gorgeous back drops to your rings or invitation suite. They assist in tying all of your beautiful wedding colors together in your images. And the only way to make those florals live forever is capture them in a photograph. We want to make sure every last detail of your wedding will be remembered for years to come.
Now that we’ve talked about some of the key elements I like to encourage my brides to gather before their wedding day I thought I would share with you a FREE PRINTABLE to help make gathering details a little easier! This detailed printable provides you with two separate sides, the groom’s details and the bride’s details. All you have to do is print it off and check things on the list as you gather them.
Talk to me!
Were you recently married and forgot to gather details ahead of time? Did you gather your details and found it helped your morning run much smoother? Or are you getting ready for your wedding day and have found this printable helpful? I love hearing your stories, so feel free to comment below!
