One of the biggest concerns for our couples on a wedding day is grabbing all the shots they want with their family, both immediate and extended. Weddings are huge for families and whether you have a big one or a small one, every family wants photos together on a Bride & Groom’s wedding day. But I know the thought of making sure we get a photo with each and every family member can be overwhelming but no worries. After shooting over 50 weddings, we’ve become pros at taking family portraits and I’ve got three simple steps to make YOU feel a lot better family portraits leading up to your wedding day 🙂

1. Give us the details in advance! This is not something I suggest… this is something I REQUIRE of all of my Brides and Grooms. Two months before your wedding day, I send out my worksheet to all my Brides & Grooms to fill out and send back to me. In the worksheet I ask for specifics on every location and detail of the day and there is a whole section dedicated to making sure we don’t miss ANY of the family formals you want. I ask in specific detail what family members you want photos with. With that information, I work it into the timeline that I share with my Brides & Grooms. This is also the timeline Jose and I carry on a wedding day with each of us. I write in detail every family member you want photos with, whether you want those in groups (i.e. John & Emily with Doe Family) or individually (i.e. John & Emily with Barbara, Godmother of the Groom) While we will always dedicate a portion before or after the ceremony for all family formals, we always know which photos you want! This is also good in case your Aunt & Uncle leave the ceremony right away and forget they are needed for family formals. We make sure that if they will be at the reception to make mental notes to grab those photos later in the evening. But if Grandma & Grandpa are only attending the ceremony, we take portraits with them right after the church! Which leads me to my next tip…

2. Tell family ahead of time! My NUMBER ONE tip for Brides & Grooms is to tell Family members BEFORE the wedding day what time they will be needed for Portraits. This can apply to anytime the portraits are being done! If you’re doing a First Look and will do Family Portraits before the ceremony, tell family to arrive an HOUR before the ceremony so we can take their portraits. We can even do just immediate families at that point and than extended families right after the ceremony. If you’re doing Family Portraits AFTER the ceremony, tell family NOT to leave the church. Even if you are doing a receiving line and a bubble exit, tell them once they blow the bubbles not to go anywhere! This is the BEST way that we will go quickly through family portraits. If you or your parents are chasing down family members, than we can easily just call the names off our list and be done with Portraits in 20 minutes! (Trust me, we’ve seen how great it works when people follow directions and it makes the day go 10X smoother!)

3. Don’t stress out! Family portraits ARE hectic and stressful. We have done this many times before and going into every wedding day, we KNOW this about family portraits. But our poor Brides & Grooms that haven’t gotten married before and haven’t experienced it are not aware of how crazy it can get. People get caught up in chatting with each other and taking photos, bridal party run straight to the limo, family start cleaning up the church…. we have even seen people argue during family portraits. Yikes! It’s just what happens because with family, it’s much easier to let your guard down and get annoyed at them! lol All I can promise you is we will handle it! I can also promise you that most of the time… people will quickly push aside their feelings to suck it up because it is a wedding day. We will handle all the attitudes with smiles on our faces and we will go through it as quickly as we can and before you know it – it will be done and over with! If there are any family members that don’t get along (divorce, step-parents… whatever!) just let us know while filling out your worksheet and we will make sure to be on the lookout for any problems that may occur and diffuse any tension quickly with happy, bubbly personalities 🙂

Hopefully these tips help you feel a little bit better about handling family portraits on your wedding day! Just remember – it will only take up 30 minutes of a beautiful day for you both and at the end of it all, you’ll just remember the smiling faces looking back at you in your photos 🙂