Family Photos: 3 Tips for Keeping Them Stress Free
Family photos are one of the most important parts of a wedding day! When Justin and I got married, I actually hardly cared about the formal family photos. As time has gone on, though, I realize how valuable they are to me, and I definitely want our couples to have beautiful photos of their families to look back on.
That said, formal family photos can be stressful if you aren’t prepared. Here are three tips to help make them as seamless and stress free as possible!
1. Keep the formal list small
Having photographed well over 300 weddings, I have found one thing to be almost universally consistent: couples with 20+ combinations for formal family photos are always annoyed by the end.
In theory, all of the possible combinations are important! In practice, standing stationary while people shuffle in and out for upwards of half an hour can get frustrating.
Here are a few ways to keep the list small:
• Save really large groupings with cousins or college friends as an informal photo. We can often snap these at cocktail hour, or have your MC make an announcement before the dance floor opens and capture them during the reception.
• Don’t break larger families down into miniscule groupings. If you want a photo with your dad’s extended family, go for it! But breaking that larger photo down into individual groupings with every single aunt and uncle can add a lot of time. Most people are happy with the larger photo that includes everyone, and doubly happy that they can run to cocktail hour faster 😉
• Minimize photos of the bride and groom without each other in them. It’s your wedding day! Both of you should be in the majority of your family photos.
2. Remind people (several times)
Wedding days are filled with emotion, people catching up, and fast paced moments. Even if everyone has been told where to be and when, I often see people get swept up in the busyness of the day.
Especially when everyone else is heading to cocktail hour, it’s easy to follow the crowd while catching up with a long lost cousin.
Have someone on each side of the family send a group text and/or verbally remind everyone where to be and when.
For example:
“Hi all! Our bride and groom want you to be a part of their formal family photos after the ceremony. After their first kiss and recessional, please do not recess away from the ceremony space with everyone else!! Feel free to stay seated, and when all the other guests clear out, the bride and groom will circle back around to take family photos.”
I have found that our couples get really frustrated when a key person is missing and someone has to hunt them down!
3. Take as many photos pre ceremony as possible
If you are doing a first look, you can even take 100% of your family photos pre ceremony and jump right into cocktail hour yourselves!
If you are waiting for the aisle moment, I highly recommend taking as many individual photos pre ceremony as you can (ie. bride and mom, bride and dad, bride and sister) and saving the groupings with both of you for after the ceremony.
There you have it! With these three tips, your family photos can be seamless and stress free, leaving you more time to spend the precious moments of your wedding day with each other, mingling, dancing, eating, and having fun, all while knowing you got the images that matter most.
Happy planning!
