Whether you love them or not, most couples want to have a bit of time set aside after the ceremony for family & other formal wedding day photos to be taken. Having these at or close to your ceremony site can make things easier for family with mobility issues. These are different than the casual and fun couples’ photos we’ll take that day.
When creating your list, think about every “smiling-at-the-camera” photo you want to have framed in your home, and with your partner included, start listing the family groupings in order of biggest to smallest.
Tips for easy and stress free family formals
- The larger the group, the more time it will take to arrange everyone for a photo. Sometimes this is just your immediate family and even that can be difficult!
- Families want to chat and catch up and you just want to get on with it and get to your sunset photos. Having some patience is important and also let me be the only one shouting names. This keeps the overstimulation and stress levels low.
- You should plan for it to take around 10 minutes each for any grouping larger than 15. I know it’s tempting to make lists with everyone you’ve ever known in them but try to keep things more immediate family-centric. Sometimes we can take your more casual groupings during the reception! We’ll try to grab it early, after your grand intros but before the dance floor gets too wild.
- Aim for only no more than 15 total groupings. Most smaller groupings take about 2-3 minutes, larger groups take 5-10 minutes, depending on the number of people and location. If you’re having a church ceremony, we’ll most likely do them right at the altar unless we’ve previously discussed a different location.
- 90% of my family formals are taken right at the ceremony site (let’s utilize those beautiful flowers!) Unless I can tell two things: 1) the lighting sucks. It’s dappled, half sun/half shade, or too dark or 2) that there won’t be enough room for the largest group. Then we’ll have to do them at a separate but close-by location.
- When you’re outlining your family formals list, put people’s names on the list so we can call them by name. Also be sure to list their relationship to you. This helps me know who is who and where to put them in the group.
- For example: Couple with (groom) Travis’s immediate family: Caitlin, Travis, Carol (mom), Charlie (dad), Ray (brother), Clayton (brother), Moira (sister) (you can add significant others and kids in the next shot)
- Put photos with your grandparents early on the list if they have any mobility issues. Also if you want one with your officiant before they leave, make sure they’re first so we can knock that one out fast.
- Flower girls and ring bearers under the age of 5ish should be early in the list too, since they get tired and grumpy very quickly and will also want to change before the reception.
- LET PEOPLE KNOW via email, text, phone call, in the wedding day timeline, on your wedding website and/or hand out printed copies of your list at your rehearsal dinner. Stress how they shouldn’t wander off after the ceremony to grab a drink, visit a restroom, or smoke a cigarette. You can even have your officiant make an announcement at the start of the ceremony along with your unplugged ceremony request. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard “Uncle so and so and my brother John went to cocktail hour since they didn’t know to stay for pictures!” I would be pretty rich.
If you are NOT doing a first look and we are doing all of the portraits at cocktail hour between the ceremony & reception, try to keep this list as efficient as possible- minimize duplicate photos where one of you steps out.
If you ARE doing a First Look and we have time to do your immediate family formals BEFORE your ceremony, we’ll do it like this:
- First Look
- then couples’ and individual portraits
- then wedding party then immediate family groupings
- then larger groupings (which sometimes work best immediately after the ceremony.)
- When we do family photos before the ceremony, it’s best to work in order of when people will be ready and available.
Almost all of my clients want some combination of the following list so I use this as my standard list unless you have other special requirements. If some of these don’t apply to you and your family, we will just nix them and spend less time taking family photos which means more golden hour portrait time for the two of you. Yay!
For example, both of our grandparents have passed away and I, Caitlin, don’t have any siblings so we just did our extended family groups after the ceremony. Prior to the ceremony we did all the wedding party, immediate family and siblings on Travis’s side.
SUGGESTED FAMILY FORMALS LIST
- Couple with officiant (if you want a shot with your officiant, they prefer to be the first, especially if they need to change!)
- Couple with flower girls & ring bearers (kiddos want to change!)
- Couple with your grandparents
- Couple with your immediate family – parents & siblings (their partners too if they are married, engaged or in a LTR.)
- Couple with your parents
- Couple with your partner’s grandparents
- Couple with your partner’s immediate family – parents & siblings
- Couple with your partner’s parents
- Couple with both parents
- Your partner with their parents
- Your partner with their siblings
- You with your parents
- You with your siblings
- You with your parents, individual
- Your partner with their parents, individual
I hope this is helpful! I know every wedding is unique, and families may not fit neatly into suggested groupings but I want you to keep some of these tips in mind when building your list.
I speak from experience when I say the day will fly by and you’ll want to spend time taking these photos and making them good! Family formals are so important.
