The bride + groom want to see your smiling faces (not your cell phones)!

Put yourselves in the bride + groom's shoes for a moment....

You're walking down the aisle as a newly married husband + wife... what do you want to see? The faces of your loved ones smiling back at you with tears in their eyes? Or cell phones covering the faces of the ones you love so much?

What do we often do when we're taking a photo? We concentrate? What do we often do when we concentrate? We focus on getting the shot with determined faces. The cell phone/ camera put a barrier between us and the moment. This should not happen between you and your wedding guests.

I saw another disheartening photo on social media this past week, and it absolutely broke my heart. In the image were guests with their cell phones, to the corner of the shot you see a groom, leaning.... so that he can see his bride walk down the aisle. This just isn't the way it should be...

The groom should never ever have to lean to try and see his bride like this... Guys, this is such a problem this day and age, it's one thing for us to have to deal with it as wedding professionals, but for the groom to not be able to see his bride..... just something to think about and consider when you're a guest at a wedding. Some people get so offended when asked not to use their cell phones during the ceremony, they think it's ridiculous and silly, but please, I beg you, look at the result of this and think of the bride + groom first of all...

One of our favorite shots to get is the moment the groom sees his beautiful bride walking down the aisle. It's becoming more and more of a challenge to get these shots because of guests blocking our cameras. 

Sometimes we literally have seconds to get these shots, and in low light or with a short aisle, it's just super important for us to have a clear view. We plan ahead of time where we will be, I'll get this perspective, Jason will get the bride walking down the aisle, and then we make sure to also get the groom's face as he sees his bride.

We had a situation one time where Jason was in place to get the shot of the groom's face, and lo and behold a guest puts the cell phone right in that spot, there was just one chance to get that shot... the moment Jason was set to grab this "one chance kind of shot" a guest held up their cell phone, covering his face in that window of time, and all that is left is a shot of a groom with a cell phone covering his face. 

Some of our favorite shots are guests reactions to the ceremony. Their smiles, joy, happy tears in their eyes... but take a guess at the kinds of faces we often see these days? Cell phone faces. Or faces that are completely blank while taking a photo with their cell phone, or holding it up the whole time to get a video (which is even worse because when we grab the wide shots of the full wedding ceremony scene, you see folks holding their devices, and they're holding them up the whole time, so there's no chance for us to get these without this happening in the shots.

But it's not just during the ceremony that we deal with cell phones taking over... as wedding photographers, getting photos of moments during the getting ready photos, the reception, all throughout the day are becoming more and more of a challenge... why? Because more and more often we are seeing folks looking down at their phones. Do you want a photo of yourself, your bridesmaids, your mother, your groomsmen on their cell phones, everyone on their phones? Wouldn't you rather have emotional moments, folks engaging, talking with each other, laughing together?

Tune in. For the bride + groom's sake, for your own sake. Memories come from moments you remember. Think about it. When you take a photo with your cell phone, do you feel like you have as much of a memory of that moment in your mind? Isn't that what's most valuable? The professional will capture the moment in the camera, why not allow yourself to capture the memory in your mind.

(Go ahead, you know you want to pin that image :)

xoxo

Jason + Heather

www.revivalphotography.com

 

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