Today we are going to talk about backgrounds.
Now this is a topic very close to my heart. All the years I spent as a wedding photographer, the one thing that is going to be so important after the wedding day – is your beautiful photos that you will cherish forever. Yet so many couples put no thought whatsoever into the background of their photos.
If you’re getting married in a park, be aware of things like rubbish bins or ugly signs.
Whether it’s a hall, reception venue, the beach or a park, it’s all about where you place yourselves and what you see behind. It may be as simple as moving the way the ceremony faces by 45 degrees.
I once shot a wedding at a park with the water behind and when I arrived they had the ceremony angled so that when the bride walked down the aisle, right behind her was a big ugly toilet block! I couldn’t believe it and tried to get the ceremony moved to a different angle but the celebrant wouldn’t allow it.
If you are getting married under a tree, be mindful if half the bridal party is standing in full sun and half the bridal party is standing in the shade.
Technically for a photographer, it’s near impossible to achieve a perfect result if the subjects on one side of the photo are in bright sun and the subjects on the other side are in full shade.
I recommend you have either everybody in the shade, or everybody in the sun.
Too many reception venues have ugly fire extinguishers, fire signs, exit and toilet signs, ugly leads and PA speakers poorly placed. All of these things are going to look unattractive in your photos.
A good photographer will shoot trying to avoid these backgrounds, but often it’s not possible to avoid them all.
If you want to have group photos taken with your guests at the reception – you need an area in the venue with a neat, clean backdrop. If your venue doesn’t have nice curtains or a clean/plain wall, you may have to set up an area with a suitable backdrop. It needs to be at least 4 meters wide so you can do large group shots as well.
Don’t assume that your photographer will photoshop ugly items out during the edit process, because it can take up to one hour per image to remove difficult objects and it’s going to double or triple the cost of your wedding photography.
Prevention is always better than cure.
I love sharing all my wedding knowledge so be sure to subscribe to my Youtube channel and follow me on my socials and if you have any wedding related questions email me yodaofweddings@gmail.com.
I can’t wait to hear from you.
♡ ​Sue