Welcome to the first of many in a multi-post series with advice on how to get the best wedding photos and make the most out of your investment in a wedding photographer!

As a wedding photographer in Charleston, the wedding mecca of The United States, we shoot quite a few weddings each year. Many of these weddings are meticulously put together by the bride herself. With many months of careful planning, full of excitement, she searches for the right venue (the wimberley wedding venue), the right caterer, the right florist, the right photographer, the right band, and so on and so forth… And why shouldn’t she? After all, she is planning for one of the most important days of her life!

She wants to design her wedding mood board on Pinterest, explore all the possibilities, research every option and make her decisions on her terms. Excellent! The checkboxes get marked off, the plan is moving forward… After countless phone calls, and endless and tiring visits to the best wedding venues, we have made the final decision on the perfect venue… Check! After several (delicious, hopefully) visits to various caterers, we now have the perfect chef preparing the perfect meal, the menu is set… Check! With hours and hours of research and time spent on YouTube, we have shortlisted the top 3 bands and are waiting for them to get back to us with a quote and after days and days of follow ups, we now have a band that we have decided on… Pay the deposit… Check! You get the idea, right? So far so good – If you have the time, this can be a very exciting experience for most brides, if tiresome, but for the most part, comes with a sense of ownership and accomplishment.

Now, as we get closer to the wedding day… All the vendors begin to start asking questions about the plans for the big day. The emotion called excitement turns into something a little different – All that joy of selecting the best ingredients of your big day now require a fearless and detail-oriented conductor to lead the orchestra of vendors to play what would be the most beautiful symphony on the day of the wedding. Everything needs to be timed perfectly, and be prepared for setbacks and plan-b’s and plan-c’s! What time should the florist arrive? When is the ceremony? What time will the caterers arrive? When will the decor be done? When do we do the family portraits? Will we have time after the ceremony for the couple’s creative session? Is there ample lighting at the reception? Is the band ready to go? There is a problem with electricity where the band should be setting up, how do we get them connected? When? Why? How?

Fast-forward to the wedding day… The bridesmaids have gathered alongside the bride… It’s a beautiful day… The makeup artist is setting up… The nervousness and excitement is setting in… The photographers arrive to start documenting the beautiful day… Everything looks perfect.

The photographer puts his camera up closer to his face, his eyes set against the viewfinder, and as he watches through the lens… What he sees is a bride that looks worried, a little stressed… picking up the iPhone every few minutes… franticly using her freshly manicured digits to type up a quick message asking about an update on the flowers… phone down, and back up in her hands right away… disappointed look, another message out to someone… Rolls eyes, takes a deep breath and tells her bridesmaids about how stressed out she is about the day. As photographers, we are capturing the candid shots that we were asked to and we are praying for a smile here or there so we can get pictures that look happy! Get the picture?

I wish I could say that this is an exaggeration, but more often than not, brides choose to plan their own wedding. And that is totally fine, as long as she understands the tradeoffs. What could have been months of peaceful preparations and having a planner seek out the best venues and showcase the ones that fit all the requirements and present to the bride… Having a planner do all the legwork to find the best caterers that suit the couples needs… Having a planner find out the availability for the top photographers, bands, florists, decorators, etc. etc… And closer to the wedding day, the planner creates the parallel timelines of tasks and timings for all the vendors and makes sure everyone is in perfect sync… Being there on the day of the wedding worrying about plan A’s, plan B’s and plan C’s… All the while, the photographer is looking through the lens capturing the bride having the time of her life… a bride that is happy, cheerful, laughing and having a great time knowing everything is in control. The only tears that are shed are the ones of joy.

Lesson learned… but sadly, AFTER the wedding day has passed. As a photography studio in Charleston, we ask every bride during our consultation if they have hired a planner… And if they haven’t, we highly recommend hiring one. Because every bride deserves a wedding that is spent cherishing special moments with the most important people in her life… and photographs where she sees herself with that magical spark in her eyes and the best smiles in the world… Do yourself a favor… Lose the stress and hire a wedding planner! (Your photographer will thank you for it!)

If you’re looking, here are some of the best wedding planners in Charleston that we highly recommend:

• Michael Winship – Winship Productions
• Christina Baxter – Cibi Events
• Taylor Hayes – The Burlap Elephant

izmir escortDisclosure: There were no endorsements made from the planners listed here… We are just writing about our personal experiences in the spirit of wanting only the best photographs and peace of mind for our brides.

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