> 7 minute read

Photographing Weddings as a Guest

Weddings are a celebration of love, not just for the happy couple, but for the groups of friends and family that meet up at such occasions. Your pictures as a guest are crucial, as they will bring memories flooding back in the years to come.

A lot of photography goes on at weddings. In fact, unless the happy couple has requested an ‘unplugged’, gadget-free wedding, there are going to be a hundred smartphone snappers all recording every moment. So, what can you and your X Series camera add that the professional photographer and the other guests won’t frame? A lot.

First, your camera is capable of much better pictures and larger variety of pictorial styles than a smartphone. And, second, your status as a guest gives you access to more areas of the wedding than the professional photographer. All you need now is a list of images that tell the story of the occasion, and you’ve got the makings of a great set of pictures the happy couple will love. Read on…

1. Portraits of Friends

With friends and family gathered together in one place, this is a great opportunity to make some really good portraits of the special people in the couple’s life. Look for locations in the shade that give you soft, diffused light, and avoid making pictures in bright sunshine. You can use your camera’s Portrait Scene mode or, better still, use Aperture Priority mode and select a wide aperture (small F number), which will blur the background slightly and help your subjects stand out.

2. Candid Pictures

Alongside posed portraits, candid pictures of people enjoying themselves at the wedding will look great, too. This is an area where you can score over the professional photographer, who will be conspicuous as a stranger with a big camera. You – as a friend among friends with a small camera – will blend in more, so people won’t notice or care when you photograph them enjoying a glass of champagne.

You don’t have to raise the camera to your eye: you can either use the viewscreen to compose a picture, while pretending to adjust settings or something, or just aim your camera vaguely in the right direction – something photographers call ‘shooting from the hip’. Switch on Face Detection AF to make sure the people in your pictures are kept sharp, not the background. And don’t worry too much about checking the results on the back of your camera; you might miss another great picture while your attention is elsewhere.

3. Pictures During the Service

This is a difficult area and one where you really need to defer to the couple’s wishes and what is allowed at the venue. As a rule, don’t stand up and move about during the ceremony (especially that part when the celebrant asks if anyone knows of any reason why the couple may not be joined in matrimony!). Better to sit somewhere that will get you a great image of the newlyweds coming down the aisle with huge smiles on their faces. Or an anxious-looking guy or girl waiting at the altar for their true love to arrive.

One of the reasons many venues, celebrants, and couples don’t want guests to make pictures during the service is that the ‘beep and flash’ of digital cameras is very disruptive. So, if you do find yourself with the opportunity to make a couple of images, be sure you have switched the AF beep and shutter noise off, as well as the flash. Switching from (MS) MECHANICAL SHUTTER to (ES) ELECTRONIC SHUTTER in the SHOOTING SETTING menu makes the camera completely silent.

4. Photographing Groups

Weddings bring together groups of family and friends who don’t see each other too often, and group photos are a great way of celebrating these times. Try to avoid the group swelling to massive sizes – between five and eight people is manageable and will produce some great compositions without taking ages to set up.

When you first mention a group photo, everyone will be super enthusiastic before self-assembling into straight line and looping their arms around each other as if in a sports team picture. If that happens, it can be best to make images as they’re trying to get themselves organised, as you’ll be able to adopt a more candid approach that can work well.

Alternatively, ask a couple of people to sit down before positioning everyone else around them, as if you were organising a number of pictures of two to three people. It’s also good to make bursts of pictures using your camera’s continuous shooting mode, so if someone blinks, you’ll have other options to choose from. Continuous shooting is selected via a top-plate dial or the Drive mode button, depending on which model you own.

5. Portraits of the Couple

Many of the principles that apply to making portraits of your friends and family also apply to photographing the newlyweds: pick a location in the shade with soft lighting; use a wide aperture to blur the background behind your subject; and use Face/Eye Detection AF to make sure sharp focus is on the subjects’ eyes.

Where portraits like this differ from others is the time you have to do them. The happy couple are also busy, with lots of people to meet and greet, plus a professional photographer to pose for. Be mindful of this and ask them if you can have just two to three minutes for a quick portrait when they have a moment.

This might not seem like a lot of time, but you can identify your location, set up your camera, and even rehearse the photograph with a friend beforehand, so all you need to do is get your subjects to step in, then make a few pictures.

6. The Traditional Events

Weddings are all about tradition, so there are a few things that are almost guaranteed to happen. From the first kiss to the first dance, and from cutting the cake to throwing the bouquet or confetti – there are things that can make a great photo if you get them right.

But these are also the things that absolutely everyone photographs, so how about trying to show a slightly different view with your pictures? Try concentrating on something else. For example, when the bride is throwing her bouquet over her shoulder, focus on the faces of the onlookers, rather than the scrum of people trying to catch it. Or when the confetti gets thrown, try and find an alternative angle.

7. The Little Details

It’s the small details that complete the story of a big day: the table decorations, the handwritten signs, the flowers, the glasses of champagne. There are plenty to choose from, and you can use these to punctuate your photo story of the day, particularly when producing a photo book.

Your Next Steps

• CHALLENGE Put this advice into practice the next time you go to a wedding, and show us the results on social media, using the hashtags #learnwithfujifilm and #wedding. You can also submit your work here for a chance to be featured on our social media channels.