While planning for my wedding, I had a lot of pressure to schedule to pose for bridal portraits, and to be honest, I never really saw the need for it. For those of you who don’t know, your bridal portraits are taken prior to the wedding day, typically a month or two before hand. You’ll need to get all dressed up, have your hair and make up done like you will the day of your wedding, and go out the the photoshoot. Most brides do this so that they can post the pictures at the entrance of the reception, or somewhere else. It is a classy idea, and lots of people do it. Beautiful scenery, a bride dressed in white equals some beautiful pictures and memories. Plus they are probably more beautiful than anything that will be taken of you at your actual wedding ceremony. Face it, you may not have the same scenery at your wedding ceremony or reception hall.
Another huge problem I saw with bridal portraits is that it only had the bride in it. You may be thinking, well of course, but think about it. The wedding ceremony is more about the bride getting to dress up and be pretty, its about the start of a new life between two people in love. Personally, I think too much emphasis is placed on planning the wedding and making it beautiful than actually working on the kind of marriage that you’re going to have after the wedding, and making that just as beautiful.
Back to bridal portraits, I chose not to get bridal portraits before our wedding. Honestly, I didn’t really see the need for it. I was planning a wedding nearly by myself, and it took up nearly all of my free time. I didn’t see the point in taking a full day off of work to go see my hairdresser, have my make up done, get dressed, and then sit around the rest of the afternoon having my picture taken. No thank you.
In my opinion, if you are going to do any type of pictures before the wedding, schedule an appointment with your wedding photographer for engagement portraits. The reason I suggest using your wedding photographer for this is that they are going to be with you constantly on your wedding day, so it helps a lot if they already know you and have spent time with you…it especially helps if you like them too.
Having engagement portraits was perfect for me, since I was able to use shots from our engagement portraits to decorate the wedding reception and ceremony. One shot greeted our guests as they entered the church, my other favorite was used on our wedding programs, and there was a shot that was framed and matted that all of our guests got to sign at the reception. That picture is treasured to me, and gives us a ton of memories to help us remember our guests and their well-wishes. I decided that I didn’t need pictures of myself in my wedding dress, and it saved me a lot of money.
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Tags: bridal portraits, engagement portraits, wedding photographer, wedding photographers, wedding photography