I quite often get asked for wedding photography tips due to the fact that more and more people are deciding not to use a qualified photographer, and instead use a family member or friend. Of course this is possibly to save money but also could be because the cost of a decent digital SLR camera has fallen significantly in recent years. There seems to be many more budding photographers out and about nowadays that would probably do just as good a job as a pricey professional photographer. 

Here are some wedding photography tips that you may want to consider if this is the route you are choosing to take:

• Get Organised – If there is no wedding planner then you are going to be faced with the task of organising all of your guests so they are all in position for any photos you have specifically requested.

This is where you may need to ask another family member or friend to help out. After a few drinks most of the wedding party will become relaxed and start chatting to other guests making it really awkward to organise people and get them into the right place for their picture to be taken. This is the last thing a bride wants to be worried about on her wedding day. Having another person on hand that can help will save a lot of time and effort.

It is worth having a wedding photography checklist that has all the photos requested by the bride and groom so the appointed person knows who needs to be in what photograph, and they can then go and find them and bring them to where they need to be.

• Check out the location – One of the wedding photography tips I can give you that will save you a fair amount of time on the day is to visit the location before the wedding day. By doing this you can have a look round the grounds and makes notes of good places where the pictures can be taken. You may also want find some indoor places just in case the weather turns bad and the light fades.

Always carry a note pad and pen and add notes to your wedding photography checklist every step of the way. If you really want to super organised arrive at the venue around the same time you will be taking the photos on the day itself so that you can check out how the lighting will be at each particular photo location.

• Be prepared – This may seem one of the most obvious of all my wedding photography tips but you will be surprised how many people will forget to do this. Make sure you have batteries charged, clean memory cards and spares incase you run out. Make sure that you put these items somewhere safe so that they can easily be located on the day should your memory card fill up or your battery runs out.

• Be familiar with your equipment. This is one of the best wedding photography tips I can give you. Chances are you may have invested in a new camera so make sure you have used it many times before the wedding day. As most cameras these days are quite complex gadgets you do not want to be fiddling about with settings and trying to find the right exposures as well as trying to heard you guests into position. Remember if you mess your photos up by not knowing your equipment then you will never be able to retake them and will never forgive yourself.

• Noise – There is nothing worse than someone’s mobile going off during a wedding ceremony. Not only does this distract for the moment it will also be something that will be heard on the wedding video should there be one. So one of my noise related wedding photography tips is to ensure that you have set your mobile phones to silent so that no beeps and sounds will be heard during the ceremony.

The final tip on my wedding photography checklist is to thing very long and hard as to whether or not it is a good idea not to employ the services of a professional wedding photographer. Whilst using a professional wedding photographer may initially seem costly you must remember they know what they are doing, and have taken wedding photos hundreds of times before. It is easy to think that it is just a case of pointing a camera and pressing click, but that is far from the truth.

Using a professional wedding photographer means your wedding photos will be perfect and it is one less thing for you to be worried about on the day.