Couples often ask what the day actually looks like from our side. Here it is, hour by hour, using real timings from weddings we have photographed around Perth. Your day will move around with the season and your venue, but the shape is nearly always the same.
Before the day: the run sheet
Many of our couples send a run sheet in the weeks before the wedding. The good ones say who is where and when, how long each drive really takes, and who to call if something changes. That one page does more for your photos than people expect, because it tells us where we need to be before a moment happens.
The most useful line on any run sheet is the time the sun sets. We will come back to that.
Early afternoon: getting ready
At a recent summer wedding in the Perth Hills, everyone was dressed by mid-afternoon and left for the ceremony just before 4pm. We like to start with the details while the room is still calm: the rings, the shoes, the invitation and the gown.
Then it is about window light. A bride beside a big window needs almost nothing else, so if you can choose where to get ready, choose the room with the best window and the least clutter.
One thing to sort out well before the morning is lashes. Extensions need time to settle and should not be a first try on the day, so the usual advice is a trial set six to eight weeks out and a final refill three to five days before. It matters for photos, because getting-ready close-ups are some of the first frames of the day. Luxe Beauty Yanchep, a lash studio in Perth’s northern suburbs, has a clear guide to timing lash extensions for a wedding.
The ceremony
A church wedding we shot in Claremont ran like this: bridal party photos outside at 3:55pm, the ceremony from 4pm and out the doors by 4:30pm. Another, in the Chittering Valley, started at 3pm and finished between 4:15 and 4:30pm. So allow for the difference between a short service and a long one before you plan anything that comes after it.
During the ceremony our job is to be close enough to see faces and far enough away to be forgotten. The moments we watch for are small: the first look at each other, the rings going on, a parent in the front row, and the walk back down the aisle.
Straight after: family and bridal party
Everyone is in one place right after the ceremony, so that is when we do group photos. Give us a written list of who you want in each photo, and ask one loud relative to round people up. That single job can save twenty minutes, and you get those twenty minutes back for the two of you.
The last hour of light
This is the part of the day we plan everything else around. At that Chittering wedding, the ceremony finished around 4:30pm and we had the couple on a dry grass hillside from about 5:30pm, with the sun low behind the gums. We spent less than twenty minutes up there, and those are the frames at the top of their story on this site.
It doesn’t take long, but it does have to be at the right time. Look up the sunset for your date, and count back from it. In a Perth summer that can be well after 7pm, and in winter it can be before 5:30pm, so a winter ceremony needs to start much earlier than most couples first assume.
The reception
Receptions tend to run tighter than couples expect. One run sheet had guests seated by 5:30pm, the wedding party announced at 5:40pm and dinner from 6:15pm. We try to catch the room before anyone walks in, because that is the only moment it looks exactly the way you planned it.
After that we follow the night: speeches, the reactions to the speeches, the cake, the first dance and the dance floor once it gets loud. A photo booth is a good way to keep guests busy and get photos of everyone who never quite made it into the others.
After the day
Your gallery arrives six to eight weeks later, with sneak peeks well before that. Every image is professionally edited, with colour and light balanced across the whole gallery, and you get at least fifty images per hour we are booked. All of the photos are included in the price.
Three things that make the biggest difference
- Plan around the sunset. Put twenty minutes for portraits in your run sheet at the right time, even if dinner has to move for it.
- Put the drive times in. If your ceremony and reception are apart, or you are moving between locations, add the travel and allow for parking. Our guide to Perth wedding venues notes which places keep everything on one site.
- Write down the group photos. A list and one person to round everyone up gets you back to your own wedding faster.
If you would like to talk through your own day, tell us your date and we will come back to you within 24 hours.