Wedding Tips & Tricks: Planning A Grand Exit
/Welcome to Episode One of my new series: Wedding Tips & Tricks from Your Photographer
Today’s topic is the Grand Exit!
I’m going to let you in on a little secret. When it comes to grand exit's at weddings, you are usually doing your “grand exit” about an hour into your reception so that your photographer can capture the big send off. Very rarely do you hire your photo and video team to stay until you actually leave your reception. Instead, we do it part way through and then we say goodbye for the night. Those photos typically end up at the end of your gallery even if they weren’t the last photos taken. As a wedding photographer, your gallery is a story and so sometimes we reorder photos to make the flow nicer.
So the grand exit you see in photos is usually a staged exit, or just a fun activity to do with your guests during the reception. If you have hired a photographer to stay until the very end of your wedding or you’re having a shorter reception then you can make your grand exit a little more exciting. Literally the sky is the limit. Seriously… leave in a hot air balloon! How cool would that be? The true grand exit is where you are not coming back to your wedding. It’s a send off!
Here are some ideas for the grand exit for the truly extra people, that is not a Sparkler Send Off:
Change into some matching bathing suits and slip and slide outta there (do not recommend for Canadian winter weddings)
If there is any body of water… jump into it! (this is on my bucket list)
Have your guests spray you with water guns
Rent a vintage car
Run through a foam tunnel, it looks like clouds!
Change into matching wedding sweatpants and use any of these ideas
Now, it takes a very special type of couple, guest willingness, (and the right weather) to do some of those crazier ideas. If you want something a little gentler, and less out there there are a lot of options that also don’t involve sparklers! The next list is ideas that can be used as a true Grand Exit or for something I am now calling the Photographer Send Off! So instead of faking your own exit, send your photo and video team off in style. This is a great way to get people hyped up and ready to party. You can do it outside in the parking lot for some of the ideas or inside on the dance floor. Both look amazing in photos and as a bonus, makes your photo and video team feel special!
Here are some ideas for you Photographer Send Off:
Smoke bombs
Hand held fireworks or flares
Environmentally friendly confetti poppers/canon
Champagne spray
Streamer toss
Ribbon wands
Glowsticks
And my personal favourite:
Bubbles
If you are one of my couples, I bring my own bubble machine (soon to be two bubble machines) to use at any point on your wedding day, whether that be for your Photographer Send Off, the wedding processional or recessional, or just during couples/wedding party photos! Bubbles are a great eco friendly, easily organized way to add a lot of fun to your photos.
No matter what you decide to do, whether it’s sparklers or another activity, make sure it fits your personalities! This is always going to be my biggest piece of advice for wedding planning: plan your wedding around YOU! What do you and your fiancé like to do? Are you outgoing? Adventurous? Shy? Silly? Don’t do something just because it’s expected of you. You don’t even have to do a grand exit or send off if you don’t want to! And if you want to jump in a pool fully clothed, go for it! Your wedding is a day of celebration of your relationship and the life you want to build together.
It’s also important to note that you ask permission from your venue for any of these ideas! They might have rules or would like to anticipate any mess clean up!
Happy wedding planning!
Love,
Your adventure loving, risk taking photographer who will always always vote yes for using any kind of water on your wedding day.
Choosing Your Wedding Photographer // PART THREE
/Before you read further, if you haven’t already, you can read the other parts of this little trilogy here: PART ONE and PART TWO!
Okay so you found your true match made in heaven... with your photographer. You love their personality, style, and the price is just right. You've asked all the right questions and you're ready.
What do you do now?!
You snatch them up because there are only limited weekends in a wedding season and you want to make sure you get your first choice *cough PICK ME! cough*. Basically you like it so you need to put a bunch of money down on it.
The typical wedding photographer will need between 30-50% as a non-refundable retainer fee. This is required for two reasons. The first is to secure your date. Unfortunately many photographers have been burned by not receiving any kind of payment for their work. The second reason is to offset loss of business if the event is cancelled. Since there are only a limited amount of weddings per year, chances are that after you book your photographer, they are getting more inquiries that they turn down because they are already booked. If for some reason, you have to cancel, they are most likely not able to rebook their dates. Some photographers have in their contracts (like I do) that if the event is cancelled or postponed within a certain timeframe AND the photographer can rebook the date, the retainer fee will be returned. While we are business owners, we are fair.
Speaking of the contract. Make sure you are sent one to protect yourself. If a photographer does not have a contract you might want to reconsider hiring them. The contract protects both the photographer and you! Make sure you read through carefully. The contract lays out all the things you can expect from your photographer and what they expect from you. This contract should list the time and date booked for, the wait time for post processing the images, payment schedule, cancellation and rescheduling policies, as well as print rights and model releases. As under copyright law in Canada, photography is considered an art and the photographer, the artist. Photographers hold all the copyrights to their images, even though they are being paid to create the art. So your contract should have a print release and a description of what the photos can be used for. Typically, they can be used for all personal reasons, on social media, printing for your house or albums, and sharing with your friends or family. You won’t be allowed to use the images for commercial gain or sell the images, those rights remain with the photographer only. As well as sharing with other vendors, leave that up to your photographer so that they can thank the others involved in your day as well as explain the proper use of images. And as always, do not edit or alter the photos!
Photography is such a fun thing to book for your wedding but these “boring” aspects cannot be overlooked. You are paying thousands of dollars and you want to make sure you are booking a trusted, capable, and responsible photographer. Make sure you look at reviews on their Google business pages as well. This will help ensure you are booking someone who is going to show up for you. However, be warned, sometimes people leave terrible reviews to photographers who they haven’t even worked with, so be mindful of both the positive and negative reviews!
And then, if everything checks out and you and your partner feel comfortable (and excited!) sign the contract, send the payment, and take a deep breath because you can confidently check off one huge decision off of your wedding planning checklist!
If you’ve read through this whole trilogy and you’d like to book me as your wedding photographer, click HERE to contact me!
