Our second wedding of 2014 was in late March. Tim and Charmaine were getting married at a hotel near Frome, Somerset.  The wedding ceremony and wedding breakfast were to be held at the same venue, making life easier for me.  

I met Charmaine and her Bridesmaids at the hotel for the usual preparation shots. They had a large bedroom with lots of natural light to get ready in. Tim was due to arrive mid-morning and let me know when he’d arrived so I could get shots of him with his Best Man and Father. 

The wedding ceremony was held in a large conservatory at the back of the hotel. Lots of natural light so no problems getting my shots there. 

We were blessed with a nice sunny day so we were able to make use of the hotel gardens for some pics, with the guests, after the ceremony. I found with a lot of the hotels, that ran weddings, it could be a little bit restricted in relation to decent locations for couple shots.

It was normal for me to take the newly married couple off for a few images on their own after the wedding ceremony. Every wedding was different though and the amount of time we had, and when we went for these shots was very much governed by the ceremony/breakfast timings.  

As I was gaining in experience, I changed my planning around this. On this occasion I’d decided to give the Tim and Charmaine as much time as I could with their guests before taking them off for a few shots, 30 minutes or so, before the wedding breakfast.  

There were also the group shots to consider and squeeze into the short time we had. I would normally suggest to the couple that they wouldn’t need any more than ten group shots. That would cover the bridal party, family and close friends and take us about 20 minutes. I’d also ask them to allocate someone (preferably who was a bit bossy) who knew most of family and could organise them for me. Even then, you could guarantee someone would be missing just when we needed them.   

Although I rarely shoot weddings now, two years ago I shot a wedding for friends who couldn’t afford a photographer. We had the same discussion, before the wedding, in relation to numbers of groups. I suggested ten would cover everything and they came back with a list of thirty! Can you imagine the logistics of trying to organise and shoot that. Needless to say, thirty group shots never happened.  

Anyway, back to Tim and Charmaine. Their wedding day went perfectly fine for us with none of the dramas that seemed to have cropped up during weddings in the previous years. That was good because we had lots more bookings lined up.

All images: ©Stephen Hyde 2007-2025 – All rights reserved.