Photography: The dilema of posed table photographs
By Daniel Sheehan (WedNet Specialist Blogger for Photography): A Beautiful Day Photography, http://www.abeautifuldayphotography.com
The people you invite to your wedding are important to you since you have asked them to come and witness your exchange of marriage vows and share in the festivities of the day.
Honoring them is a decent and respectable thing to do. They have taken time out of their own lives to share in the most memorable day of your life. Some may have traveled from distant parts of the globe to be there with you. It makes sense to honor them in a significant manner by having a photograph to remember their presence and generosity in the years to come. One solution may be to have a photo made with everyone at each table.
At first this might seem like a good approach. You could ask your photographer to follow you and your wedding partner around to every table and shoot pictures of each guest or the whole table. But consider the setting with plates half full of food and the clutter of glasses and bottles and a beautiful centerpiece blocking out faces. Consider the amount of time it will take to go around the room to each and every table and the intrusion of getting everyone to stop their meal to pose with the bride and groom. Often some of the guests are missing as they are off visiting other tables too.
From my experience, the photographs taken in such a setting do not come out looking very interesting. It is hard to arrange a group of people around a table without all the stuff on it distracting attention away from the people.
Repeating this process at each and every table, to be sure everyone is photographed, results in a collection of photos displaying what everyone has also eaten and drunk or not eaten and drunk as well. If you decide this is still what you really want, then in selecting a wedding photographer, look for a traditional studio-wedding photographer who is most comfortable with the traditional poses around the table.
Wedding photojournalists are best know for capturing the real moments and emotions of the day. Documenting events naturally to tell a story as it unfolds. They therefore tend to hate making these stiff posed table shots. Making posed table photos mean that your photographer will be missing real unscripted moments of you and your guests enjoying the reception since it will take away a lot of time. There are ways to accomplish the goal of getting everyone photographed without resorting to table shots.
The solution I recommend is to consider honoring everyone at your wedding in one large group-wedding photograph. I use a large format camera to capture these large groups. I have shot wedding groups of as few as a dozen up to more than 450 people. I include a large print of this group shot with every package and everyone in the picture comes out crystal clear. It is usually the one photo from the wedding my clients get framed to hang on their wall.
Instead of the many smaller prints of each guest at their table, everyone is there in one big picture. Usually, I find the best time to do make it is right after the ceremony and just before the reception begins. Everyone is present and it is easy to arrange them all together with the bride and groom in front. It is a lot quicker making one photo than all of the individual table shots. After it is shot, you and all of your guests can go on and enjoy the reception. The rest of the photos will then be of real candid moments of everyone having a blast. That is the whole point of the reception in the first place.