Do you spend time and money choosing a fantastic professional wedding photographer – so what about informal photographs taken by your guests? What are the benefits and drawbacks of mobile phones at weddings?
Benefits of mobile phones at weddings
As a wedding couple you cannot possibly be everywhere at once on your wedding day and neither can your professional photographer.
Asking your guests to take photos of their experiences on your special day gives you the benefit of seeing other aspects you would otherwise miss. It also gives you an informal record of all the fun everyone experienced at your wedding.
Top tips for permitting mobile phones at weddings:
- Ask everyone to put their phones on silent
- To keep track of photos taken by your guests during your ceremony is to create a unique hashtag
- A unique hashtag enables you to keep track of any photos of your wedding posted on social media
- For example if your names are Maria and Pablo and your wedding is in June 2023, your hashtag could be #mariapablojun23
- Ask your celebrant to make an announcement asking guests not to post any photos on social media until you have had time to send a few images to close family and friends who could not attend the ceremony
- Ask guests to wait 24 hours or 48 hours before making any photos public
Drawbacks of mobile phones at weddings
- Saying your words of commitment to your soul mate in front of those who love you most is a meaningful event, you want your guests to really be present in the moment and truly experience the emotion of the ceremony – with their phones off!
- You want all of your guests to relax and be free from the social pressure to be the first to post the perfect Instagram wedding photo.
- With all of this in mind, you invest time and money choosing a professional photographer to portray your wedding as you want it, in a specific style.
- Your photographer also wants to capture the smiles, laughter and emotion of your guests – and they cannot do that if everyone has a phone in front of their face!
- And you certainly don’t want strangers seeing images of your wedding before you do!
A happy compromise
One way to compromise on the question of mobile phones at weddings is to ask guests to put their phones down just for the period of the actual ceremony itself.
From the cocktail reception onwards, everyone is encouraged to relax and invited to use their own cameras and phones to record the happiness and fun – but on condition that they do not post any images onto social media until a specific period after the wedding.
And remember to use your unique wedding hashtag when posting!
Author bio: Debbie Skyrme is "Celebrant Spain". Award winning bilingual destination wedding celebrant officiating elopements, vow renewals and wedding ceremonies in the Spanish sunshine.
