What do we mean by “Easy Wedding Photography” and how is it accomplished? Why even try to make it easy? Easy for who?

I decided to write this San Francisco city hall blog post in response to a very common concern among engaged couples looking for a wedding photographer. These types of concerns are especially prevalent with grooms:

Will wedding photography dominate our day?

Are we going to have to do a lot of silly poses?

Is the wedding photographer going to be difficult to deal with?

Will we feel uncomfortable during the formal shoot?

Will the wedding photographer listen to our concerns or suggestions?

It is going to be super expensive to have our city hall wedding photos taken?

Notice that most of these VERY common questions do not have anything to do with the quality, quantity or cost of the wedding photos. Yes, you would think that our clients would be more concerned about those types of issues. After all, isn’t that the most important thing? We all want great photos and lots of them for a low price. Oddly enough, however, we receive a great many emails and calls asking questions that are more related to how the shoot will go and what will be required. I recently almost lost a wedding booking because the groom decided that he didn’t want to go through with hiring a professional city hall wedding photographer. His main concern was feeling that it would be uncomfortable to pose for pictures. After some reassurance that I would strive to make the photo shoot “easy” the couple went ahead and booked. This is a common occurrence with grooms and even sometimes brides. We all want memorable San Francisco city hall wedding pictures, but are we ready to put in a little work to accomplish it? This is the sole reason, we try to make our San Francisco city hall wedding photography as easy as possible for the couple. We want them to not only remember the great time they had through their photos, but was also hope that they have a good time during the process. I have seen some San Francisco city hall wedding photographers mention that it is very important for the bride and groom to be fully engaged and involved in the picture taking. While this partially true, there are some couples who just want great wedding pictures without working for them. Easy City Hall wedding photography is the right approach for these types of couples.

Keeping Wedding Photography Comfy

So it is obvious that this is a valid concern among our clients. Who wants to have no fun on their wedding day? Who wants to spend the entire day taking wedding photos? With a few exceptions, the answer is nobody. Most people want to have brilliant wedding photos with a small amount of fuss and time spent. Is this realistic? The answer really depends upon the expectations of the couple. Consistent with this same topic, many of our engaged couples let us know that they want mostly candid photos on their wedding day. I always let them know that we are happy to provide them any type of photography coverage that they prefer, but I am also quick to point out that San Francisco City Hall weddings may not have as many candid moments as a typical wedding would have. There is no dancing, no cake cutting, no toasts and often times no guests. This means that some of the candid photos need to be set up in advance. When these couples are attracted to our website by our pictures, we have to admit that many of the photos were set up and posed. My feeling is that a balance approach is really the answer.

Creating Candid Wedding Moments for the Camera

As mentioned above, the candid wedding moments at SF City Hall need to be created by the photographer in most cases. We do this by asking the couple to walk hand-in-hand throughout the building and interact as though they were just going on a city hall tour. We even have a fun trick which involves the couple walking hand in hand, but moving about in a playful manner. The photos that come out of this are always fun and different. Plus they look very candid. But obviously not all of the photos can be walking shots. We mix it up and have the couple interact in other ways as well. We even might sit them down on the Grand Staircase and just have them goof around together and talk. Some of our best images can be born out of these contrived situations. Keep the wedding photography easy and you will end up with great final images! The point to this blog post is that as a couple, you should feel comfortable telling your San Francisco city hall wedding photographer the type of coverage you want and need.