Traditional and photojournalistic are the two main divisions of style in wedding photography. The approach and technique may differ greatly, although both styles use similar equipment. Which style to use depends on what you want and your budget.

Traditional Wedding Photography

Traditional wedding photography puts more emphasis on quality and posed pictures. You’ll need time to set things up for the shots, getting people together, and relocating any equipment. This ensures you get the exact pictures you want, with a lot of control over the pose and location. A disadvantage to this style is the stress that may be involved with the set-up, and your pictures will look like they’ve been set-up.

If you decide to go with this style of photography, it will give you a great wedding album. Traditional wedding pictures turn out often looking like a photo shoot rather than a wedding day. This can be to your advantage to have pictures taken specifically to go on pages in a scrapbook or album.

Traditional photography is for you if:

* You have time for the set-up
* You know what kind of pictures you want
* You want to avoid photos of silly or potentially embarrassing moments
* You want a traditional, old-fashioned look to the pictures
* You’d like posed photos of all the guests in their best dress

Photojournalistic Wedding Photography

Photojournalistic wedding photography involves the photographer being the bride and groom’s shadow, following them throughout the day and taking pictures. You won’t need any time for set-up or moving equipment, but you’ll have less control over what and who gets photographed. Your pictures will be of people interacting and moving, like a storybook of your wedding day.

If you decide to go with this style of photography, you’ll have low stress, high energy pictures. Every shot will show the excitement of your big day, and photos will be taken with the photographer’s creativity and vision. Your wedding will be captured in a more natural and authentic way, going through the day, instead of a series of posed pictures.

Photojournalistic photography is for you if:

* You don’t want to schedule time for set-up
* You want silly, potentially embarrassing photos
* You want the pictures telling the ‘story’ of you wedding
* You’d like pictures of people being themselves while in their best dress
* You want the energy and excitement kept in the pictures

No matter what style of photography you decide to go with, or even some of both, make sure it goes along with the way you want your big day to unfold. Not only do your pictures depend on the style of photography, but the photographer as well, because each person will pay particular attention to different aspects of you wedding.

Make sure to openly communicate with the photographer you choose, so you get exactly what you want for your wedding pictures, with either posed moments or candid portraits, or both!

I know how hard and stressful it can be to decide on every aspect of your wedding. It seems like EVERY decision is a major one from Catering to Wedding Photographers. But if you’d like other tips on how to choose a wedding photographer or for ideas on styles of photographs, as well as how to pick one that works for you.

These tips are simple, but you’ve just got to know what questions to ask and what to look for. You can read more tips at Wedding Photographer Seattle.

Don’t get discouraged, it’s not impossible to make these decisions and stay sane at the same time! Learn more ways to Choose Your Wedding Photographer Seattle by clicking the link or going to http://www.weddingphotographerseattle.org.

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1. Know Your Audience

Knowing who your intended audience is an obvious, but sometimes overlooked step in the process of developing your slide show. For instance, if you’re showing your slide show at your wedding reception, perhaps you’ll want to include some pictures of the guests, and not just pictures of you and your fiancee.

2. Shorter is Sometimes Better

After you’ve determined who your intended audience is you can start to get an idea as to how many pictures you’ll want to include in your slide show. We’ve found that video montages that are between 8 – 12 minutes in length are ideal for wedding receptions. This usually works out to about 3 songs and 75-100 pictures. While you can certainly display more photos during your slide show, you want to be careful not to subject your guests to an extremely long slide show. Some people have elected to develop two slide shows. One that is their “personal” slide show that will be given to their parents or kept for themselves and the other is their “reception” slide show that will be shown during the big event.

3. Choose Quality Photographs

While recent advances in digital photo restoration have allowed torn and poorly developed photographs to be brought back to life, there is only so much that the software can do. Pictures that look great printed (correct lighting, framing, developed properly) will also look great while scanned. Pictures that are extremely dark or grainy, while perhaps improved somewhat, will still not appear the best.

4. Choose a Variety of Photographs

Even though you may love all the pictures of your dog Rusty, you’re audience may not want to sit through all the pictures of him. Instead of showing 10 pictures of ole’ Rusty, perhaps choose the best 2 or 3. Using a variety of photographs can keep your audience interest.

5. Landscape pictures show better than Portrait pictures

Given the standard 4:3 dimensions of television monitors, photographs that are in landscape mode (vertical) as opposed to portrait mode (horizontal) show better on a TV. While portrait photographs certainly can and SHOULD be used, you should be aware that there will typically be a black border that appears around the photograph. It’s best to use these sparingly throughout the slide show and not clump them all together.

6. Give some thought to music

Choose music that has meaning to you, music whose lyrics go well with the pictures. Also pay attention to how long the music you’re choosing is. If you’re only showing 30 pictures, you might not want to choose a 8 minute song.

7. Add short video clips

Do you have any home videos sitting around gathering dust? Think about adding perhaps a 10-15 second video clip in the middle of the slide show. The video clip can help break up the video montage and is a great way to keep your audiences interest.

8. Add motion to your slide shows

Slide shows developed on PowerPoint and other consumer level software will typically be just static photos that go from one picture to the next. Consider having your slide shows created with the “Ken Burns” effects that Pan and Zoom on each photograph. This can help bring your pictures to life.

9. Add transitions to your slide shows

Transitions such as fade in/fade out, dissolve, and image peel are also an effective way to move from one photograph to the next.

10. Test! Test! Test!

If you’re planning on showing your video montage or slide show at an event like a wedding reception, try and test ALL the equipment prior to the big day. Make sure the projector or television, DVD Player or Laptop, and sound is all working.

Creating a captivating slide show or video montage can be done successfully with keeping a few of these tips in mind. Pictures that are preserved to DVD can be enjoyed for years to come.

Mike Yared is the owner of http://dvdPhotographs.com a Michigan based company started in 2003 that is now the leading producer of Wedding Slideshows for couples throughout the United States and Canada. DVDPhotographs produces custom slideshows for weddings, birthday parties, anniversaries, bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs and other special occasions. Parterning with a company like DVDPhotographs.com can help ensure your slide show is of professional quality that you can be proud to show at your event.

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Your wedding day will only happen once. The memories will last forever but, great pictures and videos will allow you to keep and share the memories in a special way. If you are planning to hire a professional photographer, it might be a good idea to have friends and family taking pictures as well. Every moment of your wedding day is only going to happen once and everyone will see it differently. Photographing your wedding is a fun way for friends that are not in the wedding party to feel they made a valuable contribution.

There might be guarantees from a professional photographer but, what good will those do after the ceremony? Those moments can never be captured again and if something goes wrong you will have no recourse but perhaps a financial refund. Ask others to take photographs and video also, you should have no problem enlisting back up photographers.

There are certain shots that you will need to make sure do not get overlooked. Provide a list of people and shots that are to be taken and have more than one person take each one.

1. If you hire a professional photographer you probably want to save money where you can. Ask them to show up only when needed and be specific about which shots you want and where they should be taken. There is probably no need for them to take pictures of the wedding party getting ready but this might be a lot of fun for one of your friends. Have a friend or family member with the groom and his groomsmen and one with the bride and her attendants taking pictures.

2. It would be a lot more fun for the bride to have a friend riding with her to the church taking pictures stead of a strange photographer.

3. Make sure that whoever will be taking pictures gets good photos of the venue before your guests arrive. Of course there should be plenty of pictures as guests arrive as well.

4. Besides pictures of the actual ceremony there should be pictures of the seated guests and wedding party. These should include the entire wedding party and the parents of both the bride and groom.

5. You will need to let your photographers know what pictures you want right after the ceremony and who is to be in them. These pictures should include pictures of the bride and groom together with their parents. One picture of the new couple with his parents and one with hers is a photo that often gets overlooked. If parents are remarried, you should get a picture of the biological parents alone with the couple if you can. Don’t feel too uncomfortable asking for this particular photo, you will be so happy you did.

6. Put disposable cameras on the wedding reception tables and encourage all guests to take pictures of each other and anything they think will be important to you. Instruct them to leave the cameras on the tables for you to develop and you will make sure whoever wants pictures will get them.

If you hire a photographer you can save a little money by asking to buy your pictures unedited or on a cd, you will want to ask about the reprinting rights. Limiting the amount of time they spend at the event and the number of pictures they take is also helpful. But, friends and family will be happy to take pictures all day long for free. Everyone can’t be a member of the wedding party but this is one of those great job for friends that are not in the wedding party, and it will save you a ton of money.

Belinda Nelson is a free lance copywriter who enjoys writing on a variety of subjects. Each article is carefully researched and put together for the benefit of the reader. You are invited to find out more and leave your own comment about her findings on the subject of unique weddings by visiting: http://www.makeauniquewedding.blogspot.com/. Be sure to sign up for your free gift while you are there!

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Having pictures is a must during the wedding. When all is said and done, the wedding pictures will serve as reminders of that wonderful big day. These pictures are also something to look forward to on your 20th wedding anniversary. Unfortunately, wedding photographers, with their packages and inflexible picture sizes, are notoriously expensive and often hard to deal with. Somehow, many photographers do not understand why the couple didn’t want wallet sizes. This can leave you scratching your head wondering how can pictures of my wedding be made affordable and reasonable? Everything hinges on who is finally chosen to photograph the wedding. Here are some suggestions.

The wedding photographer
The biggest frustration in wedding photography is paying an expensive photographer and then ending up with pictures that you do not like. If you have already decided to hire this person, try to find an affordable one who has a portfolio of beautiful pictures. The best way to do this is to ask around. Talk to a friend or a relative who may personally know a wedding photographer. Talk to someone who recently had a wedding to determine if they like their photographer. And most important of all, you must talk to as many wedding photographers as you can. Compare their prices, packages, and portfolio. Choose the photographer who not only takes good pictures but is also willing to accommodate your wishes and your budget.

The local photographer
In your search for a professional to take pictures and who will have affordable rates, it is recommended to consider someone local. These local photographers may not specialize in wedding photography but they will surely do the job. Since they don’t specialize in wedding photography, they don’t have pre-established packages. This is your opportunity to make your own wedding photography package.

The photography student
There might be a photography class being held in your area. You can visit these classes and find a photography student who would be willing to exchange his/her photography services for a chance to build a portfolio. Payment is usually minimal and limited to the expenses for developing the pictures. These students most likely know how to do photo editing and can they often produce dramatic pictures.

The family friend
Photography is a popular hobby. There is a good chance that either the bride or the groom knows a friend who dabbles with photography. Dabbling does not mean using the digital camera every now and then. This family friend should be a photography enthusiast and proud of the pictures that he/she has taken. This friend might be interested in expanding his/her portfolio by taking pictures of your wedding. Of course, you need to pay for the processing of the pictures. You just need to make sure that this friend won’t mind taking pictures while others are socializing.

Guests with cameras
The most practical way in having wedding pictures is to simply ask the guests to bring their digital cameras. These cameras are convenient because the pictures taken need only be sent via email to the newly married couple. The only expense of the couple is the processing or developing of the pictures that they like. Of course, there’s a chance that there might not be any picture that they would like. Thus, before the wedding, it is a good idea to divide the photography tasks among the guests. That is, one guest is especially requested to take pictures of the ceremony. Another guest is requested to take pictures of the cake. And still another guest is asked to take pictures of the couple. All guests, of course, are welcome to take lots of pictures.

Every guest
If the couple wanted to have unique and funny wedding pictures, they can purchase cheap and disposable cameras and place them at the tables. Every guest will have the chance to use these cameras and it would add fun to the wedding reception.

About The Author
Find 100′s of Unique Wedding Ideas at UsWeddingIdeas.com. Learn how you can “Save Money on Your Wedding and Plan it Your Way!” Get started immediately with a 5 part eCourse. Yours Free just for visiting.

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