How To Create Your Wedding Day Timeline
First Things to Consider
Close your eyes and imagine what your perfect day would be like. Does that include getting ready with your best friends or with your spouse-to-be? Exchanging vows privately? Feeding each other cake at the end of the day? Once you decide which moments and traditions are most important to you two, you can begin building your wedding day timeline.
Consider what kind of photos do you want. What photos do you want to have forever to look back on? Do you want a sweetheart session at some point in the day so you can get those intimate, one-on-one shots of you and your fiance? Do you want lots of group photos where you mix and match the family and friends pictured? It’s a good idea to decide these things ahead of time so that everyone knows when and where to gather. This way you don’t waste precious time or feel like you're herding cats on the day of your wedding.
Decide on your photo locations. Where will you be getting ready? Where will the ceremony be? Where can we sneak away during you two’s sweetheart session? Odds are, you’ll tour your wedding venue before the day of the wedding. So keeping an eye out for good photo locations while you’re touring or after the fact through photos on their website is a great way to have a plan of action before the day arrives. If you’re having trouble deciding on locations or knowing what will look best, I typically arrive about 15 minutes early to scout out some spots for the first look, the family photos, etc.
Decide what pre-ceremony traditions you’d like to incorporate. Decide whether you want a “first look” with your soon-to-be spouse, your parents, or anyone else. Decide whether you want a private vow readings. These moments usually takes place once you and your fiance are done getting ready and before the ceremony begins. This decision is personal to you two, as some decide they want the first look to occur during the ceremony itself as you walk down the aisle. However, the first look can be a great way to get a lot of the photos taken ahead of the ceremony and free up more time for you to be able to socialize and enjoy your reception with your guests without having to worry about stepping away for photos.
Have a time frame in mind and begin building a rough draft of your timeline. I can help you with this as much or as little as you’d like. Once you’ve decided the most important moments you want to happen on your wedding day, allot a certain amount of time for each significant moment. I normally recommend planning your family photos and sweetheart session after the ceremony around golden hour, the hour right before the sunsets. Solo or couples portraits take about 45mins, and photos with the wedding party typically take about 30 minutes depending on how many of your friends and family members you’re planning on including. That lets us take full advantage of that beautiful, warm light before the sun goes down and you two party into the night.
How I recommend your wedding day is structured:
Getting Ready
Getting ready photos are a great time to capture the pre-wedding excitedness that happens while you two are getting ready. These moments include you getting dolled up and dressed prior to the ceremony (hair/makeup, putting on your dress/suit, hanging out with your closest friends and family). This is also the time that I will take photos of any of the special details you’ve poured your heart into (rings, vow books, dress & veil, shoes, etc.). I recommend having me arrive at the end of this process so that I can get some “getting ready” shots of the tail end of hair and makeup. That way I’m photographing the closest to your final look and still getting those action shots of the makeup artist doing their thing.
First Look vs. First Touch vs. Private Vow Reading
These are all pre-ceremony traditions that can be incorporated on your special day:
The first look is when a couple sees each other for the first time on their wedding day. This intimate moment typically makes for an emotional photo opportunity. First looks can be with your significant other, your parents, or anyone special in your life that would be blown away by how amazing you look.
A first touch is similar to a first look, but instead of seeing each other before the ceremony, you’ll hold hands around a corner or hug with your eyes closed. This allows for you two to connect before the ceremony but save the first time seeing each other for down the aisle.
Instead of saying your written vows in front of your guests during the ceremony, you can recite them in a more private setting with just the two of you. Private vows are meant to be more personal and intimate and allow you time to connect prior to the ceremony without any performance anxiety.
If you plan to do any of these, I highly recommend add them to the timeline about an hour before the ceremony. If you decide to do a first look with your partner prior to the ceremony, you can get all the shots you planned, including bridesmaids, groomsmen, and immediate family, beforehand while still making sure there’s enough time to transition smoothly into the ceremony.
Ceremony
The moment we’ve all been waiting for! Regardless of how you decide to structure your ceremony the photo coverage is pretty straightforward. If you’re hiring an officiant, they often help you nail down a timeline specifically for the ceremony. However, if you’re having a family member or someone significant in your life officiating and you need a quick rundown, the typical flow of a ceremony is:
Processional - The group of people walking down the aisle in a specific order to mark the beginning of a wedding ceremony. The processional often includes a permutation of the officiant, the wedding party, flower girls, ring bearers, and the bride and groom and their parents.
Joining hands at the altar - Face each other and not the officiant so your guests can see your smiling faces.
The vow exchange - These are either performed by the officiant and you repeat OR the personal vows you two wrote for each other.
The ring exchange - Remember to give the rings to the keeper or ringbearer before the ceremony.
First kiss!
Exit processional - This is reverse order of the first time (you two first) and I always recommend you two pause and kiss at the end of the aisle before exiting.
Signing the marriage license - Normally, this is done right after the ceremony to make your nuptials official on paper.
The average length I see for ceremonies is about 20-30 minutes but the length of your ceremony depends on what you want to include that you think speaks to your specific union, or any religious or cultural traditions you want to include. Other ideas to include: handfasting, sand pouring, tree planting, & candle ceremony. If you have questions about any of these alternative ideas, feel free to ask me for more details.
Family and Friends Photos
Now is the time for all the big group shots! Now that the nerves of walking down the aisle have been conquered, you get to take photos with all of your family, friends, and assorted guests who are celebrating with you. Before your wedding day, I will share with you a detailed shot list that includes all the go-to groupings for family photos (bride and groom with both sets of parents, bride with siblings, groom with his parents, & many more). You’ll be able to check the ones that are most significant to you and the ones that don’t apply to you, so that the day of I make sure not to miss any important combos of the loved ones in your lives. Depending on how large your families and friend groups are, I recommend alloting 30-45 minutes immediately after the ceremony for these group photos. Planning to do it right after the exit processional will ensure that none of your people wander off before we can grab a photo with them.
Sweetheart Session
After the whirlwind of group photos, I like to give you two a private moment to soak up all the emotions of the day. This is a great opportunity for the now-married couple to step away from socializing and the bustle of the wedding in order to spend some one-on-one time before the reception. This is the portion of the day where you get those sweet, intimate shots of you and your partner basking in that newlywed glow. I try not to keep you away from the party for too long, so you can expect the sweetheart session to be 30-40 minutes. I’ll gently guide you two into poses and prompts while still giving you two privacy to fully enjoy each other’s presence.
Reception
The reception is another extremely personal part of the day, as well as the “grand finale” of sorts, and it’s up to you to fill it with whatever events you want. The progression of dinner, the first dance, parents dances, and bouquet toss are all up to you, as well as the music and the dance-floor-wildness levels (hopefully). This is a quick rundown of how I recommend you space it out:
Dinner - This is when I take a short break because most people don’t want to be photographed while eating and I’ll eat while you two eat to ensure I don’t miss any of the special moments to follow.
Toasts - I recommend letting the loved ones you’d like to give toasts know beforehand so they have plenty of time to prepare. Or you can open it up to anyone that would like to say something sweet to the newlyweds the night of.
Cake cutting - I’ll lead you through the specifics right beforehand but discuss with each other prior to that moment how you plan to do it - are you going to gently feed it to each other? Or is it going to get wild with cake in the face?
First dance - Pick a special song to dance your first time as husband and wife.
Parent dances - Classic combos include mother/daughter and father/son dances, but every family is unique so customize it to yours
Bouquet/garter toss - The single ladies line up behind you to try to catch the flying bouquet/after the garter is removed on the dancefloor the single men line up to try to catch it as the groom throws it.
Fun dancing - This can be a free-for-all with all your favorite playlist hits and/or it can include fun group dance songs (such as the cupid shuffle, the dollar dance, the anniversary dance, etc.).
If you hire a DJ, they’ll help you create a detailed timeline for any of the events you want to include during your reception. If not, I can totally help you plan all the special moments you two want to include in celebration of your marriage finally being official!
Grand Exit
Though technically part of the reception, the grand exit is a way to let your guests know that either the day has come to a close and the married couple is leaving the wedding, or that it’s an appropriate time for people to begin heading to their cars and leaving. The grand exit doesn’t necessarily have to end with the bride and groom leaving the venue, but it can also occur when the photographer is leaving so that guests know that it’s the end of photo coverage for the day and that the wedding is coming to a close. The grand exit is also a great opportunity for the guests to gather one last time and see the couple off, either with sparklers, confetti, bubbles, or anything else you may want to be thrown or waved in your direction! It’s a very fun, relaxed way to bring your wedding day to a close.
Mock Wedding Day Timeline
So with all that being said, here is a mock timeline for an October wedding day in Arizona with a first look and 8 hours of photography coverage:
1:00pm | Bride Starts Getting Ready
1:45pm | Photographer Arrives; Photograph Details
2:00pm | Groom Starts Getting Ready
3:00pm | First Look
3:30pm | Wedding Party & Immediate Family Photos
4:00pm | Couple Downtime; Photograph Ceremony & Reception Decor
5:00pm | Ceremony Starts
5:25pm | Ceremony Ends
5:30pm | Family & Friends Photos; Followed by Cocktail Hour
6:00pm | Sweetheart Session
6:30pm | Sunset
6:30pm | Bride & Groom Enter Reception; Reception Begins
6:40pm | Speeches
7:00pm | Dinner is Served
7:45pm | Cake Cutting
8:00pm | First Dance
8:05pm | Parent Dances; Seperately or both parent dances at the same time
8:20pm | Dance Floor Opens
8:45pm | Bouquet/Garter Toss; Any Other Fun Traditions
9:30pm | Last Call
9:45pm | Grand Exit
10:00pm | Photographer Leaves