The best wedding photographers don’t try to draw attention to themselves. They capture the natural, unscripted moments of your special day, and their photos reflect the genuine love and joy of your guests at the celebration. If you’re looking for a photographer who will be in the background of your wedding day, unobtrusive and graceful, you might consider wedding photography with a more natural or documentary style.
Just because a wedding is formal or traditional doesn’t mean that it can’t also be modern and contemporary. Wedding photography is more than just getting a picture of the bride and groom, so don’t be afraid to ask your photographer about his or her style. Here are some common wedding photography styles:
Formal wedding photos
Formal wedding photos are a good choice for couples who want to capture their beautiful day but don’t want anything too dramatic. For instance, this type of photography is great for traditional weddings and families who want formal portraits of both the bride and groom together with family members at their wedding.
Formal wedding photography can be especially important to couples who have relatives who live far away from where they are getting married or don’t get to see them often, because it allows them to capture those special moments on film so that everyone can remember what an amazing time they had in person.
Traditional wedding photography
When we talk about traditional wedding photography, we often refer to traditional wedding group or family photos. These are of course taken by many todays photographers and traditional wedding photos are still very important part of the big day.
Traditional wedding photography poses a lot of problems for people who want to look natural and relaxed in their pictures. It’s often said that the best photos are candid, but that can be hard to achieve when you’re posing for a camera. You’re self-aware, and your body language is likely going to change in subtle ways because of it.
Traditional wedding photography is the most common style and also the best known. The photographer will take posed photos of the bride and groom, their families and friends. They usually have a studio set up in which they can capture these moments. The photographer will also provide you with an album of all the images they took that day so you can look through them later on down the track.
Documentary
The alternative is shooting a documentary wedding. A style that’s all about capturing life as it happens. With this approach, you’ll have fewer posed shots, but more opportunities to capture real moments while they happen. Your subjects won’t be thinking about the camera most of the time. They’ll be thinking about the moment they’re living in, which will allow them to feel natural and authentic instead of posed and uncomfortable. Plus, you get more variety, you’ll get moments of laughter and exuberance, but also tenderness and serenity.
You can even use this approach for couples who want traditional poses—just make sure you ask your clients ahead of time whether they want an unobtrusive or traditional approach. It’s important to let them know how this will affect how you work during the event. For example, if they want a traditional approach, explain how you’ll still do posed portraits but will be shooting candids most of the day.
Documentary wedding photography is a style where the photographer captures the day as it unfolds, with no direction or posing. It’s also known as photojournalistic or reportage wedding photography, which means that the photographer takes photos in a journalistic style.
This type of wedding photography will capture moments that happen naturally throughout your day, such as your first look with your bridesmaids before heading to the ceremony or dancing with your father before cutting into your cake.
Photojournalistic or reportage
Photojournalism is another important style that is closely linked to natural or documentary wedding photography. Photojournalism is often known as a way to document important history events such as during wartime. If you want to get a sense of how it used to be done, you can see photographs from past historical events. Today this approach ha been applied to weddings which are seen as events. Photographers who carry on this tradition are often called wedding photojournalists.
Fine art wedding photography
`Fine art wedding photography’ is a phrase that can be used to describe any style of wedding photography that focuses more on the art than it does on capturing candid moments. It’s about telling stories and creating something visually beautiful, making it an ideal fit for couples who want their wedding photos to have an artistic touch.
In order to capture this style properly, photographers must know how (and when) to stage shots and make them look natural. They also need to edit each photo with care so that each one tells its own story—one that can be understood by anyone who views it, whether they know what they’re looking at or not.
Contemporary wedding photography
Contemporary wedding photography is a style of wedding photography that focuses on capturing the moment and emotion of the day. It is a documentary style of photography that is more candid than traditional wedding photography. The photographer will capture the day in a way that reflects your style, so if you want to feel like you’re looking at a magazine spread, this is probably not for you. However, if you love artistic photos and want your guests to enjoy them as well, contemporary might be right for you!
The best part about contemporary? You don’t have to worry about having an elaborate visual plan for every single moment (although this can certainly help!) because each element will be highlighted in its own way with beautiful black-and-white images throughout their album after editing them together into one final piece by our team at Studio Dots Design & Photo Lab!
Wedding photographers have many different styles to choose from
You should also set up a consultation to discuss your wedding photography vision. It’s important to know what style of photography you want, and more specifically, the types of photos you want taken at your wedding. For example, if you love candid shots with little editing, then it’s best to hire a photographer who specializes in this type of work.
If it’s not too much trouble for you, I would like to suggest that we meet in person for coffee or tea so we can discuss all this in detail so that I can help plan my services accordingly!
Wedding photography is a wonderful way to create lasting memories of your day. Congratulations again and good luck in finding the right photographer!
