This is some great wedding timeline timeline advice from a photographer’s point of view!

Originally Posted on Darby Elizabeth Photography

Planning Your Wedding Timeline

There are so many wonderful guides online to help you plan and map out your wedding day timeline.

This timeline from Liene Stevens over at Blue Orchid is a great guide to help you remember to include key events into your timeline that you might otherwise neglect. Also here’s a fabulous mock up timeline from WeddingBee that show’s how a wedding timeline might look for brides to have a starting point in planning their day.

I thought it might be fun to add my thoughts as a photographer to these great minds on things to consider when drafting your wedding timeline. And since I’m a photographer, most of my suggestions tend to be about the photography heavy portions of the day!

Family Photos: If you have very small families you can get away with 15-20 minutes for this sections of the day. I usually suggest having 30-45 minutes set aside just for family photos. We usually don’t get all of this time due to outside factors such as a family member being late or MIA at the time of photos. Also it’s common to add extra group photos as we are shooting. I love adding extra groups as I come from a huge family and always want to have the shot of me and my cousins of my mom and her sisters, but it does add extra time so buffering your time-line to allow for these kinds of situations is a great idea.

I also love to shoot the family photos before the wedding when the bride and groom are seeing each other prior to the wedding ceremony. One great advantage to taking all of the family photos prior to the wedding ceremony is that everyone can enjoy and mingle during the cocktail hour!

Bridal Party Photos: I love bridal party photo time because it’s just the bride and groom with their best friends! My biggest suggestion for the bridal party photos is to have an extra person on hand to be the drink runner or errand person should someone be missing. One of the hardest parts of shooting a large group of fun young people is that someone is always running off to do something. By having an extra hand it will help keep things moving along at a swift pace. Bridal party photos are one of the liveliest and fun times of the entire day. I usually like having around 20-30 minutes just with my bridal party, though I’ll always take more time when I can get it!

Bride and Groom Photos: Well your photographer is not going to complain if you give them tons of time to shoot photos of the two of you. I love to have at least thirty minutes set aside just for the couple at a minimum. While that might sound like plenty of time we usually don’t get all of that time to ourselves. On your wedding day everyone wants to give you a hug and a kiss and tell you how good looking you are, which is so much fun but takes a few moments here and there. Buffering your time together will allow you and your guest to mingle as your photographer takes you around the venue while allowing your photographer to get all of the shots that you fell in love with and hired them to get! If you have the ability try to set aside 60 minutes for your couple photoshoot so that you have some of that buffer time built in.

Also if you are seeing each other prior to the wedding it is a little easier to maximize that couple photoshoot time. When shooting the couple photoshoot after the ceremony during cocktail hour plan on spending 15-20 minutes signing the wedding license and being congratulated!

End of the Wedding: One area of the wedding that is kind of unclear is how long to have your photographer stay at your wedding. While this varies for your event needs and ceremony time my general suggestion is 10 or 10:30 and here’s why. By 10 or 10:30 the bar has usually been open for 4-5 hours and your guests are probably becoming a little adverse to bright flashes and just want to relax with their cake and coffee. This suggestion is exactly that, a suggestion, but I’ve found it to be pretty true for most weddings.

Desert Mountain Wedding Film Trailer

view + style = a wedding to envy

Taz and Jeanette’s May wedding was a beautiful affair! The entire day was kept on track by the ever wonderful Liene Stevens, of Blue Orchid Designs, and captured on film by Jennifer Bowen!

My favorite things about Jeanette and Taz’s wedding trailer are:

1. The View: There is a time lapse shot in the wedding that show’s off the stunning view the wedding guests had.
2. The Ceremony Set Up: The courtyard, where the ceremony was held, was simply beautiful!
3. Her Dress: The cut of her dress is so flattering, I just loved it.

arizona spring + afternoon luncheon = a sentimental wedding

Ryan and Blair are hopelessly in love and it showed in every aspect of their precious wedding. It was hosted at the lovely Phoenix icon, The Arizona Biltmore Resort. Family is huge to both of them, they are deeply sentimental, and it shows in their wedding.

Special thanks to Liene Stevens and the girls at Blue Orchid Designs for helping this day go off flawlessly. And a special shout out to the fabulous Hollye Schumacher for taking the beautiful photos.

My 3 favorite things about Blair and Ryan’s trailer are:

1. The calligraphy on the menu cards.
2. The sweet look they share during the ceremony.
3. Their rings and the shot with the rings and the sun flare.

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“I am absolutely, without a doubt, speechless. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving us such an amazing preview! Ryan and I were completely floored when we watched it last night. I sent the link on to my parents as well, and they were over the moon about it. I want to thank you and your team so much, but I genuinely don’t have the words! Having our day on film, in this quality, is an immeasurable treasure for us.” -Blair and Ryan

If you enjoyed this trailer you’ll probably love our other wedding trailers!

Planner Liene Stevens

Liene Stevens, owner of Blue Orchid Designs, is a brilliant wedding planner and consultant of all things wedding. Funny and down to earth, Liene’s reputation as a powerful wedding resource reaches across the entire country.

I asked Liene what her favorite part of a wedding was – and was very intruiged by her answer.

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I want Liene to send me more information!

Spend a minute with a wedding expert – Liene Stevens of Blue Orchid Designs

Each week My Wedding Film likes to do a little spot light to let you know the best and the brightest that the wedding world has to offer. Today meet Liene Stevens of Blue Orchid Designs. Liene is a wedding planner in Scottsdale Arizona and New York.

In this little segment we asked Liene what her deep dark TV watching guilty pleasure was. You know, the kind you’d never admit to, but you really really love to watch.

I want Liene to send me more information!

Spend a minute with a wedding expert – Liene Stevens of Blue Orchid Designs

Each week My Wedding Film likes to do a little spot light to let you know the best and the brightest that the wedding world has to offer. Today meet Liene Stevens of Blue Orchid Designs. Liene is a wedding planner in Scottsdale Arizona and New York.

In this mini interview we asked Liene to fill us in on her fun and unusual name, Blue Orchid Designs.

I want Liene to send me more information!