6 Tips for Perfect Family Photos at Your Wedding

Family Photos at a Wedding Require a very delicate balance.

They are some of the most important photos of the whole day, but nobody actually wants to line up and take pictures when you could be off celebrating. Especially when you have your wedding in a beautiful place like the Big Island of Hawaii!

Here are a few tips for making your family photos turn out amazing without taking too much precious time on your wedding day. We loved how these ones turned out from a Hilton Waikoloa Village wedding!

1. A first look is an amazing way to have an intimate moment with you and your partner, and it also allows for family photos before the ceremony! Having those photos done before guests even arrive lets you go right into mingling after your ceremony. This way, you have more time with everyone before you sneak off for your wedding sunset photos!

2. Getting a list of all the different groupings you’d like to your photographer before the wedding day helps us finish photos quicker and makes sure we don’t miss anything!

3. Let people know that they’ll be in the family photos beforehand and make sure they know to be on their best behavior.

4. If there are going to be any kids in the family photos, let us know! Depending on the ages, I’ll sometimes bring baby toys or some treats to help bribe kids into putting on their best smiles. 

5. With kids, try your best to save any discipline until after the photos. I know that correction can sometimes be unavoidable especially since kids are ready to finally move around after sitting still for the whole ceremony. We love working with kids and have a lot of tricks to help make the family photos fun for them! But if a kid has been disciplined during the photos, giving a genuine smile is usually the last thing they want to do.

6. Assign a bridesmaid or groomsman to help wrangle everyone together. I won’t know everyone’s face on the wedding day, so if someone isn’t responding when I call their name it could easily disrupt the flow of photos. Having someone who knows who everyone is there to make sure people are ready when they’re up next helps a ton!

Time is precious on your wedding day, and we pride ourselves in doing our best to make sure you get all of the best family photos you could want while getting you back to celebrating your marriage as soon as possible! If you’re thinking about the Hilton Waikoloa wedding venue for your big day, inquire today and we can hop on a call to tell you all of our insider tips!

Here is what the bride had to say about her time with us!
“Our photos are beautiful! And our experience with Grant and ELP Productions was wonderful from our first interaction to delivery of our final gallery. I first chose ELP Productions because I liked how Grant edited the photos, truly capturing the vibrant Hawaiian colors and sunsets. Before we even met in person, Grant took the time to chat and get to know us. During our ceremony and all the picture-taking, he was friendly, open, patient and kind, and our comfort with him shows in the photos. He was fun and flexible with the grandkids, which really made a difference. Grant is an excellent photographer and editor, and just a nice human. We could not be happier with our choice of ELP Productions to capture all the moments of our special day.”