The Wedding Day Timeline || Lynchburg, VA Wedding Photographer

There’s a lot of big decisions you’ll have to make for your wedding day- from caterers and bakers, to what dress you’re wearing, and who you want in your wedding party, etc. Yet, one of the most important decisions you’ll have to make is your wedding day timeline. You want to make sure you have enough time to ensure that you have the time set aside to get those wedding day photographs, to be able to capture the memories of your Dad seeing his little girl in her wedding dress, your Grandparents dancing together, or your groom seeing you for the first time!

Here are a few tips when prepping your wedding day time:

1- Remember, everything always takes longer than you expect. You may be expecting your ceremony to be 10-15 minutes, but also counting in the time it takes for everyone to say hi to each other, and walk over to the cocktail hour, it will most likely be closer to 30 minutes.

2- Check the time of sunset! Especially if you aren’t planning on doing a first look! I recommend scheduling the end time of your ceremony an hour before sunset so you have time for family portraits, photos with your wedding party, and of course time for pictures with your new hubby!

3- Make a list for family photos. Talk with your Mom, and your future mother-in-law so everyone is on the same page, and create a list of about 10 groupings for family photos. I recommend immediate family, grandparents, parents, siblings, etc! Then anything else can be captured at the reception!

4- Build in extra time. I usually recommend 30-45 minutes before the ceremony of “extra” time in case your hair or makeup is running late, a groomsmen forgets his tie and has to run back out to get it, etc!

5- Make sure you prioritize Bride and Groom portrait time! The day goes by in a blink and it’s easy to rush through these, but these are the photos that you’ll want to remember the day by!

Hope these tips helped you! I believe creating a great timeline is crucial to a successful wedding day that is stress free! Because of this, I include a custom timeline creation meeting with each and everyone of my couples!

Family Portrait's don't have to be miserable! || Lynchburg, Virginia Wedding Photographer

Since it's a Monday morning (yuck)... I figured now would be the best time to talk about (almost) everyone's least favorite part of the wedding day... formal family photos.  We have all been in those weddings where the family photos drag on and on, and we all know that we just want to get to the food! Early on in my photography career, I would mostly play it by ear and photos would seem to last forever... and there would always be something that was missed.  It was always so stressful for me, but worse, for the bride, groom and their families.  

I quickly learned that this was not what I wanted weddings to look like- I strive to help my brides and grooms be completely stress-free on their wedding days and this was throwing everything off! So, I changed my approach completely and now have the bride and groom provide a full & detailed list before the wedding day.  I have them chat with their parents together to set expectations.  If we only have 15-20 minutes for all of the family photos, we cannot have a list of 30+ variations.  

Some tips I've learned along the way: 

* Talk with your Mom & your future Mother-in-law to make sure everyone's expectations are set.  Discussing how you have 15-20 minutes of family portrait time that you're splitting between your family and your fiance's family.  

*If there are people you want in family photos, make sure you're communicating that with those family members! Having to search someone down in the middle of portrait time is no fun! 

*We can start family photos right away, even if there are some guests still around! Once they see us starting photos, they will automatically start walking over to the cocktail hour! 

*The best light is not always the ceremony site.  I will scope out the lighting situation before photos and have a plan for where would be best for those! 

*I always start with the officiant, and then the family with the oldest members so they can get into the reception and sit down!

Here is the list that most of my couples start with, and then adjust it based on their specific family members attending their wedding!

Bride & Groom with Officiant 

Bride & Groom with Brides Full Extended Family (parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, etc.) 

Bride & Groom with Brides Grandparents

Bride & Groom with Brides Immediate Family (parents, siblings, spouses & children) 

Bride & Groom with Brides Immediate Family no spouses (parents, siblings) 

Bride & Groom with Brides Parents

Bride with Brides Mom

Bride with Brides Dad

Bride with Brides siblings

Bride & Groom with Brides Siblings

Bride & Groom with Grooms Full Extended Family (parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, etc.) 

Bride & Groom with Grooms Grandparents

Bride & Groom with Grooms Immediate Family (parents, siblings, spouses & children) 

Bride & Groom with Grooms Immediate Family no spouses (parents, siblings) 

Bride & Groom with Grooms Parents

Groom with Groom's Mom

Groom with Groom's Dad

Groom with Groom's siblings

Bride & Groom with Groom's Siblings

Remember, the more detailed you can be for your family list the better!! It is always so helpful for me when I'm calling out names to be specific! Calling out "Brides Aunt" can be a lot more productive if there's a name included in that! 

See, formal portraits don't have to be THAT difficult! I can knock them out in about 15-20 minutes and get you enjoying your wedding reception sooner than later!! 

Ashley Eiban is a Wedding & Portrait Photographer based in Lynchburg, Virginia- available for travel world-wide.  Currently booking a limited number of weddings for 2016 and 2017.  Contact us today for additional information! 

Central Virginia Wedding || An Avoca Museum Wedding

Guys. I swore I wasn't ready for Fall. I wanted to cling onto summer for as long as possible. Soak up every last sun ray and time in the pool. And then this weekend happened.  A weekend that hit us with cooler temps and a slight breeze and it was magical.  It was the exact taste of autumn that I needed.  To shoot a wedding and it not be sweltering, everyone wasn't sweating and dying- it was perfect.  

Jerry & Holly had a beautiful, intimate ceremony at The Avoca Museum in Central Virginia.  It's a beautiful museum, full of gorgeous, green gardens, intimate little spots, and history.  It was the perfect spot for their families to join- Holly's from this area, and Jerry's all the way from Texas.  They had the county touches added in with the gorgeous museum to make it a truly unique to them wedding! 

Holly did the sweetest first look with her Mom and her Dad! Totally made me tear up!! 

A special thanks to the vendors that helped make this day unique and special! 

Venue: Avoca Museum in Altavista, VA

Make Up: Cheri Lanier with Mary Kay

Hair: Mitchell's on 7th in Altavista, VA 

Florist: Cheryl's Secret Garden in Lynchburg, VA

Dj: DJ Stu and Party Patrol Productions in Hurt, VA

Cake: DIY by Groom's Step-Mom (Leisa) 

Catering: DIY and Cheryl Ragland

Groom & Groomsmen Vests: Men's Warehouse in Lynchburg, VA

Photobooth: O'Snap Photobooth  in Lynchburg, VA 

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Ashley Eiban is a wedding and portrait photographer based in Central Virginia.  Serving Lynchburg, Charlottesville, Richmond, Roanoke, Farmville, and surrounding areas.  

Available for travel world-wide.  Currently accepting a limited number of sessions for 2016 and 2017.  Contact us today for additional information! 

Planning your Wedding: Creating an Effective Timeline

I'm so excited to start a new blogging series to help YOU in planning your own wedding.  As you can imagine, I've seen lots and lots of weddings- some have gone so effortlessly, and some have, well, not gone as smoothly. One of the many hats I wear on any wedding day is time-keeper! I help brides know when they need to step in their dress, when the groom needs to be downstairs for the first look, what time the reception starts and photos need to be done.  

In my opinion, one of the most important things you really have to nail down (after your photographer, of course! ha) is a solid time-line.  This is something I am so happy to build for each of my brides- in thorough detail based on their specific wedding day, and I'm excited to share with you how you can create a time-line to help keep everyone on schedule! 

I start out by discussing with my bride what their wedding day will look like! Pretty simple! 

Some of the questions we go over are: 

-What time will the ceremony be?

-Are you going to be doing a first look, a first-look no peek, a first-look with your Dad?

-How many family photos are you planning on needing (there's a blog post on this coming!) 

-What time does the reception start?

-Are you doing a send-off? 

With those questions, I can start building an outline and plugging in the main details: (below is an example for a beginning time-line WITH a first look): 

     5:00 Ceremony Begins

     5:30 Ceremony Ends / Cocktail Hour Begins

              Extended Family Photos

     6:00 Reception Begins

     10:00 Send-off

With these details, I start adding in our additional information. I know that I want my brides and grooms to be 'in hiding' at least 30 minutes before a ceremony so all of their guests that arrive early don't see them. This couple wants to do a first look, so we are able to do the Bride & Groom photos, the bridal party photos, and the immediate family photos before the Ceremony even begins!  

So just by getting those questions answered, I am able to fill out this 8 hour time-line of the wedding day! 

2:00 Photographers arrive- shoot detail photos, Bride & Groom getting ready/dressed

2:45 Bride & Groom First Look 

3:30 Bridal Party Photos- Girls/Guys/Combined

4:00 Immediate Family Photos

4:30 Bride & Groom in Hiding

5:00 Ceremony Begins

5:30 Extended Family Photos

6:00 Reception Begins

8:15 Bride & Groom Sunset Photos

10:00 Send-off 

I'll be back with the Planning Your Wedding Series to go over topics about the Reception Time-Line, creating quick & painless Family Formal Photos, Getting Ready, etc.  I would LOVE to hear your input if there's anything else you would like to see in this series! Planning a wedding can be SO overwhelming- but it doesn't have to be!  Keep in mind, when hiring me as your wedding day photographer, I help you with this process every step of the way!