Getting ready | How to prepare

When you are planning your wedding you have to think about a million things. Though on your wedding day you just want to enjoy it without being busy organizing the last pieces.

The getting ready in the morning of your wedding day is the time of anticipation and excitement. Your mom and sister, maybe your friends will be with you to help you getting into your dress and being beautified by a make-up artist and hair dresser.  I love this time of the day.  The details are still waiting to be used and the atmosphere of excitement fills the room. And mum is teared up as her little girl is getting married. Often the wedding location is perfectly planned to get the most beautiful images during the ceremony, the portrait session and the dinner . But what about the morning ? When I arrive at a wedding location in the morning the room where the bride and her girls are getting ready is often filled with clothes and stuff and sometimes the light is very poor. It is never impossible to photograph in low light rooms but a cluttered background is hard to ignore on a picture. If you want to make sure you are having beautiful light and calm backgrounds on your getting ready images there are just a few tips to keep in mind.

1. Find a room with a beautiful window – one is enough but natural light is always better than artificial light

2. Put all the clothes and stuff in a room that wont be photographed or in a corner that wont be on the picture. Like that you are making sure when I photograph you while your hair is getting done and you are getting into the dress that the background is clean and beautiful. This makes the often unspectacular room where the brides are getting ready look a lot more sophisticated and elegant.

3. Ask the girls around you and your mum to get ready first. It looks a lot nicer when you are getting into the dress when the persons helping you are already in their dresses instead of sweat pants and a jumper.

These small details will make a big difference in your getting ready images and when you sit together on your couch looking through the wedding album in 40 years you just remember the anticipation and the excitement and mums tears because her girl is getting married – not the clothes that lie on the ground and the stuff of your bridesmaids.

A little example before we cleaned up the room and got Katharina’s sister dressed up. This picture made it into the album – but just look how beautiful it looks with the room cleaned and her sister in her beautiful aqua blue dress. This room had just a tiny little window but the light is gorgeous close to the window. As you see the lights in the back are switched on and the lamp that is next to the getting ready area is switched of to avoid mixed lights from ambient light and artificial light in the picture.

This is the room after cleaning and Katharina’s sister in her beautiful dress while helping her sister.