Photographer Expert, Cameron Ingalls’ Answer:
Many magazines these days include a checklist of questions to ask your potential photographer. One of those questions is, “Do you have an assistant?” Usually the couples don’t even know why an assistant or 2nd shooter would be a valuable addition to have along on the wedding day.

Here’s how I roll: I show up at the bride’s dressing room at least 2.5 hours before the start of the ceremony. I have already discussed with the bride the timeline and when I arrive the bridesmaids are totally dressed and prepared for pictures. I spend 15-30 minutes shooting details; the brides dress, jewelry, invites, and any action that takes place. After I take pictures of the bride putting on her gown, I start shooting her with her bridal party.

By the time an hour has passed I’m done with the ladies. Now for the groomsmen! Every wedding is different because every couple is different. To me, pictures of dudes putting on their pants aren’t that beautiful. And the groomsmen aren’t usually too keen on being photographed during their ‘getting ready’ process, which doesn’t take them long anyway. So, sometimes I might bounce over to their dressing room and snatch some shots of ties being noosed and alcohol being consumed in tiny glasses, but most of the time they just meet me somewhere near the ceremony site for photos.

Sometimes we will be pressed for time because the ladies took longer than expected so I can always send my 2nd shooter to cover the groomsmen either getting ready or their portraits. Mostly my 2nd shadows me and captures more of the candid shots, details, and abstract stuff. My 2nd shooter fills in the gaps with color and detail. While my subjects are looking to me for direction, my 2nd can snipe the moments when they are more unaware of our telephoto lens.

Everything I do is all about adapting to the couple’s day and what is most important to them. We have a rough timeline but also allow that timeline to flow with the couple’s unique needs and any unexpected changes that arise

Posted by Cameron Ingalls of Cameron Ingalls Photography

Photography by Anna Kuperberg – see more at www.kuperberg.com

If you’ve rented the centerpieces for your wedding flowers reception tables, giving them away to guests is obviously not a good idea. But if you’ve created centerpieces and want to make one guest at each table feel like a lottery winner, give them away, but do it fairly. Here are a few ideas – some mundane and some a bit of fun – for dispersing your highly coveted reception table centerpieces equitably!

 

Put a gold star or some other sticker under one chair at each table. At some point during the festivities, have the DJ, emcee or best man invite everyone to look under his or her seat for the gold star. Whoever has it wins the centerpiece!

Have the reception DJ, emcee or best man announce that the centerpiece at each table goes to the person who traveled the farthest to attend the wedding. This way a small token of your appreciation can be given to your dear friend who’s made the trip out to be a part of your special day. Don’t forget to personally say thank-you before the reception is over!

With a nod to respect for elders, announce that the oldest person at each table is the recipient of the centerpiece. This is where female guests must decide which they want more-to keep their age under wraps or your centerpiece. Then again, there may be women who want the centerpiece so badly that they’ll add a decade or two to their age just to get it.

The “Hot Potato” centerpiece giveaway ploy is silly fun. The emcee first requests that someone at each table pull out a dollar bill, which will be returned. Then, without telling them why, the emcee has the guests play “hot potato” with the bill. As the music plays, the bill is passed around in a circle from guest to guest. The centerpiece goes to whoever is holding the bill when the music stops. Remember to have the winner return the dollar bill to its owner.

For this method, the emcee can announce up front that it’s time for the centerpiece giveaway. The emcee then says, “The first person at the table to pull out foreign currency from pocket or purse wins” or “the first person to pull out a cell phone that isn’t black wins.” Make sure the emcee has prepared several options in case it takes three or four rounds to give away all the centerpieces.

Finally, if you and your groom share a bizarre sense of humor or simply want to make the evening go quickly so you can get down to a more personal celebration of your marriage, here’s your centerpiece giveaway. Have the emcee announce, after the salad plates have been removed, that the centerpieces go to the person at each table who finishes his or her entrée first. Then sit back and enjoy the next few minutes. It’s fun to see how many people will inhale their food to get that centerpiece

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Category:wedding flowers and wholesale flowers

Photography by The Wiebners – Joel and Rita Wiebner – see more at www.thewiebners.com

There are lots of reasons to be married al fresco, and you don’t have to be limited to the hot summer months! With contingency plans, you can tie the knot in the great outdoors during any time of year (yes, even winter). Here are some things to consider:

They say that if it rains on your wedding day, it is supposed to bring good luck to the marriage. This is only true for those couples that have a backup rain venue, or a ton of umbrellas. 

During the summer, an evening wedding might be preferable due to excessive heat during mid-day and even through the late afternoon. Also, the reception will then go into the night, when there will surely be some relief. 

This means providing shade if it’s going to be hot, or a source of warmth if it may be chilly (consider a heated tent – although this isn’t exactly cheap; blankets are a cozy alternative and can be shared…how romantic). Give special consideration to elderly and handicapped guests, for whom the elements and terrain of the venue can present increased difficulty. 

I mean the real-live creatures here, people. Save the figurative ones for your honeymoon. Critters can be the most relentless wedding crashers, and will prove to be even more annoying than the drunkest guest at the reception. Plan to provide citronella spray or candles around the site, or handle the pests in some other way…but do plan for them. 

This could greatly affect your guests’ ability to hear the ceremony. There are other factors that could affect the sound quality also, so be sure to visit the ceremony site during the time of day (and time of year) that your wedding will take place and make note of any external or environmental noise that will likely be present. Had I done this myself before my own lakeside wedding, I would probably have realized if you choose to get married in front of a busy marina, your guests are far more likely to hear the boat engines than your vows. 

This is an especially important consideration if it will be hot and particularly if there will be a buffet or other food set out. Talk to your caterer about timing and cooling of food in order to keep it appetizing and, most importantly, safe! Nobody wants to eat shrimp cocktail that’s been baking in the sun for four hours. 

If you’re getting married during the warmer season, offer non-alcoholic beverages before the ceremony, such as water with lemon or iced tea. Alternatively, if you’re planning a winter outdoor wedding, you may want to provide hot cocoa or some other steamy beverage to warm them up upon their arrival. 

No, I know you’re both consenting adults. I’m not talking about that. If you’re getting married at a public place, such as a park or beach, check to see if you need permits, especially for alcohol on the premises. Your guests don’t want to see the happy couple leave for their honeymoon handcuffed in the back of a squad car. 

Provide information to your guests about environmental factors that you anticipate and that they can prepare themselves for. For example, if your wedding site will be soft and grassy, you may want to advise the women (and maybe some of the men, depending on your guest list) not to wear heels. This information should be included in the invitation rather than the welcome packets, so that they have the time and resources necessary to plan for the event. 

Plan for inclement weather.

Consider time of day.

Make your venue accessible and comfortable for guests.

Don’t forget about the birds and the bees!

Will it be windy?

Will your food survive the elements?

Keep your guests hydrated.

Are you breaking the law?

Keep your guests informed.

Make sure to order wedding flowers that can last on the outside, stay away from hydrangeas, gerberas and lisianthus, you can use flowers like poms, roses, orchids (they are very strong), athuriums, callas and minicallas.

 Weddings can be very expensive but many brides are finding creative ways to save money without compromising on quality. There’s nothing to stop you from getting the wedding you’ve always wanted. You just have to think a little out of the box and more creatively. Here are some ideas to get your juices flowing.

 1. Choose or find a venue that is already beautiful and lush with flowers and well kept lawns. There are usually parks or gardens with these characteristics.

 2. Plan to use wedding flowers that are readily available and in season. This will save you a lot of money. Although it may seem like a good idea at first, holding a wedding during February is not cheap. In February, flower prices are very high due to Valentine’s Day.

 3. As far as possible, hold your wedding during the festive season i.e. during Christmas or Easter when most Churches are already decorated with beautiful flowers! You just have to find a church with the type of wedding flowers that you like.

 4. If you know someone else who is getting married about the same time that you are, you can save even more money by coordinating flowers and splitting the cost.

 5. Use the internet to shop around for the best deals on flowers and consider buying from www.theflowerexchange.com. You can use a product comparison website to locate suppliers with the cheapest prices without compromising on quality. The Flower Exchange.com guarantee fresh flowers so you don’t have to worry about whether or not the flowers will be fresh when they arrive.

 6. Another money saving idea is to arrange your own flowers such as bouquets of simple roses tied together with a ribbon. If you’re not confident enough to do it, you can find simple guides online on how to arrange flowers for weddings. You can also just ask a friend or a family member to do it for you.

 7. Cheap flowers such as carnations when used in abundance so that the blooms are packed together can be quite striking. Visit some online florist websites and browse their pictures of wholesale flowers in the weddings section for some ideas.

 8. Avoid imported or exotic flowers unless they are cheaper than the ones that are locally available.

 9. Using very large arrangements can be very expensive so it’s a good idea to use as few as possible. You can save even more by limiting the number of people in your wedding so that you don’t have to do many bouquets!

Labels: wedding flowers

Ah…one of my most favorite subjects! I just love to decorate with wedding flowers. Fresh flowers make a wedding so romantic. The right blooms in the right amounts can also make your wedding stand out from all the others.

When I plan a wedding, I could go on and on and on with flowers! The right flowers can really enhance a theme. Of course, decorating with flowers alone, can be, and is – a very expensive proposition. I am going to talk about how to use wholesale flowers to your advantage to set off the feeling and theme of your wedding – without breaking the bank.

We cannot talk about flowers without talking about theme because everything must compliment the theme of your wedding. This would include flowers, linen, food, invitations, number of guests – everything. If everything does not complement, your event becomes jumbled and non-cohesive. You also must look at your budget realistically. A black tie wedding with heavy-upgraded linens, 5 course meal, and elaborate flower arrangements for 200 people – is not going to work with a 30K budget – at least not in the DC/Baltimore area. Also, you must realize that you do not have to have a black tie wedding to have something extremely nice and elegant. Any themed wedding can be very nice and elegant – as long as it’s cohesive from beginning to end.

For a more casual fun affair, think about fun arrangements in vibrant colors. Some flowers choices that may work would be  tulips, Baby’s Breath, lily of the valley and a variety of grasses. Think about Gerber Daisies to add some color, and Peonies, Hydrangea, Dahlias to add some girth. Put your blooms in fun containers (a basket for a country affair, a seashell for a beachy theme, a fresh pot for a springy theme) and feel free to play with different shaped containers, tables and the like. For instance, submerge cut fruits and other tropical fruits in glass vase, with some lighter blooms protruding out of the top. Opt for a floral headpiece rather than a formal veil. Keep things light, airy, fresh – but always coordinated throughout.

For a fall affair, I like to use darker flowers, with vegetables, husks, wheat, and hay – to honor the harvest. For winter, try some Manzanita branches, or curly willow, hypericum berries, holly, wreathes with white and blue florals – or maybe red and orange for the holiday. For spring, wild flowers are great for a fresh wedding. Tulips are beautiful fully blown open and make a stunning presentation. Peonies are great. For summer, try something colorful, but more formal – like roses of all varieties. Gardenia is very nice – would work well as a floating bloom – but also offers lots of fragrance. If you are sensitive to smells, then this bloom is not for you.

For a more formal affair, try wholesale roses, ranunculus, all varieties of lilies (calla, etc), orchids, stephanotis and the like- in darker more subdued colors. Hydrangea also looks very nice as its size makes arrangements fuller. For a formal space that could use some height, think about tall or tall and short more formed arrangements (less airy – more roundy-moundy) and incorporate elegant and elaborate candlelight.

Are you planning to embark on your honeymoon armed with a giant vase full of your leftover wedding flowers ? What, that’s unlikely you say? If you’re flying, that means that you will need to be able to cram them all into a 3-ounce test-tube sized water receptacle and zip that into a teeny baggie for security purposes. If you can do that, kudos for being conservative with your resources but I don’t think they’ll show up very well in your photos.

On the other hand, if you’re a member of the vast majority who doesn’t know what to do with those lovely blooms after they’ve enhanced your celebration, consider donating your wedding flowers to brighten the days of sick or elderly members of your community. Check with local hospitals, nursing homes and assisted living centers in your wedding area to see if they will accept your donation, and also find out how they would like the flowers to be delivered. It’s possible that they will send somebody to the reception facility to pick them up, which would make the task especially easy to accomplish…just make sure they don’t schedule the pickup before you’ve said your I Do’s! Otherwise, you could delegate the responsibility to a friend or family member who will be available after your wedding day to help.

Check out the following websites for some guidance in your search for a facility in your area:

American Hospital Directory

Nursing Home Info

Assisted Living Info

You can also donate the leftover food from your reception to a local food rescue group that will bring it to a local shelter or soup kitchen that day. They will send delegates to march into your reception and demand of each of your guests: “Hey, you gonna finish that?” before yanking their plates out from under them and emptying the gourmet fare into a giant doggy bag. I kid. I think. Anyhoo, unlike food banks, who cannot accept perishable items, food rescue groups will be able to put your leftovers (that haven’t been served, of course) to good use. See the I Do Foundation’s tips page for more information on donating your leftover reception grub.

You can also get in touch with a community soup kitchen to find out about local food rescue groups. Or contact the Second Harvest Organization, which is an extensive network of food rescue programs.