When it comes to deciding on how long to book a wedding photographer for, there are so many factors to consider. How big your wedding will be, the time of year, your location (or location changes!), how big your wedding party is, whether you want getting ready photos captured and how long much of your reception you want captured – just to name a few. I’m here to say that while all of those things are important, I really need to make the argument for wedding dancefloor photos and building time for them into your photography timeline.
How to plan enough time to capture the magic of the dancefloor
When I help my couples plan their photography timelines, I always start with the ceremony and dinner times and work forwards and backwards. When we’re talking about the dancefloor photos at your wedding, we work back from dinner, through dessert and speeches, golden hour photos, first dances and then plan for about a good 45 minute to an hour of photos of you and your favorite people breaking it down. Here’s why.
An hour might sound like a looooong time to get pictures of people dancing. And it could be. But it’s inevitable that something will run late or be delayed. Maybe dinner takes an extra 30 minutes to get to all of your guests (this is common!). Or we lose mom for 10 minutes while she mingles before the mother-son dance. No matter what, adding this buffer gives us plenty of security to ensure you get super fun photos with your friends and family at the end of the night.
Keys to making those photos great
Most people have an idea if their guests are dancing queens. Let’s be honest, that’s the real key to great photos. Wedding dancefloor photos are pretty sad when there’s no one out there, but there are some keys to making those pictures extra special. Here are a couple of my favorite tips:
- Wedding party snowball dance: This is where the DJ calls the wedding party out onto the floor for a dance after your parent or first dances and every time they stop the music or play a sound effect, each member of the wedding party runs into the crowd and grabs a new person to join you.
- A planned group photo on the dancefloor: The DJ announces we’re doing a fun group shot on the dancefloor and needs everyone out there to pose for a shot. You all scream and throw your hands in the air, I grab the photos (scroll to the last image in the gallery below!) and then the music picks up with all of your people right there to keep the night going.
- Anniversary dance: This is a dance where you have all the couples join you on the dancefloor for a slow song until the DJ calls out how many years they’ve been married, leaving the longest married couple by the end. It makes for wonderful couples photos of your people in love, reminiscing about their own love stories.
- Just have a bomb playlist: Know your people and yourselves and pick music that will help keep the party going all night long.
Now onto my 49 arguments for wedding dancefloor photos…
I could go on and on with words, but I’ll let some photos from my 2022 dancefloors tell you the story themselves. These are from two different weddings this year, both of which planned for a full hour of photos on the dancefloor, and I have to say, they didn’t disappoint.
If you’re looking for a photographer who’s not afraid to jump in the middle of the dancefloor action and capture the party, shoot me a note. I’d love to capture images just like these of your people.
