When you make your list of photos you want your wedding photographers to be sure to get, don’t forget to include groom portraits. Actually, scratch that. There is no way that you will forget those! But just writing down “portraits of groom” is not enough. You and he are going to want more than just blah pictures. Shots of him just looking at the camera and smiling are going to leave you flat when you see them years from now. Really creative groom portraits that make you stop and take notice, though? Those will bring a smile to your face no matter how much time passes! So make sure to add those to your list and to pick wedding photographers with a track record of producing creative pictures of grooms.
Let’s dig a little deeper into why getting groom portraits that stand out from the rest is so important. There is the obvious, of course. This is your wedding, a once-in-a-lifetime event that should be documented with skill and care. Every picture is important; every shot matters. Dazzling groom portraits help do justice to the magnitude of your event and what it represents. Blah shots don’t.
But you probably know all this already. There is another reason why you will want really special pictures of the groom, though, that you might not have thought of. How many times in a man’s life is he as dressed up as he is on his wedding day? Unless he is a celebrity or James Bond, not all that many. A friend’s wedding, perhaps. One elegant evening event every couple of years, maybe. Your future children’s weddings, definitely. But the opportunities to get pictures of him looking as sharp and dapper as he does on the day he marries are few and far between. So you definitely have to take advantage of the chance. And you definitely need to make sure that the portraits your photographer do the occasion justice!
But wait! Does the thought of elaborate, creative portraits have your groom squirming? If so, we get it! Most grooms do not love that part of their wedding day. For starters, posing for pictures is not easy for those of us who are not professional models. Every time we have had our portraits taken, we have never been exactly sure how to stand or where to put our arms!
Making the whole process more stressful is when on a wedding day most grooms do their portraiture. The best time scheduling-wise is right after they finish getting ready and right before they head out the door to the ceremony. The problem is that that particular moment is when a groom might be feeling the most nervous. And not really in the mood to have his picture taken!
The good news is that even the most daring, most creative groom photos can be pretty painless! As long as your wedding photographer comes in with a head brimming full of ideas, they can create magical photos of even the most nervous groom in just a few minutes.
And can you guess how long this took to create? Not even 30 seconds! As we were photographing this groom and his groomsmen, we knew that we were going to be taking portraits of him before leaving his hotel room at the Hilton Garden Inn Washington DC/Georgetown Area. So we were keeping an eye open the entire time for creative possibilities. When we saw a colorful red picture with a dark circle in the middle on the wall, we knew we had something special.
So just before the group headed out the door, we asked the groom to stand so that we could see him reflected in the glass surface of the painting. Some small adjustments got his head right in the center of that aforementioned dark circle. We felt like that was an ideal way to ensure that all the more artistic elements did not take focus away from the main subject. The groom centered in that circle draws your eyes directly to him. We asked him to look to the side for two reasons. First, an image of him looking at his reflection in the picture felt like an odd concept to us. Why would a groom be doing something like that? And second, we wanted a pose that was a little different and more offbeat to match the overall vibe of the shot. We think the resulting image justifies that choice!
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