How much reception photography coverage do you need?

The rule of thumb by guest count

Receptions vary a lot in timing, so in the video we give the rule of thumb we use for the majority of our weddings. If your guest list is between 80 and 150 people, we typically allocate about 3 hours of reception coverage.

The first two hours, or two and a half hours, are dedicated to the formalities: the grand entrance, the first dance, the speeches and toasts, the table visits, the games, the bouquet toss and the cake cutting. We want to capture all of that. The last 30 to 45 minutes is usually the open dancing.

A Middle Eastern, Persian or Jewish wedding usually lasts a little longer, with more festivities at night, more performances and people genuinely excited about their dancing, so we tend to stay a little longer. For an Indian wedding, with even more dancing and performances, let us know and we will stay for additional time.

A smaller, intimate wedding can need as little as 30 minutes. With only 10 to 20 people you often stay in the prepared room: we photograph the decoration, then the guests once seated and before the food comes in, then a cake cutting. You do not have to serve the cake, just cut it.

What the formalities actually take

Two to two and a half hours sounds generous until you list what happens in it. Dinner service takes a good part of it, speeches run long, and the table visits, where you greet every table with us following, are the slowest part of most receptions.

So we suggest treating the formalities as a block rather than a list of five-minute items. If the DJ, the planner and we all know when the block ends, the open dancing happens while we are still in the room instead of starting as our coverage ends.

Longer nights and shorter ones

Persian, Middle Eastern and Jewish receptions are built around the dance floor. The hora, the knife dance and the second wind after dessert all happen past the point where a typical reception winds down, and we do not want to leave just as the room gets going.

A dinner for twenty is the opposite. Nothing is waiting to happen, so the room, the seated guests and a quick cake cutting cover it, and the hours you save usually do more good earlier in the day, on portraits.