After almost 10 years photographing weddings, I’ve learned a lot about what documentary wedding photography means to me—and surprisingly, it has less to do with never posing people and more to do with knowing when photography should take a backseat to the wedding itself.

I’ve photographed big weddings and tiny ones. Days with packed timelines and days with almost no timeline at all. I’ve watched wedding trends come and go, photographed traditions that meant everything to a couple, and photographed couples who decided to throw almost every tradition out the window.

And somewhere along the way, I realized something pretty simple:

Your wedding doesn’t have to revolve around the photos. The photos can revolve around the wedding.

That idea has shaped almost everything about how I photograph weddings today.

Your wedding is not a photoshoot

There are so many incredible photographs to make on a wedding day. I love a beautiful portrait. I love good light. I love film and movement and composition and making something that feels like art.

But none of those things are more important to me than you actually experiencing your wedding.

I don’t want you spending an hour taking portraits if you’d rather be at cocktail hour hugging people you haven’t seen in years.

Give me 15 minutes.

Genuinely. I got you.

I’ll give you direction. I’ll tell you what to do with your hands. I’ll fix the weird thing your jacket is doing. I’ll move us into better light. I’ll make sure you feel comfortable.

We’ll make some damn good photographs.

And then I’ll send you back to your people.

You don’t have to do anything “for the photos”

There are a lot of things that have somehow become standard parts of a wedding day because they photograph well.

But that doesn’t mean you have to do them.

Don’t want a first look? We’ll make the timeline work without one.

Don’t care about wedding party photos? We don’t have to take them.

Couldn’t care less about having every getting-ready detail perfectly styled on a flat lay? Cool.

Don’t want to leave your reception when the light gets pretty because you’re having way too much fun with everyone you love?

Stay at your reception.

This doesn’t mean those things are bad. If you’ve dreamed about your first look or have a Pinterest board full of portraits you absolutely love, I want to make those with you.

The difference is that we’re doing them because you want them, not because your wedding is supposed to become a production for the camera.

There’s a time for me to step in

Sometimes documentary wedding photography gets interpreted as a photographer standing in the corner and never interfering with anything.

That’s not exactly how I work.

I love posing.

I love stepping in during portraits, giving you direction, finding good light, and creating something intentionally beautiful.

And honestly, knowing how to direct people is part of what allows me to give you more of your wedding day back.

We don’t need 45 minutes to hope something magically happens in front of my camera. I can step in, help you feel comfortable, make the photograph, and move on.

There’s a time for me to direct.

And there’s a time for me to shut up.

Knowing the difference might be one of the most important things I’ve learned in nearly a decade of doing this.

More photographs doesn’t always mean more memories

I don’t believe you need 1,000+ photographs with 14 slightly different versions of the same moment to have your wedding documented well.

I’d rather give you a gallery full of photographs that each add something.

The big things, obviously.

But also your mom fixing something on your dress. Your friends sitting around a table. Your grandparents watching from across the room. Someone laughing with a drink in their hand. The slightly blurry film photograph that somehow feels more like the night than the technically perfect one beside it.

Quality over quantity.

Always.

Your photographs should look like your wedding

Not every wedding needs to be intimate.

Not every couple wants to skip traditions.

Not everyone wants 15-minute portraits.

There are couples who genuinely love the production of it all. There are couples who want an enormous wedding party, an elaborate getting-ready morning, hours of portraits, every detail styled perfectly, and a giant list of photographs they can’t wait to make.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of that.

But if you’ve been planning your wedding and quietly wondering:

Do we actually have to do all of this?

No.

You don’t have to build your wedding around what photographs well.

You don’t have to perform your wedding for Instagram.

You don’t have to leave a moment you’re loving because somewhere else has better light.

You don’t have to choose a tradition you don’t care about because it’s what weddings are “supposed” to look like.

Your wedding can just be your wedding.

Whatever that looks like.

You get to be at your wedding

That’s really what all of this comes back to for me.

I want your gallery to be beautiful. I want to make photographs that feel like art. I want to give you portraits that make you stop scrolling when you see them.

But more than anything, I want those photographs to remind you of something you actually experienced.

I want you to remember what the room sounded like.

Who was sitting beside you.

How hard your best friend was laughing.

What your dad’s face looked like.

How it felt when everyone you loved was in the same place at the same time.

Because your wedding isn’t being created for the photographs.

The photographs are being created because your wedding happened.

You get to be at your wedding.

I’ll take care of remembering it.