Pearls Events Favorite | The Wedding Slide Show
In the past few years, I have personally seen a decline in wedding slide shows. I am not certain why this is, however I would guess that the fees venues charges plus the time it takes to put together the slide show discourages people from doing so. Plus, with the use of Facebook, many people have old photos out there already.
Over two years ago, I shared some of the pros & cons of the wedding slide show. I have a love/loathe relationship with them. See the entire post and some great comments on the original post.
LOVE: Personally, I enjoy watching these. I am a photo lover, even with people I do not know! I like to see baby photos through courtship photos. (And I LOVE professional wedding photos) It's always fun to see the the couple growing up. And when I attend a friend's wedding, it's fun to look for myself & all those silly high school pictures we took at Steak 'n' Shake at 2am after the Sweetheart Swirl. You know what I'm talking about.
LOATHE: Professionally, I do not enjoy watching guests getting antsy while being forced to watch. Most brides & grooms have someone in their family who want to take on the responsibility of putting these together--a mom who wants to show off her beautiful boy, or a father who is tech-savvy and wants to spend a lot of time working on this huge project. If you are going to have one, just keep it short & sweet. One song for the groom, one song for the bride & one song for the couple together. That's around 9 minutes total. Max. I suppose I also loathe how non-attractive the screen & projector can be (see above photo...)
Over two years ago, I shared some of the pros & cons of the wedding slide show. I have a love/loathe relationship with them. See the entire post and some great comments on the original post.
LOVE: Personally, I enjoy watching these. I am a photo lover, even with people I do not know! I like to see baby photos through courtship photos. (And I LOVE professional wedding photos) It's always fun to see the the couple growing up. And when I attend a friend's wedding, it's fun to look for myself & all those silly high school pictures we took at Steak 'n' Shake at 2am after the Sweetheart Swirl. You know what I'm talking about.
LOATHE: Professionally, I do not enjoy watching guests getting antsy while being forced to watch. Most brides & grooms have someone in their family who want to take on the responsibility of putting these together--a mom who wants to show off her beautiful boy, or a father who is tech-savvy and wants to spend a lot of time working on this huge project. If you are going to have one, just keep it short & sweet. One song for the groom, one song for the bride & one song for the couple together. That's around 9 minutes total. Max. I suppose I also loathe how non-attractive the screen & projector can be (see above photo...)
7 lovely comment(s):
It definitely has to be done well. I prefer to have a slideshow playing in the background during cocktail hour. Gives the guests something to do, but they also do not feel forced to watch it.
I do like when photographers have their laptop streaming photos from the ceremony on their laptop during cocktail hour as well - lets the guests get even more excited.
I've personally only seen one that was tear inducing and fantastically put together. Most of them though aren't very well produced and they get slotted into the timeline at an awkward place in the evening - its one of those things, if you're going to do it, do it VERY well or not at all. A halfway there presentation is just lackluster!
I find that it can be a wonderful tool to share the ceremony with people at the party that were unable to attend.
However, most of the time it's done as a 'value added' item, more of an afterthought then a planned event. The reception venue must have dedicated equipment, such as a hanging projector out of the way to make it work seemlessly. Having a table in the middle of the floor for people to bump/walk in front of just adds to the poor execution. The same goes for the slide show prep- it takes an assistant a solid hour to do it right; just throwing the photographs in a folder and hitting play is a disservice to both your audience and your subjects.
In this photographers opinion.
I'm so with you on this Aletha. They can be great at times, but more often than not, they're just slopped together without much forethought.
I don't offer them except as a bargaining chip anymore, simply because most people want you to scan the pictures and it's very time consuming.
However, I put together a formula for slideshows that not everyone likes as we're putting it together, but has yet to disappoint in the final product:
3 minutes total (one song)
50 pictures max broken up as follows:
15 Bride Childhood
15 Groom Childhood
20 Couple pics
That's just one guys opinion though. Everyone has their own thoughts on this typically. :) Thanks for the post, sorry for hijacking!
I think the ideal solution that gets the pros you listed without the cons is to have a slideshow running during the cocktail hour or before or after the ceremony. This gives people something to look at but doesn't make them feel they have to sit quietly and watch instead of talking to those around them.
Great post, Aletha. I think the BEST way to show wedding videos is to have it running in an area that guests can watch or not watch, but not forced.
From the slideshows I've run into at weddings the one major thing that seperates the bad ones and the good ones is if they stop everything to force people to watch. It's awkward, and not ideal.
Like others mentioned, have them playing so people can check it out at their lesiure. Make sure that if you do them, then do them well. (or find someone who can do it well)
I really liked the suggestion of a short 3 min one song slideshow above. If you do think you need to feature it as an event during the reception, keep it short and sweet.
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