What time should our wedding be?

[rodent]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SunBride the sun definitely doesn't take 4 hours to set in mexico! You'll have to stop taking pictures probably half an hour or 15 minutes before the official sunset time, seeing as the sunsets behind the buildings and trees, so it gets dark before sunset. For my wedding last month the sunset time was 6:15pm, we had the ceremony at 3pm, so we had about 2 hours for photos afterwards (3:45-5:45) and that was great. An hour and a half would probably have been okay, but we would have been more rushed (don't get me wrong, we were still rushing a bit, but not crazy rushed). Of course if you are going to see your husband before then you can get lots of pictures then. I didn't want to see mine before, so we only did pictures of ourselves alone and with bridal party and with our individual families beforehand.

I'm glad you posted this. I was trying to figure out when to actually take the sunset pictures.

[rodent]

OK, I looked up my day & sunset is at 7:32. So at what time would the sky be that beautiful sunseting sky that looks so great in pics? or do you not get a sky like that in cancun?

 

Also, the sun rises at 6:07am. If you want to go out to the beach to watch it, when is the best time to get out there?

[Matt Adcock]

Bottom line here that everyone needs to consider is that the sun sets to the west and the Riviera Maya (most places) face due east.

 

If you DONT get married during daylight savings time, if you start your ceremony at 3pm-4pm, someone (usually always the bride or the person standing on the left) will be blinded by the sun's harsh beams of light.

 

This is a fact, no disputing this unless you are getting married under a covered area.

 

Harsh beams of light make for the hardest to photograph in relationship to contrast. Squinting eyes and just harsh light... We recommend 4-4:30 ceremony start time if you don't get married during daylight savings. I've seen hundreds of weddings on the RM coast, and LOTS of them starting at 3 or 3:30... blasting the poor eyes out of the bride.

 

 

Check out this slideshow to get an idea of what I'm talking about...this was a JAN wedding: del Sol Photography Wedding Photojournalism

 

shot at 3:45pm, 11/20/07

The light is harsh, contrasty and slightly painful for bride and bridesmaids to stare at... Shot in Playa del Carmen.

 

Here is another non-daylight savings wedding |January 1/19/08 wedding

 

 

Either way, we think some of the best light in the sky happens AFTER the sun sets. If you have super nice equipment (fast lenses) then you can shoot well into the early evening.

 

We shot this wedding in tulum this year... ceremony started real late after 6pm... , bride and groom walk down the isle at 6:27pm!

 

 

 

Last picture we shot on the beach is actually moon lit, shot at 6:54pm.

 

Pretty insane eh?

Notice the quality of light during the ceremony..

Here is their slideshow: del Sol Photography Wedding Photojournalism | Shot in Tulum. We don't actually recommend ceremonies to start this late as we won't have time to shoot any formals / b&g portraits post ceremomy, but this just goes to show you the maximum of our camera's abilities very late in the evening!

 

 

 

We use very fast pro lenses, so we can shoot with very low light situations...another advantage by hiring a pro photog! You may want to ask your photographer... but you can trust that later is better than earlier for us

 

 

If you are considering a Daylight savings wedding, try around 5 or 5:30 ceremony start time.

 

hope that helps put some photo perspective to your question!

 

cheers,

matt

[rodent]

Thanks so much for the info. I guiess I should have scheduled my june wedding for 5pm. We do have an awning though. I'm just not sure if mike & I will be under it. It looks like it covers the guests.

[SunBride]

That's a good point about the too bright sun. We had our ceremony at 3pm (this was the week before daylight savings time started) and did not have a problem. However when the groom's family was taking photos at 2pm they had problems with the sun. I don't know why it was fine at 3pm, I guess we were just lucky. I had our sunglasses on standby but I never once thought about putting them on during the ceremony, and we aren't squinting in any of the pictures. It was very sunny (even though looks cloudy in the first picture) with only the odd cloud in the sky.

 

 

 

 

I'm not sure what you mean by the perfect sunset lighting, but here are some of my pictures as an idea (these were taken by a professional who came with me, although by the looks of it she didn't use the same type of equipment as Matt talks about above based on the pictures he posted with the moonlight)

 

These were shot probably about 1 hour - 45 mins before scheduled sunset. You can see she used the flash (I think) to avoid shadows in faces

 

 

 

 

 

These were shot probably about 30 - 45 mins before scheduled sunset

 

 

 

 

This one was shot I think pretty much right at scheduled sunset (maybe 15 minutes before). We had stopped taking pictures for about 15 minutes to half an hour at this point, and then we went back to try to get just this one with a sunset (she said she would try playing around with editing since the sunset was not that good)

 

 

I has posted this elsewhere, here was the schedule of my day. I think it worked out really well (allowed my photographer to take 2000 photos!). It would have worked equally well I think if we had started about a half hour to an hour later, but I didn't mind having extra time. If you have 2 photographers you could condense the time more, seeing as I had to leave time after my photos for the groom's photos, so I just hung out in the room for an hour

 

9am: hair appointments

11am: get dressed and do make-up

12pm: photos of me alone and with bridesmaids

1pm: photos of me with my family

2pm: photos of groom alone and with family

3pm: ceremony and toast

3:45pm – 4:30pm: group pictures

4:30pm – 6pm: pictures of bride and groom

6:30pm: dinner

[rodent]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SunBride I'm not sure what you mean by the perfect sunset lighting, but here are some of my pictures as an idea (these were taken by a professional who came with me, although by the looks of it she didn't use the same type of equipment as Matt talks about above based on the pictures he posted with the moonlight)

Thanks! very helpful.

The sunset lighting I'm talking about is when the sky looks like the sky in Matt's siggy pic. Or maybe that's something the photographer captures with their camera settings. I honestly don't know how it works. When I watched Matt & Sol's video the sky didn't look as intense as it turned out in their pictures, so it must be photographer magic. Shutter speeds?

Also, this picture of Nics • TAMARACK STUDIOS •

And Jean-Marcus posted a wedding with beautiful sunset pics.

I wish I knew more about this when I scheduled my wedding. I'm worried we'll be outside during the harshest part of the day & eatting dinner when it's beautiful.

[SunBride]

I was hoping to get beautiful sunset photos too, but my photographer said the sunset just wasn't very good that night. Maybe advanced editing can create a beautiful fake sunset, I don't know. My photographer said there was nothing there for her to work with.

[Leticia]

I chose 3 pm I don't want pictures in the dark

[heather007]

Daylight savings time? LoL. Where I live, that does not happen. We are so backwards.

 

Anyway, Gabriela [the Barcelo co-ordinator] just emailed me and told me that I don't have a choice for the times of our wedding. Nice hey? She said I can "request" a time, but it all depends on the judge.

 

If I didn't have so many deposits down, I would change hotels. I'm having so many issues with them right now.

 

~~

[jajajaja]

Crap- that sucks Heather. I'm sure all will work out though! Is 5pm the latest? If so, I'm sure you could still swing things. Although I was married in PV, our ceremony didn't start until 6:15. We had plenty of time to take pics.

 

Also, if you don't think you will have enough time, schedule a TTD session so you get lots of nice daylight pics.