Wedding Guest Etiquette from Jay Crihfield on Vimeo.

Today we are not talking about wedding photography, I wanted to talk about something that has come up recently and that’s wedding guest ettiquite.  While there are tons of magazines, books, websites and blogs that proved advice on wedding ettiquite for the bride, groom, parents, best man, Maid of Honor and bridal party, not much is written about how to behave as a guest.

To give you an idea of what I’m talking about, here are a couple  of examples from recent weddings.

The first was when the DJ asked everyone to stand for the introduction of the bride and groom, one particular gentlemen who clearly had been over served during the cocktail hour, could barely make it to his feet.  No big deal, but unfortunately the tables were spaced very close together, and the bride and groom had to pass right next to this man as they made their way to the head table.  Unfortunatly this person decided it would be cool to give a big high five to the bride and groom as they went past him.  Too bad he forgot about the full glass of red wine in his hand .  Needless to say the outcome was not a jolly high five, but a disastrous spilling of red wine directly onto the bride’s gown.  The bride and groom were pretty cool about it, and had a good laugh, but I can assure you the bride’s mother was mortified.  I can only hope they have a rockstar dry cleaner who could remove the stain prior to preseeving the dress.

Another incident involved one entire side of the ballroom.  When the best man got up to present his remarks, several members of the grooms family loudly “shooshed” the other guests to be quiet.  Not a big deal in my book, but unfortunately as soon as the best man finished his marks, the same people who demanded quiet during the best mans speech, immediately began eating, driing, and carrying on for the entire length of the maid of honor’s speech.  I’ve tweeted about this before, and basically if there is one job you have as a guest, that’s to simoly shut up when anyone is speaking.

Finally the last indcident involves drinks on the dance floor.  It seems to be more and more common for people to become so attached to their cranberry and vodkas, or miller lites that they can’t seem to leave them on the table when they hit the dance floor.  But here’s what you should ask yourself…..do you want to be the person who stops the party because you spill a drink and have to wait for the dance floor to be cleaned up before everyone can start dancing again?  On a more serious note, I’ve seen guys with drinks drop them, and while their drink plumets to the floor, nearly miss landing on the  head of either the ring bearer or the flower girl.  As someone who has small kids, unless you’d like me to break a rocks glass on your head, you might want to think twice about leaving the drink at your table.

Now I’m not trying to tell anyone not to have a good time.  However what I am say ing is that brides and grooms invest a tremendous amount of tine and energy into their wedding days, and I think it’s very disrespectful to them to act like a complete ass-bag at their reception.  While it’s easy to say that many oaf these antics might go unnoticed, some things are noticed and can stick in peoples minds for years to come.

Welcome to the newest weekly feature to the blog, “Friday Favorites.”  Every Friday I am going to feature one of my favorite wedding photographs (and maybe a few portrait favorites), as well as some of the story behind how the photograph was created.

When I asked Christine to describe the look she was going for with her wedding photographs, two words immediately jumped out at me:  “urban” and “bad-ass.”  When we pulled onto the lot of an abandoned car dealership near downtown DesPlaines, she hopped out of the limo with a huge smile on her face and asked “will this work?”  Although we were in the suburbs, I immediately knew this was the perfect location for the type of wedding photographs Christine wanted to create.  While I was looking around the lot for ideas, I noticed Christine standing in front of the old sales “shack,” or “island” with her bridesmaids.  It only took a couple of tweaks to create an image that not only became one of my favorites, but has become a favorite of many other brides I’ve been able to work with as well.

Be sure to bookmark the blog and check back every Friday for each new installment of “Friday Favorites!”