It’s a typical scene, the bride-to-be huddled over wedding magazines, surrounded by her bridesmaids, deciding on colour schemes and bouquet styles and wedding favours. I’m sure you can picture it in your head (thanks Hollywood). In fact, this is a scene you might have even found yourself in recently. It could have been over coffee with your mum or over the phone with your bestie, but it certainly happens for most brides.

And the common factor that’s missing from this picture? The groom-to-be. Because most grooms don’t care about weddings, right? Well I meet a lot of couples, and I would say that this is far from being true.

People are often surprised when I tell them that about 20-30% of the enquiries I get are from the groom-to-be. And even more often than that, even if it was the bride-to-be that contacted me, the groom has usually had input into that decision.

(Having said all that, I also usually find that if there was one partner in the process that needed more convincing that having a professional photographer was a good idea, it’s the groom. He’s the one one that said, “What do you need a professional for? There will be plenty of people at the wedding taking photos!” Then after some explaining (and eye rolling), if both partners agree that some better quality documentation of the big day is worth having, then they contact me!)

The groom to be might not be into the details. He might not care about bunting and bridesmaids shoes. But it’s his big day too. I usually find most grooms care about what they wear, because they want to look nice as well. They sometimes care about the cars (if they’re into that kind of thing) or the menu (because you know - food). But what all grooms care about, no matter how unorganised they are or how little they know about bombonieres…they care about YOU. The groom cares about the wedding because the person he loves most in the entire world cares about the wedding. And often he cares because declaring his love and commitment by tying the knot means something to him as well. And most grooms agree that it would be great to have some really nice photos of that.

So even though the idea of different types of necklines doesn’t thrill most guys, that’s ok. My job is to make being in front of a camera for a day feel easy and fun for both of you. (And don’t worry, it’s a whole lot less like modelling, and a whole lot more like having someone there in the background taking some pictures of you hanging out with the love of your life on a really special day.)