Weddings
How to get the best light for your wedding photos
Light is the foundation of photography. It’s built right into the word itself: photo means light, and graphy means recording or representing.
But when most couples plan a wedding, light understandably isn't very high on the list of things they're thinking about. You're choosing a venue, coordinating with vendors, deciding when the ceremony should begin, figuring out where everyone will get ready, building a timeline, and making hundreds of other decisions along the way. Whether the windows in your getting-ready room face the right direction probably doesn't seem nearly as important as whether there's enough space for your entire wedding party.
And sometimes, it isn't.
But many of the decisions you're already making will also determine what kind of light is available for your wedding photos.
That doesn't mean you need to plan your entire wedding around photography. Quite the opposite. Your wedding should be designed around the people you love and the experience you want to share with them. It simply helps to understand how your choices affect your photographs so you can make those choices intentionally.
As frustrating as it may seem, there is no single answer for what constitutes the "best" light for wedding photos, as it depends heavily on your aesthetic preferences and the vision you have for your wedding day. With that said, most couples prefer lighting that is soft and even, illuminating faces without creating harsh shadows or extreme differences between light and dark parts of the frame. Depending on the location and time of day, that light might come from a large window, open shade, a cloudy sky, the setting sun, or thoughtfully placed flash.
Bright sunlight can create beautiful photographs. So can window light. So can a dark reception illuminated almost entirely with flash. You can see examples of these different lighting conditions throughout my wedding photography portfolio.
The important question isn't simply: "Is there enough light?" It's: "What kind of light is available, and does it support the way you want your photographs to look and feel?"
That's a question your photographer can help you answer.
When I arrive at a wedding venue—even one I've photographed many times before—one of the first things I do is walk through the property and study the light. I want to see where it's falling, where it isn't, how it interacts with the spaces we'll be using, and what may change as the day progresses.
Doing that ahead of portraits means we can spend less of your wedding day searching for locations and more of it actually enjoying the people you're there to celebrate with.
You don't need to learn to see light exactly like a photographer does. But understanding a few fundamentals can help you make wedding-day decisions that give us more options.
Here are some of the biggest ones.
What Is the Best Light for Wedding Photos?
- How close is it to the venue?
- Will everyone comfortably fit?
- How much does it cost?
- Does the space feel like somewhere you'd actually enjoy spending your morning?
One consideration that's easy to overlook is window light.
1. Choose Getting Ready Spaces With Plenty of Window Light
Why are windows important for getting ready photos?
That might sound counterintuitive. Photography is about light, so shouldn't more light always be better? Not necessarily.
Window light and artificial room lights frequently have different color temperatures. Your eyes adapt to those differences so naturally that you may barely notice them, but a camera sees them more clearly. When someone's face is illuminated partly by daylight from a window and partly by warm overhead lighting, the colors can become difficult to balance naturally. The problem can become even more noticeable when a room contains several kinds of bulbs with slightly different colors.
Turning off unnecessary overhead lights allows me to work with a more consistent source of light and often produces more natural-looking skin tones. Of course, that only works when enough window light is available.
What should you look for in a getting ready room?
- Look for large windows. Generally, more window area gives us more usable natural light.
- Think about privacy. Floor-to-ceiling windows aren't nearly as useful if the blinds need to remain closed because they overlook a busy parking lot.
- Ask your hair and makeup team to work near a window when practical. Good natural light can benefit them, too.
- Keep one area near the windows relatively uncluttered. Bags, garment covers, food containers, and everyone's belongings accumulate quickly on wedding mornings. Keeping the wall opposite or beside the windows relatively clear can give us an easy portrait location without stopping the day to clean.
- Pay attention to the room itself, not just the décor. A beautiful room isn't automatically a photographically bright room.
One of the most important lighting decisions you make may happen months before your wedding - when you choose your ceremony time. That's because sunset changes dramatically throughout the year—particularly here in Ohio. A 5:00 p.m. ceremony can create very different photography opportunities in June than it does in November.
2. Think About Ceremony Time in Relation to Sunset
Fall is one of the most popular seasons for weddings in Ohio, and for good reason. But those beautiful autumn colors arrive alongside increasingly early sunsets. If your ceremony happens in the late afternoon, it may be close to dusk—or already dark—by the time we finish family and wedding-party photographs.
Winter creates an even tighter window.
I once photographed a winter wedding with a late-afternoon ceremony where the sun had completely set by the time formal portraits began. We created the photographs using off-camera flash, and artificial light can absolutely produce beautiful results. But it changed what was possible. Flash takes some additional time to set up, and rather than freely moving from one naturally lit location to another, we needed to work more intentionally within the areas I'd prepared.
Neither approach is inherently better. What's important is knowing the tradeoff before your wedding day.
If you'd like a deeper look at how getting ready, ceremony time, newlywed portraits, family photographs, and the reception fit together, I've put together a separate guide to planning your wedding photography timeline.
Why ceremony timing matters more for fall and winter weddings
But there's an important distinction: Golden hour isn't automatically the best time for your wedding portraits if reaching it creates a worse wedding experience.
Imagine you're planning a summer wedding with an early-afternoon ceremony. Sunset may not arrive until you're well into the reception. In theory, we can step outside later for golden-hour portraits. In reality, you may be eating dinner, listening to toasts, talking with a grandparent you haven't seen in months, or having far too much fun on the dance floor to care about the angle of the sun.
And that's okay.
I'd much rather make beautiful photographs in the light we have than pull you away from a moment that matters simply because the light outside has become technically ideal. The key is deciding ahead of time which priorities matter most to you.
Another decision that can give you significantly more flexibility is whether to see each other before the ceremony. I've written more about the emotional and practical tradeoffs in my guide to whether a first look is right for your wedding day.
When is the best time to take wedding photos?
Timing isn't the only factor that matters for outdoor ceremonies. Direction matters, too.
Most outdoor ceremony layouts are understandably designed around aesthetics. There's a beautiful tree, garden, lake, vineyard, skyline, or architectural feature, and naturally you want that view behind you as you exchange your vows.
But before finalizing the setup, it's worth considering one more thing: Where will the sun be during the ceremony?
The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. If an afternoon ceremony is arranged in a way that places strong sunlight directly across the wedding party, one side may be brightly illuminated while the other falls into deep shade.
Modern cameras give photographers an impressive amount of flexibility when preserving highlights and shadows, but there's still a limit to how much contrast we can overcome when the light falling on two people is dramatically different.
There's also a much simpler problem: One of you may spend the entire ceremony squinting.
When the sun is more behind you, we can often create what's called backlighting. Instead of harsh sunlight hitting your face directly, the brighter light comes from behind, while your faces remain more evenly illuminated. It can create a beautiful highlight around hair and clothing while also helping separate you visually from the background.
Your planner and florist can do extraordinary things to create a beautiful ceremony environment.
They just can't move the sun. If your venue offers flexibility in ceremony orientation, asking your photographer to weigh in before the layout is finalized can be incredibly helpful.
What direction should an outdoor wedding ceremony face?
3. Consider the Direction of the Sun for an Outdoor Ceremony
Good wedding photography isn't always about creating the brightest possible environment.
Sometimes darkness is part of the atmosphere.
A reception room filled with daylight during dinner can feel warm and welcoming. Later that evening, the same room may feel completely different with the lights lowered, candles glowing, and the dance floor illuminated by your DJ or band.
That change can be a good thing. In fact, some people are much more comfortable dancing when they don't feel like they're standing under fluorescent lights in front of 150 people.
So when planning your reception, don't assume photographers want you to keep every light in the room turned up. We have flash. The better conversation is about what you want the reception to feel like. If you love a darker, energetic dance-floor atmosphere, tell your photographer. We can plan our lighting around it rather than fighting against it.
The goal isn't to make your wedding look like a photography studio. It's to photograph the environment you've intentionally created while still making sure the people within it are beautifully documented.
4. Think About How You Want the Reception to Feel
- Are there covered outdoor areas such as porches, porticos, covered walkways, or valet entrances?
- Are those spaces large enough for portraits?
- Is there an indoor location large enough for your full wedding party or extended family?
- Will those spaces actually be available when portraits are scheduled?
- Are they occupied by guests during cocktail hour?
- Is there enough window light?
- Do you like the appearance of the indoor locations nearly as much as the outdoor ones?
That last question deserves more consideration than it usually receives. I've seen venues with gorgeous outdoor portrait options but very limited indoor alternatives. That's perfectly workable on a clear day. But if you're choosing between two venues and one offers attractive, naturally lit locations regardless of the weather, that flexibility has real value. If you're still deciding where to celebrate, I've also put together a collection of Columbus wedding venues I've photographed, including a closer look at the spaces, atmosphere, and photographic opportunities each one provides.
In summary, a good backup plan gives you more than protection from rain. It gives you peace of mind. Instead of checking the weather forecast every hour during wedding week, you can know that we've already talked through what we'll do if conditions change.
What should you look for in a wedding venue's rain backup space?
If you've lived in Ohio for very long, you probably already know that even a carefully researched weather forecast can't guarantee what your wedding day will look like.
A late-spring cold spell can make that flowering field far less appealing than it seemed during your venue tour. A humid 95-degree July afternoon may make twenty minutes of outdoor portraits feel considerably longer. And rain can suddenly make large portions of a venue unavailable—particularly if keeping your dress clean matters to you.
That's why a weather backup plan isn't simply a logistical consideration. It's also a lighting plan.
5. Have a Photography Backup Plan for Bad Weather
At most receptions, once the ambient light begins to fall, photographers rely more heavily on artificial lighting. I commonly use off-camera flashes positioned around the room along with a flash on my camera.
Depending on the space and the look we're trying to create, I may bounce that on-camera flash into the ceiling to create softer, broader illumination. But the farther the light has to travel—to the ceiling and all the way back down—the more flash power is required.
Once ceilings become particularly tall, bouncing light becomes increasingly impractical, and we may rely more heavily on direct or off-camera flash instead. Again, that doesn't mean a venue with soaring ceilings photographs poorly. It simply changes how I light it.
And that leads to perhaps the most important point in this entire article.
Does ceiling height matter for wedding photos?
In effect, we're temporarily turning the ceiling into a very large light source.
White, tan, and light-gray ceilings tend to work especially well because they reflect light without dramatically altering its color. Darker ceilings absorb much more of that flash.
Strongly colored ceilings and walls can create another challenge: color cast. For example, bouncing flash from a brick wall or warm wood ceiling may introduce reddish or orange tones into the light. A strongly green wall can reflect green light back onto skin.
We can compensate for some of this while photographing and editing, but neutral surfaces generally give us more flexibility.
Why does ceiling color matter for wedding photography?
That can create deeper shadows and greater contrast within photographs, often contributing to a moodier appearance. I can still use the available window light to create soft, flattering portraits. I can also introduce flash when needed. But the room itself will still influence the result.
White or light neutral spaces naturally reflect more light around a room, while darker rooms absorb more of it.
Neither is universally better. They simply create different photographic possibilities.
How do dark walls affect wedding photos?
Here's one of the less obvious ways a venue influences your photographs: The color and height of the walls and ceilings affect how light moves through a room.
Imagine a getting-ready suite with enormous windows, dark gray walls, brass fixtures, warm wood furniture, and a dark painted ceiling. It might be a gorgeous space. Maybe you love the intimate, old-world feeling of it. But if you're envisioning extremely bright, airy photographs, there's a potential disconnect between the environment you've chosen and the photographs you're expecting.
That's not because the room is bad. It's because light and environment work together to create a cohesive look and feel.
6. Pay Attention to Interior Walls and Ceilings
You should not have to become an expert in window direction, color temperature, backlighting, flash, or sunset times to have beautiful wedding photographs.
But your photographer can only help with the decisions we're invited into.
The amount of window light in your getting-ready space, the timing of your ceremony, the direction of an outdoor setup, the availability of sheltered portrait locations, and even the color of a reception ceiling can all influence what we're able to create. That's one reason I view wedding photography as much more than arriving with cameras on the wedding day, and it's a key reason I highly recommend looking beyond a photographer's highlight reel and reviewing how they approach an entire wedding day.
The planning matters.
Not because we're trying to turn your wedding into a photo shoot, but because thoughtful planning often allows photography to take less attention on the day itself.
If I've already studied your timeline, learned which relationships matter most to you, understood your priorities, and anticipated how the light will change throughout the day, we can work much more efficiently when your wedding actually arrives.
You don't need to wonder where you're supposed to stand. You don't need to calculate sunset. And you don't need to abandon your guests because someone suddenly realizes that the "perfect light" is disappearing.
We've already thought about it. That gives you more freedom to be present. Because ultimately, great wedding photographs aren't valuable simply because the light was beautiful.
They're valuable because of the people standing in that light.
7. Work With Your Photographer to Set a Vision Before the Wedding Day
I've spent years learning how to find, shape, add, subtract, and manipulate light. That's part of being a photographer. But I don't expect my couples to spend their wedding day thinking about any of that.
I want you thinking about the person you're marrying. About your dad seeing you dressed for the first time. About the friend who traveled across the country to stand beside you. About hugging your grandmother after the ceremony. About the ridiculous thing your sibling says during their toast. About being surrounded by people who may never again be gathered together in exactly the same place.
My role is to think ahead about the photography so you have the freedom to experience those moments. That's why the planning process matters so much to me.
If you'd like to learn more about how I help couples prepare for their wedding and build a photography plan around what matters most to them, you can explore the Brad Gillespie Photography wedding experience.
Because beautiful light helps make a beautiful photograph.
But the people inside that photograph are what make it worth keeping.
Beautiful Light Matters. What Happens in It Matters More.
Lindsay & Kyle
We really appreciated how flexible he was with changing plans and moving around to multiple sites for photos. Everyone in our wedding party commented on how fun and comfortable getting photos was. Brad even made sure that we were enjoying our reception and not just taking pictures with guests, which we really appreciated. Our photos turned out beautiful and really captured our personalities.
"Brad was wonderful to work with! He made the wedding stress-free and fun"
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2025 wedding collections begin at $3400, and the average couple invests $4500 for complete coverage.
As part of my desire to craft an experience that is tailored to you, I design custom collections for each and every couple.
For more details on your wedding photography investment, please contact me. I'd love to get to know more about you and to create a custom collection for you!
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