The importance of the Wedding Album and why you should have one.
Get a wedding album…there…I said it. Truthfully and bluntly. To be honest I am a rubbish salesman and the last thing I want to do to my couples is give them a hard sell to buy a wedding album. I mention it in my meetings and have it as an option but I don’t push them hard. But, please, if you are reading this and getting married and contemplating an album then get one. They may not be cheap but they are worth every penny.
A wedding album is an investment. Think about it…. weddings aren’t cheap. Dress, shoes, venue, transport, food, photographer, music…it all adds up. You work hard and save and put on a beautiful party with friends and family. You have a wonderful day full of laughter, tears, dancing and celebration. You go on honeymoon and then come back to receive your digital files on USB containing the story of your day. You go through them and reminisce, reminded of the emotions, the fun and the moments. Then you close your laptop and ……then what?
These digital files, these memories, these moments remain there. Condemned to an eternity in a jpeg prison. You owe it to yourself to set them free. And why not, why wouldn’t you want to have these beautiful images at hand in a stunning wedding album to share with visiting family and friends to rekindle and reignite those wedding day feelings. To start conversations and reminisce about the day. And, above all to remind you of how you felt at that precise moment in time when you made that commitment to your partner.
Images should be in physical form
There is something wonderfully tactile about a wedding album. Books have been around a lot longer than computers. For centuries books were (and still are) educators, history recorders, story tellers and records of thoughts, feelings and facts. There is something comfortingly familiar about turning the page of a book. There is something that’s addictive, something that resonates with all of us that you simply don’t get from the digital version. If that wasn’t the case then why would digital designers create e-readers to mimic the action of leafing through pages.
In the modern digital age its more important than ever to get those memories off that computer and to have them at hand. These photos, these memories are not meant to be stored away on a hard drive. You shouldn’t be ‘scrolling’ through them. You shouldn’t be hitting the arrow keys to go forward / back to view each individual image at a time.
These images should be laid out in physical form to tell the story of your day. Images should be grouped together on a page, in a sequence so that the viewers eyes can quickly follow the story. The viewer will be entertained. Images should be isolated, given space to breath and prominence on a page so that the emotion can be felt. None of this is capable, in my opinion, in digital form. Having that weighty album, with beautiful images on a beautiful paper right in front of you and physically turning those pages whilst friends and family gather round, or whilst in a quiet reflective moment, is emotionally engaging.
For future generations
And then there is the history, record, timeless factor. This was proved to me at a wedding I shot the other week. The bride and her friends were looking at the bride’s parents album. Had those images been on a hard drive would they have been viewed, at that point in time, and created the laughter and fun that existed in that moment. No. It simply wouldn’t have happened.
Could you imagine. ‘Oh, hold on, let me just get the macbook, let it boot up, find the folder with the images in and then scroll through them whilst swinging the laptop around’!!! No, the moment would have gone! The laughter and emotion, the conversation and the jokes were all triggered by the album being there, on the coffee table, in physical form for someone to pick up and leaf through. The memories came flooding back to the mother of the bride and the stories began. The album, that physical book of memories and emotions created joy, created laughter and recreated emotion right there and right then.
Still with me…..good…
And one last thought…imagine if there was a huge meteor shower that had mega magnetic powers and wiped all the hard drives on the planet. Apart from a global crisis, and potential Armageddon, you would have no wedding images, no photographic record of your day and that would be a disaster!
So, if you have got this far and are still not convinced, then don’t take my word for it. Take a look at the below and follow your heart….I think you will know where the truth is.
Feel free to comment or ask any questions.
Kind Regards
