Wedding Planning: Sparklers

Sparklers are great to add some fun to your wedding and of course a great photo opportunity!

Sparklers can be quite seasonal anyway but I would recommend the best time of year for capturing sparkler shots are when the evenings are drawing in between late September to April.

Obviously you can do them any time of year and whenever your wedding is, but if you are wanting your photographer to capture these images for you, I would say autumn/winter due to light.
In the summer months your going to need to wait until around 10pm for it to be dark enough, most photographers coverage typically ends around first dance time, so this would mean more hours to add to your coverage.

Another thing to factor in as by 10pm onwards your guests may have enjoyed a few drinks so it may prove a little bit harder to do (and safety!) so I find earlier is always better.

To light the sparklers make sure you buy lighters, and lots of them. The sparklers will all need to be lit at the same time to get the full effect, so don’t make the mistake of buying a box of matches.. (yes it is a common mistake) and as you can imagine having one box of matches this doesn’t work well passing the matches round, as by the time the box has been passed around to everyone a lot of peoples sparklers will be out! So lighters are a must.

Id say one lighter between two-three people. Small groups can hold their sparklers together and light them all at the same time.

Who do you want in your sparkler shot?

I would recommend doing sparkler shots with just the bridal party, this is just my personal preference, and i’m more than happy to get everyone in, and involved, but the the only reason I usually say this, is it can be very difficult to get a big group of people who are all a bit merry (and obviously excited to be playing with sparklers!) to all listen enough to light their sparklers at the same time, and if you go for a shot with everyone in the shot the full shot will be very full, and I like you the couple to be the main focus of the shot!

Safety wise – make sure you have lots of space around you, and a bucket for afterwards so everyone has somewhere to put the finished with sparklers!

I’d love to chat to you about your wedding day! Feel free to pop me a message

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