No wedding photos on social media

[StrongInside]

Hi,

Neither my partner, nor myself are on social media anymore, and we would like our wedding day to be kept private. We want to choose who sees our photos, but obviously don’t mind if guests post photos of themselves on their social media. I feel really strongly about this and have already mentioned on our wedding website that we have a private photo album there where guests are encouraged to upload their photos. I have asked guests not to tag our special day and not to post photos of myself, groom or our child on social media.

I know for a fact, from past experience, that some family members will rebel against the above, but I’d like to have a sign at the ceremony as a gentle and/or humorous reminder anyway.

I’ve read about a couple who put a page on everyone’s seat at the ceremony asking not to take any photos of the ceremony as there was a professional photographer there to do that, and threatened to take anyone’s camera/phone away for a small child to play with while eating a large popsicle and possibly ketchup too😃

I simply want to ask our registrar to announce that we invite everyone to be fully present and to leave all the photo taking to the professional photographer during the ceremony (as if certain people will care..). If someone does want to see our ceremony through their phone, so be it, but we don’t want any photos of us on social media. Any wording ideas or photos of signs you have seen?

I havent come across this before- most people seem to want as much social media fuss as possible! I would feel exactly the same as you OP. Its your private occasion and its up to you how the photos get shared. There is absolutely no excuse for anyone not honouring your wishes on this, so long as it has been made clear to them. You have already mentioned it on your website, and I think having it mentioned on the day would be a good idea too. Good luck!

Why don't you just put a short, honest and polite note on everyones chair, summarising what you have put on your post here. I think that comes across better than the 'humourous' example you shared.

Thanks both. Yeah, I agree, the humorous example was a bit passive aggressive. Not everyone will read through our website and the ceremony will be outside if it’s a nice day, so I think the notes could be blown off the seats. Pinterest is full if signs used at ‘unplugged’ ceremonies but I can’t find much on not using social media.

I had a small wedding and wrote that on the invites
People know we are very private and if friends or family were to judged us for that then they don’t know us very much
Plus we don’t care. We did things our way

I was the same op. Our registrar announced our wish that people do not take photos or videos of the ceremony (in a really polite way), and everyone obliged. I think that, along with my friends and family knowing I’m quite a private person, set a president for the whole day.
I didn’t put any signs up re: social media (I think they rub people up the wrong way), people were taking photos, but everyone respected our wishes re: social media and pcs of myself, DH and DC.

Perfectly reasonable request, but I doubt if anyone but you will read through the detail of your website.
In Church, it is very normal / usual for the prebytyr to remind people at the beginning of the service that photos aren't allowed during the service, so I can't see there being a problem with the registrar doing so at the beginning of your service.
Are you having an 'Order of service' / anything printed? you could include it on there if you are.

Registrar is a good idea rather than a note on tables.

We didn't put a sign up at the entrance to our ceremony saying 'please leave your phones, camera and devices in your pockets until the reception drinks, we want to see your faces not your devices' we didn't mention social media as we had an outdoor wedding without phone signal and weren't fussed about photos going on social media after our wedding day as most of our friends have private social media and we're really lucky that we don't have social media obsessed friends and family.

I don't know where 'didn't' came from it's meant to say 'we put a sign up' 🙈

A polite notice is fine. But please dont threaten to take away peoples phones- that’s overly aggressive and everyone knows you don’t have the authority to do that. No one would be taking my phone off me, and I’d like to see them try 🤔

Was going to put a note but the minister actually took it upon himself to ask people not to post on social media until we did. SIL had it on her invites.

In fairness one of my colleagues put our group pic up that night but it didn't have my DH (does not do social media due to work) or his kids in it so I didn't mind.

Pintrest have plenty of ideas for how to pitely but firmly make a notice though, and people are generally very good.

It's completely fine for you to ask people not to put stuff on social media. If anyone doesn't respect your wishes on your wedding day then they are being extremely rude.

We got married last year and asked for people not to share any photos on Social media until we’ve had a week to ourselves to enjoy our honeymoon and not have it all splashed online before we’d even seen any photos ourselves etc. We just wrote a nice note to put on the seats at the ceremony along with the confetti bags and everyone respected it and we said we are happy for them to take photos but please respect our wishes and honestly it went down well nobody said anything bad . The bloody photographer shared some though before the day was even over !! We got texts from some distant family who didn’t turn up and commented on how they didn’t like my dress and we’d not even seen any photos ourselves and it had come up on the photographer Facebook and they somehow saw it. It was so annoying but generally the note thing worked minus the professional lol

I'm getting married on Saturday. Don't mind the social media part but I do t want to look around and see people on their phones all day. It's so bloody rude. On our welcome sign I've added thanks for sharing our day we kindly ask you to put your phones away.

The registrar is going to mention it too. If they have them out in the evening it's not too bad but it's a small wedding and everyone on their phones will be a bit shit!

Yes get someone to say be present and no photos .

They say now at the start of school plays and it’s gone from everyone with phones up in front of their faces to none.

I think that’s a definite then to ask for the registrar to make a polite announcement. It doesn’t cover the whole reception though, and I don’t want any photos of me, my partner or our child on social media at all, not just from the ceremony. I have a funny feeling my future MIL will post online anyway, she wouldn’t have read the website. So should I put a little notice on the tables next to favours for each guest or one sign per table?