Want goofy reception pictures? Skip the polaroids on the tables

I've been meaning to post on this for a long time, but better late than never, right?

The quandary of how to get good photos at a wedding reception has been around for as long as there've been cameras, I should think. Besides the requisite posed photos with family and wedding party attendants, how do you get great photos of the dancing, the action, the hijinks at the individual tables? Now, this solution I discovered last October doesn't address all those needs, but it sure does have fun trying.

The wedding I attended at the Brandeis-Bardin Institute in Simi Valley was notable in my mind for a number of things -- the unique color combo of brown and purple, the location which I'd never been to before, that it was my first Jewish wedding. But the other thing that set it apart by a mile from the hundreds of other weddings I've decorated over the years was the awesome photo booth by Cheesy Photo Booths. You can click the photo to the left to see it full-size, btw.

Oh, and yes, that would be myself and my husband in these photos.

The photo booth was super fun -- I got in there by myself (obviously) to mug it up, plus went in with other folks as well. The booth showed each pose on a screen outside, so if you were doing something goofy or naughty inside, the whole party could see. The Cheesy folks even provided scrapbooks, markers, scrap paper and glue sticks so we could scrawl goofy messages to the bride and groom. Each time you went in, you got two copies of each set of four photos. Technically, one was supposed to be either cut up and pasted into the scrap book, and the other was for you to take home. But you really didn't need to put the photos in the scrap books, since the bride and groom (in our case) got a CD of all the photos taken in the photo booth.

Now, there was one drawback to the photo booth -- it couldn't fit enough people! Heh. I daresay about 10 people tried to get in to take a picture all together and had the booth bursting at the seams. The photo booth folks had to help hold it together. I don't think it was a dangerous situation, but I think it would be nice for the booth to be big enough for big groups.