So, you want photojournalistic. Candid-but-editorial. Documentary style wedding photos so film feeling you’d swear they must was staged.  

I say this with my whole chest: there is nothing more cinematic than real life, when you let it roll unscripted. 

Your love isn’t some rom-com rewrite, it’s a sleeper indie hit begging for a wide release. The kind of romance that makes The Notebook look like a PG matinee.

And if anyone could give Ali and Noah a run for their lake-drenched money, it’s Teryn and Matt. 

Their lakeside Minnesota wedding at Catalyst at Nature Link had everything documentary style wedding photos thrive on: Humans who love their people (and their cat) hard. Heirloom details chosen intentionally. A venue that’s a little wild in the best way and a documentary wedding photographer that’s a little bit wilder (also in the best way). 

We shot how it felt, not some pre-packaged version of what it “should” be. And it shows. 

Vendors | Venue: Catalyst at Nature Link | Florist: Malana Sophia Floral | Make Up: Eso Makeup | Hair: Hair with Mel | DJ: DJ David James Events | Dress Shop: The Wedding Design Studio | Dress Designer: Paloma Blanca | Dress Alterations: Custom Sewing by Heather | Suit: The Black Tux | Food: 3 Cheers | Bar: Liquid Motion | Day of Coordinator: Kallan Swenson with Realm Planning

Catalyst at Nature Link Set the Scene, Their Wedding Details Gave It Meaning

I ask every couple for their box of details but you will never (I repeat, nev-er) catch me prescribing what goes in. Perfume isn’t your vibe? Skip it. Heirloom jewelry is the heartbeat? In it goes. 

Flatlays only work when they’re built on your priorities, not mine. But you best believe I’m going to get down and informal with your details. Rings tucked into florals. That elegant little invitation of yours tucked into a fern you’d swear I had planted myself, just for the occasion (I might be in my landscaping era, but I do have limits). Shoes on the dock to set the scene. 

The point isn’t “pretty.” It’s your pretty. A slightly-unruly-but-totally-intentional vignette of your life. 

Oh, and if you think for one second I’m treating your venue like wallpaper? Hate to break it to you, but your wedding venue is a character in this film, and I’m giving it lines. 

Tall pines, honest light, candlelit corners. A venue that held the scene instead of stealing it. The kind of venue that lets me shoot wide so you remember where this happened, then close so you remember what it meant. 

And to Teryn and Matt it meant everything. 

North wasn’t just a direction; it was a literal North Star tied to Teryn’s family cabin. Choosing Catalyst at Nature Link was a nod to those roots. So, I roamed like an editor chasing cutaways. 

Lily pads at lake level? Got ‘em. The dock giving air and intimacy? All day, baby. Their cat peeking from a cabin window? YES. 

Frames you feel before you can even clock why. Up-north-to-the-bone and documentary style to its soul. Cinematic from scene one.

Choose Story Over Staging For Your Getting Ready Photos (And Let the Lululemon Bag Stay)

In no world would I ever drag you to some random corner just because I love the light there. Same goes for the classic “stand in front of the window with your dress” move—unless you actually want to get naked by the window. (Live your truth. My camera’s ready.) 

I’d rather document your morning as it happened than mess with your comfort levels. Give you the room; let it breathe— that’s the vibe. 

For Teryn, that meant hanging with her girlie girls while her maid of honor steamed her veil in the closet. For Matt, it was getting ready as far from the window as possible, Trader Joe’s tote bag by his side. I didn’t move him. The same way I didn’t pull his best man into “better light” or script a father-son tie intervention. I just let them be— and let layers of real life stack into one lived-in frame.

Sure, if a cord on the wall is screaming at me, I’ll clean it in editing. But sanitize reality so it stops feeling like you? To quote a certain ‘90s icon: “Ugh, as if!” 

The mess is the movie. The clutter is the cinema. The live-in-it-and-let-it-breathe morning is where honesty becomes art,.

You Decide How Your Documentary Style Wedding Photos’ First Look Plays Out

First looks are where short films meet improv. For those first few minutes, I’m your assistant director: placing you where the light is honest, giving your cue, and then… I fade into the background so the moment can direct itself. No scenes play the same— and I’m OBSESSED with that. 

For his close-up, Matt wanted a tap-free first look with his mom. So, we set him outside, brought her in, and let it roll. Teryn pictured a classic tap with her dad; I placed him, told him she would lead, and stepped back. No “hug now.” No “turn now.” Just his body wrapping her in his, eyes closed, face pressed against her like muscle memory.

And then came Teryn and Matt’s. 

Teryn had a vision, and her vision was vision-ing. Matt at the end of the dock. Clark Lake stretching behind them. Teryn’s dress fanned out behind her like it was auditioning for a period drama. I gave him his cues and 12 words that set him loose: “whatever she decides in the moment is how it’s gonna play out.” 

And play out it did— so swoonworthy, it hurts. 

Teryn hovering in that gorgeous almost, just for a breath. The tap and his turn. Their heads leaning together. Arms held out like they couldn’t take enough of each other in. Ali and Noah could never.

Every couple wants something different. Some want me close, catching the nose crinkles; others want distance, letting the landscape carry the weight (and letting them have some P&Q, thanks very much). Teryn pictured the dock, the lake stretching wide behind them, and nothing but her human. So I set the scene and stepped out.

That space left room for the quiet in-betweens—Matt showing her his ring, their moms leaning over the railing to sneak a peek, the real reactions, the unscripted responses, the oh-my-god-this-is-actually-happening emotion. 

You can’t force any of that. You can only notice.

We Like a Pose, But We Love a Prompt and the In-Betweens Even More for Documentary Style Wedding Photos

The secret to those could-we-ever-be-that-cool authentic photos? Me whipping out a trusty “take her dress and walk that way” and letting you hand it back however you damn well please.

One couple laughs through it, another gets quiet, another goes full runway. Same prompt, different vibe. 

For Teryn and Matt, it looked like wandering under Catalyst’s tall pines, his hand clutching fabric like letting go meant losing her and the moment. And then… the atmosphere won out. My second shooter hidden amongst the trees was forgotten. The prompts flowed fast and loose. Teryn went full Disney princess—twirls, swooshes, forest-path frolics that became their own woodland daydream.

(PSA to all brides: twirl in your dress. Sit in it. Walk in it. Breathe in it. Make sure you can move WELL in it. Consider this your cinematic stress test.)

Not every frame was strictly documentary, but every frame felt it. Case in point: Matt hoisting Teryn’s bouquet mid-search for their cat’s tuxedo. Looks prompted, wasn’t prompted—just them cracking up between setups while I noticed.

Wedding party portraits work the same way. Yes, we get the very posed lineups—classic, intentional, one for the mantle. But my favorites are when I prompt you to walk with your people. Some wedding parties turn it into a full-on hype squad, jumping in the air and cheering them on. Others keep to clapping sweetly and simply. 

Either way, it’s yours.

And here’s the thing: you can always tell which shots were posed and which were of the moment. But you can’t have documentary style wedding photos without both. What makes it cinematic is what happens between those directions.

Their inner circle bent over mid belly laugh between poses. Grandma reaching for Teryn’s hand. Matt juggling his nephews while his mom tries to make them smile.

Posing is intention. The beats in between— the unplanned, oh-so-you ones? That’s the art of noticing. That’s Tayler Dumas Photography.

(“Did she just…?” Yes, yes she did.)

Reactions Are the Receipts for Documentary Style Wedding Photos

Confession (but also, hi, my entire personality): give me a candle-lit, romantic-feeling space and I’m going to get a million different angles and million different table shots. That’s a promise.

Close up, far away, weaving between tables, ducking between conversations— shooting through shoulders just to catch your dad mid-laugh like you were sitting right next to him. I want your gallery to feel like stepping back into that room. 

And the Catalyst reception space was ambient-lit perfection. Like, lower-the-light, lower-the-shutter, and let-the-motion-blur perfection. My favorite kind. 

Cue me never in the same spot for more than two minutes. I’m circling the room like a fangirl with a camera. Everywhere and nowhere at once. 

A close-up of people mingling at their tables? Got it. Grandma laughing behind her hand? Gold. Matt’s nephew glued to his toy cars? Something Teryn and Matt probably missed in the moment but now have forever. 

From the church ceremony to the dinner, I’m noticing your people choosing, praying, cheering, mingling, full-on crying (rent free forever and not even mad). Loving on each other and beaming at you. 

But toasts are where reactions matter most.

All those expressions you didn’t see because you were focused on the speaker? I’m snapping them for you. Your maid of honor’s face as she nails the line she’s been working on all morning. Your guests’ can’t-breathe, face-scrunched laughter. Your dad’s eyes red with the happiest of tears, handkerchief abandoned on his lap, his wife’s hand on his shoulder (I could die). 

Those reactions are the point. Everything you didn’t see in the moment but get to keep forever.

Keep the Filtering to Golden Hour and Let What Feels Good Fly

Teryn and Matt’s golden hour opened with a wink from the universe. 

During speeches, Teryn’s one-woman turtle fan club was toasted… and on our walk to the dock? A tiny turtle cameo. Click. Documentary-style photography loves a happy accident. 

And then as if on cue, Matt scooped her up. I framed it close: her shoes mid-air, hand clutching his shoulder, straight out of an Officer and a Gentleman rewrite. I didn’t prompt it, but Matt knew the assignment. 

Faceless, but you feel it. A shot so good I wish I could claim prompt credit but also low-key not because this is EXACTLY what I’ve been saying: the documentary-but-make-it-cinema is the in-betweens (all you) and the art of noticing them (all me). 

And if you thought that was cinematic as heck?! Buckle up, because then they boarded a freaking boat. 

Boating is in Teryn’s bones. Golden hour speeding on a northern lake was on her vision board. Tossing out prompts from the bow and catching every moment is my vibe— director’s chair energy, but… wetter. Her dad took the wheel, and I captured every veil toss, ring close-up, and Matt’s holy-heck-you’re-really-my-human-forever glances. 

And then real life really took the lead and gave me the nod like “sit down, I got this.” Their people cheered from the venue like every airplane applause rom-com scene EVER, a passing pontoon honked and Teryn and Matt, sun-warmed-and-a-little-bit-wild, yelled back “frick yeah we just got married!” 

Put a stamp on and full-send it.

A Fly On The Wall and Crushed Beer Cans By an Empty Cupcake

That’s the heartbeat of documentary style wedding photos—not manufacturing a moment, but being present enough to meet the messiness that makes it. 

As a documentary-style wedding photographer, my job is 90% the art of noticing the tiny beats you might miss but that somehow define you: grandma fixing grandpa’s tie. Your maid of honor rehearsing her speech under her breath. Half-finished drinks on the table. Shoes abandoned on the dance floor.

Your wedding is meant to be lived. And it’s the living that gives your gallery life. 

The Art of Noticing Is the Heart of Documentary Style Wedding Photos

So, let the spontaneity in. I promise you, twenty years from now, you’ll laugh at the Lululemon bag, taste the espresso martini foam, cry at the way your dad looked at you, and wonder when your nephew finally stopped playing with that Hot Wheels car set. 

All you need to ask yourself is this:

“When you look back at your wedding photos in ten years, what do you hope to see?”

That’s what I’m here to notice.