Prepare photography plans and named family groups

Open Photography from a wedding to plan coverage, family photographs and each shooter’s work. Your studio’s working plan and private family answers remain separate. An invitation exposes only the approved information described by its scope.

Start with coverage, then choose the photographs

Add lead, second-shooter and assistant entries under Coverage. Give each shooter a booked start and end time in the plan’s named timezone. A crew-roster reference identifies a person; it does not reserve that person, accept a crew offer or create payroll. Manage those commitments in Crew.

Choose the photographs that matter from the original starter-idea library, or add your own. Mark must-have photographs, estimate their minutes, assign shooters and write instructions suitable for those recipients. The library is optional: inserting selected ideas makes independent items rather than automatically adding every idea to the wedding.

Schedule photo, travel, break and event blocks. Link each block to its photographs, family groups, shooters and location. The planner reports overlapping work for the same shooter, work outside booked coverage, a block with more estimated photographs than time, missing assignments, unconfirmed permission and must-have photographs without a block. These are planning warnings; they do not automatically shorten coverage or move the event. References to deleted people, locations, photographs or family groups must be corrected before saving.

The event reference displays the published schedule you are authorized to see. Copy a moment into the photography plan, then review its timing. This creates a separate planning block with its source revision; it does not rewrite the wedding run of show or automatically follow later event changes. Recheck the published event reference before saving a revised photography schedule.

A worked eight-hour plan

Morgan covers noon to 8 p.m.; Riley covers 3 to 7 p.m. Give Morgan the couple portraits from 3:15 to 3:45 and Riley the ceremony reactions from 4 to 4:30. A second simultaneous block for Morgan produces an overlap warning; simultaneous work by Riley is allowed.

For the 4:45 family window, assign the approved groups to Riley and attach those group IDs to Riley’s block. If the window is 25 minutes and the groups total 30 estimated minutes, either review the groups or agree a larger window. The system shows the estimate instead of silently deleting someone’s photograph. A brief assigned to Riley shows Riley’s photographs, family groups, coverage and calls; Morgan’s unassigned work remains outside it.

Collect family context privately

Under Family questionnaires, create an expiring link for the couple and copy it to them. No email or text is automatically sent. New links are stored as fingerprints; copy a new link before leaving the page. Anyone who holds the link can read that questionnaire’s latest response and submit an updated version until it expires or is revoked.

The couple can name people, their relationships, explicit household groupings, requested combinations and a gatherer. They can flag early portraits and combinations to avoid. Practical circumstances and the reasons for avoiding a combination belong in private notes, not shared gathering instructions. Revocation stops subsequent access while retaining the studio’s response history.

Review groups shows the current response and a proposed order. The suggestions use the couple’s explicit grouping preferences, prioritize requested early portraits, and reduce changes in who stands in the next group. This is a deterministic planning aid, not a guarantee of the shortest possible sequence. Incompatible requested combinations are omitted with a warning. Review omissions, membership, order, gatherer, shared instructions and estimated minutes before applying.

Applying a reviewed response copies only approved group names, people’s names and shared instructions into the working list. Private family notes, reasons, source response IDs and person IDs are excluded from recipient briefs. Later answers do not change the working plan until the studio reviews and applies them. If the source changes while a preview is open, review the newer response. A response cannot remove a group still used by a scheduled block; revise the block first. Completed groups cannot be replaced silently.

Share an assigned brief or a couple’s list

Create an Assigned shooter only link for a particular shooter, or an explicit shared-plan link for a person who should see all approved items. Separately choose whether the link includes family groups and may record completion. Only a shared-plan link can receive permission to edit shared family groups. Read-only links cannot check off work.

Save assignments before inviting someone. Reassignment changes what an assigned link may access. Revoking or expiring a link stops subsequent page, mutation and image requests; a previously issued storage image URL may remain valid for up to 60 seconds. Private questionnaire responses, location fees, private permit notes and crew pay records never appear in either shared scope.

A couple’s family-edit link can change approved names and gathering instructions. It cannot change shooter assignments, read private questionnaire answers or remove a group while a scheduled block still uses it.

Record work without overwriting another shooter

Checkmarks are saved on the server independently from plan revisions. Two shooters can complete different photographs without overwriting one another. A stale check-off for an edited, removed or reassigned photograph is rejected. The page refreshes every five seconds while no local edits or requests are pending; it is not a reliable offline capture workflow.

If you change or remove a completed photograph, the studio editor identifies the affected completion and requires an explicit reset. Ordinary saves preserve completion for unchanged photographs, even if another shooter checked them while your editor was open. If a response is interrupted, use Check original request before making another change. This retries the same request identity rather than creating a new operation.

Print the reviewed list before traveling somewhere with poor reception. Printed output includes family names, gatherers and shared notes; your browser can save it as a PDF. The native offline guide describes the separate device workflow. This photography editor does not claim native or offline parity.

Keep references, history and routines reliable

Attach a ready private JPEG, PNG or WebP from this wedding’s Documents, or add an HTTPS reference link. A recipient image request verifies current assignment, wedding ownership and the saved image checksum. An unavailable reference shows an explanation. Saved plan versions retain image references, so Documents deletion is blocked while a saved photography revision references that image. There is no destructive photography-history purge in this workflow.

Saved plan history previews retained revisions. Restoring one creates a new revision, keeps current completion for unchanged photographs and requires a reset decision for changed completed work. It does not rewind questionnaire submissions or copy historical checkmarks over current progress. A damaged snapshot or altered original image blocks recovery for studio review.

Templates make independent copies with fresh identifiers and completion, without inherited shooter assignments, source-person IDs or private reference images. Review copied names and shared notes before using a routine for a different wedding. Retrying the same saved template request does not append a second copy.

Locations and light

Copy a studio location into the wedding’s plan to retain that guide revision’s details. Subsequent guide edits do not silently change the wedding copy. The wedding location separates shared meeting instructions from private permit notes and fees. Confirm actual venue permission yourself; the saved flag is an operational record, not a permit issued by the venue.

Add a light study using the date, coordinates and timezone. Saving recalculates sunrise, sunset and the approximate evening-light window on the server. This is an astronomical estimate: weather, terrain, buildings and venue access can change usable light. Review the saved calculation inputs when the date or location changes.

Studio location guides can also be published as public branded pages. Everything deliberately published in a guide is public, including its location notes and fee information, so keep access codes and private client details out. Attach up to ten explicitly selected photographs per location from your own published galleries. Public image requests check the current guide, original gallery visibility and active photograph; a hidden or replaced photograph is not exposed through an old guide. Uploaded originals and private gallery contents remain protected. Copy embed supplies a read-only iframe for the published guide; unpublishing the guide also disables the embed. HTTPS reference links remain separate references.

Planning, copy-only invitations and shared completion require the application database and normal access controls. Private reference-image delivery also needs configured private storage. This workflow sends no automatic provider messages and performs no production setup. Gallery uploads, album proofs and orders are separate workflows documented in the gallery help articles.

Your photography studio’s wedding cards show the latest saved light estimate, including its actual calculation date, local sunrise, sunset and evening window. This is the retained study, not a new forecast. Check the date and venue coordinates before relying on it.