Well-meaning relatives and friends wanting to preserve memories of the day are your enemy when they clog church aisles and step in front of your expensive wedding photographer for a quick photo.

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Before Mackenzie Luttrell was married at the Leiper’s Fork Inn in September she recalls seeing décor items and signs for purchase that politely asked guests to put their cell phones down during the ceremony.

And once she got her wedding pictures back, she wished she had bought a few.

“I can say that sometimes I get really frustrated, and I have to stop looking at them because a lot of my ceremony pictures, they’re ruined because there’s so many screens,” she says.

“What would be a shot of my beautiful family and friends looking longingly [at the ceremony] are now just screens everywhere. It did not ruin the moment by any means, but it ruined the photographs afterwards.”

And professional wedding pictures are not exactly cheap.

The Knot 2014 Real Weddings Study, with nearly 16,000 U.S. brides and grooms married in 2014 participated, reveals the average cost of a wedding was $31,213, although prices can run tens of thousands more.

The survey also states couples spend about 10-12 percent of that for photographers and videographers, but Hendersonville-based Anjeanette Hoer of Anjeanette Illustration Photography says that it can be as much as half of the budget.

“Major purchases for a wedding are your dress, your venue, your photographer and your catering, so if [those things] were very minimal, I know that I was most of the budget,” Hoer adds.

Interferes with the pro

Chastidyi Parrott of Star Noir Studio in Knoxville has been shooting weddings for almost seven years, but for the last few she has requested that most of the brides have unplugged ceremonies for the very reason Luttrell wishes she had.

“Guests are constantly pulling out their phones and not really paying attention to the ceremony, so you’ll get pictures of 40 guests all looking at their phones or iPads instead of looking at the bride and groom. Which is sad,” Parrott says.

Parrott doesn’t get much pushback from couples when she suggests they unplug, especially when she shows them examples of ceremonies in which guests are given no direction about their phones.

And not only can guests ruin pictures, they can also physically interfere with the photographer.

“I had a gentleman set up a GoPro on a chair in the middle of the aisle at a wedding once,” Parrott explains. “He did it while I was up close, and I didn’t realize it. I almost backed over it and fell in the middle of the aisle during the ceremony.”

Hoer has been shooting weddings for about four years, and cell phones have always been a part of the conversation. Brides might not know how disruptive guests’ phones can be, and photographers need to fill them in.

“I always bring it up because you have to set your expectations for your people,” she explains. “You have to tell them Aunt Sally’s going to have a giant pink bedazzled iPad, and she’s going to step in the aisle. That’s going to happen if you don’t set expectations.

“But a lot of times people don’t want to hurt their guests’ feelings so they don’t say anything because it’s awkward.”

An in those cases where the couples refrain from putting limits on their guests, Hoer is forced to send them bad pictures of important moments, if only to cover herself when they invariably get upset with the result.

In one instance, Hoer had worked with the bride and two wedding planners to set up the perfect shot for her exit with her new husband. But the overzealous guests got in the way despite being told to stay back.

“I had everything set up,” she says. “We had made an aisle, and as they went to exit, the couple was going to walk about five steps then he would dip her.

“He starts to dip her and people from both sides of the crowd rush up with their phones and into the picture. I ran forward but the only picture I could get was the back of all these people running forward.”

The bride was disappointed, but understood when Hoer sent her all of the shots she could, all blocked by guests and their cell phones.

“At some point you have to protect yourself as a photographer because we signed a contract, and I have obligations to fill,” Hoer adds. “Still, I can’t be responsible for your guests’ behavior.”

A social media event

Hoer thinks guests with cellphones are a double-edged sword because she knows they are excited and only want to participate.

Asking people to leave the phones down past the ceremony is impossible, so instead she suggests creating a hashtag and making the pics guests take a social media event.

“That makes it a lot of fun for everybody,” she says. “People are excited, and the way that most people document and take notes on their life is through their phones now.

“There were always the point-and-clicks and the old film cameras. There was always somebody who was a hobbyist at weddings before cellphones. Now it’s just so accessible. We would all like people to take a breather and be in the moment, but that’s kind of how people are in the moment now.”

As understanding as Hoer is about the place of cellphones in society, she struggles with the rise of selfie sticks.

She gets that selfies are part of younger couples’ lives and will even snap pictures of the bridal party taking pictures of themselves, but when the selfie-taking eats into the staged picture time, she puts her foot down.

“When I’m trying to take formal wedding pictures of the altar or outside, and they’ve all got selfie sticks out, it takes 20 minutes to calm it down and then we don’t have time,” Hoer explains.

“Then later on if the bride is upset we didn’t get a picture of this or the other – so I do have that in my contract that for any formal shots and stuff like that – I need them to co-operate with me. We all need to work together.”

Hoer has even candidly shot a proposal for a couple where the girl had her cell phone in her hand the whole time.

So while she couldn’t make herself known during the proposal to tell her to drop it, Hoer was able to stage a few shots later so the phone was not the star.

“The whole time he’s on bended knee, she’s holding the phone, and I don’t know what I can do about that,” she explains. “You can Photoshop some things but it’s awkward.

“It’s such a part of our lives now, so part of me says you have to go with it, make it part of the moment and enjoy it.”

Candid shots also affected

For years it was the trend for couples to leave disposable cameras on the dinner tables during the reception.

Then, those cameras were collected before the end of the night so the newlyweds could enjoy the reception from the loved ones’ point of view.

But as cell phone use has grown, disposable cameras are out, and couples rarely get to see the pictures their guests spent all night taking.

Luttrell says she was lucky in that most of her reception photos feature guests laughing, dancing and having a good time, but she will always be upset by the ceremony shots of her loves ones more concerned with getting their own picture than being in the moment.

“It is so sad, and the thing is I haven’t even seen those pictures,” she says of her guests’ cell phone snaps.

“It’s great that those folks got the shots on their camera, but they are just going to sit there.”

Parrott says the appearance of cell phones in reception photos are not quite as glaring because there’s other stuff going on to entertain the guests.

And really, regulating cell phone use during a reception is practically impossible and totally unrealistic.

“There’s really no way to get guests to leave their phones for the entire time, so if they can do it for the ceremony that’s usually all I request,” Parrott explains.

And even if the bride, groom or photographer say nothing to the guests, there are some common sense rules they should follow to ensure the lasting images aren’t ruined.

“If you’re standing up taking a picture, if you’re in an aisle, if your phone’s going off, if you’re texting or watching the game, you really just need to stop,” Hoer says.

“It’s unloving and you’re there at a wedding because you care about them on some level so you can put it away for an hour.

“And just think of all the stuff you have to look forward to when you turn it back on.”