Madison Wedding Photographers Who Stay Calm, Present, and Ready for Whatever the Day Brings
Madison Wedding Photographers
Documentary coverage from getting ready to the last dance, shot across Madison, Middleton, and the surrounding countryside
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
We live in Viroqua, about two hours west of here. On paper that's a drive. In practice, Madison is the city we know best.
Viroqua is a town most of Wisconsin has to look up. Madison is the exception. Say it at a wedding here and somebody at the table has been to the co-op, knows a farmer out our way, or spent a weekend in the Kickapoo Valley. A lot of what this city puts on its tables comes from our end of the state, and we know a fair number of those people by name.
So we're here often. More weddings than almost anywhere else in Wisconsin, and then plenty of trips that have nothing to do with work. Dinner, a show, a night away in the slow season. It's the city we keep talking about moving to.
That's context, not a credential. What actually matters on a wedding day is that we're not learning Madison while you're getting married. We know the drive, the traffic, what four o'clock in July does to a ceremony on the west side. Which means our attention stays where it belongs, on you.
There are two of us and we're both photographing all day. Not a lead and an assistant. Two people who've worked the same weddings for twenty years and don't need to talk much to cover a room.
Most of the work happens before the wedding. A phone call, a questionnaire that's more fun than it sounds, and enough conversation that by the day itself we know who your people are. That's most of what keeps us from missing things.
On the day, we mostly stay out of the way. We don't invent moments, we recognize them. When we do step in, it's usually to point you toward better light and then leave you alone in it. We direct the moment, not the smile.
Roughly: mostly story, some portraits, a few formals. You'll get the photo with your grandmother. You just won't spend an hour of your wedding making a list happen.
Nineteen years in, very little rattles us. Rain, a florist running late, a ceremony that starts forty minutes behind. That steadiness is part of what you're hiring, not just the photographs afterward.
Documentary style means we travel light. We can throw the bags on a bus with the wedding party, walk six blocks to meet you, and keep shooting the whole way. Downtown Madison on a Saturday asks for that.
we are ray + relly!
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
We've photographed almost every inch of downtown Madison at this point. We go back now with our kids, and half the drive is us pointing out windows. Wedding there. Wedding there. There are a few churches we still haven't been inside. Not many.
A few we know especially well:
Madison Public Library. Works literally any month of the year. All that light, and climate control, which matters more than people think in July. Read our full guide to getting married at the Madison Public Library →
Over the Vines, Edgerton. An 1888 barn with a working vineyard, run by owners who live right on the property. Ana and JP's day there had crystal chandeliers, a stone milk house, and a forty-foot tree swing, all behind a gate that kept the whole thing quietly private. See Ana + JP's wedding →
Aldo Leopold Nature Center. Wooded trails and soft natural light do a lot of the work without much help from us.
See Jamie + Scott's wedding →
Folklore Village. One of the best golden hours we've caught on camera anywhere. Worth building a timeline around.
See Kristen + Alex's wedding →
Memorial Union Terrace. The chairs, the lake, the memory of being on campus. It's busy, always. We've learned where the shade sits as the crowd moves, when to let the crowd into the frame because it's part of the story, and where the quiet corners are when you'd rather have none of it.
The Madison Club. Right on Monona, which means color in the sky at sunset and deep shade off the buildings to work in.
Allen Centennial Gardens. Beautiful, and there's no shade for a ceremony. We'd point you toward the shoulder months here.
Monona Terrace. Same story on midday sun, and it comes alive later in the day.
Also, over the years: Olbrich Botanical Gardens, First Unitarian Society, Grace Episcopal, the Masonic Center, the Overture Center, the Orpheum, the Children's Museum, the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, the Edgewater, Marigold Kitchen, and the AC Hotel. Plus most of the parks worth knowing, Tenney, Olbrich, James Madison, Olin, and Vilas.
Don't see your venue here? Reach out anyway. We don't scout ahead of time, the light's different every day regardless. We read the room when we get there.
Madison Venues & Locations We Love
- ana + jp
"Words cannot describe how thankful we are that ray and kelly photographed our wedding. first of all they are wonderful people who are incredibly easy to work with. we were planning from afar but they used phone calls and easy (and fun) surveys to make sure they knew us and understood what we wanted them to capture prior to the day of. while we have some posed photos of family and friends the true beauty of ray and kelly is their ability to capture the emotion and little interactions that may be forgotten if not preserved in a photo. we did not have a videographer and instead chose to have them do a motion picture (check out their website for examples). it is such a work of art! we would choose them 100 times over again.
"BEAUTIFUL PICTURES AND WONDERFUL PEOPLE TO WORK WITH"
"Ray and Kelly worked their magic and gave us photographs that we will laugh and cry about over and over again."
"I'm genuinely excited for anybody who has the opportunity to book Ray and Kelly"
- Vanessa + David
Click below for more
Recent Madison Area Wedding Photos
VISIT THE BLOG
Over The Vines in Edgerton is one of our favorite venues near Madison: an 1888 barn with a working vineyard, run by owners who live right on the property. Ana and JP's day there had crystal chandeliers, a stone milk house, and a 40-foot tree swing, all behind a gated entrance that gave the whole thing a quiet privacy. See Ana + JP's full wedding day →
Katelynn told us she knew our work was right for her the moment she saw it. She wanted a wedding day that felt candid, not curated, with room for the small, quiet moments most people forget. Aldo Leopold Nature Center gave us exactly that: wooded trails, soft natural light, and a setting that let the day unfold on its own. See Katelynn + Cory's full wedding day →
Kristen and Alex live in Seattle but wanted to get married near Madison, and Folklore Village turned out to be the perfect fit: live music, incredible food from Underground Food Collective, and one of the best golden hours we've ever caught on camera. It's the kind of wedding that reminds us why we love shooting in this part of the state. See Kristen + Alex's full wedding day →
photography that tells a story,
you're in the right place.
Madison in summer feels a lot like the Driftless does, same humidity, same long green. What changes is the frame. Out our way we're mostly working with nature. Here the lakes and the buildings do half the shaping, which means fewer greens, harder lines, better shadows. We like giving a Madison day a balance of both, something organic alongside the shapes and light the city gives you.
The two lakes split the evening. Mendota, on the campus and Edgewater side, gives you sunset over the water. Monona gives you color coming into the sky and deep shade off the buildings to work in. Neither is better. They're different evenings, and it's worth knowing which one you're getting.
On timing, June and September are our favorites for an outdoor day. Still green, still full of life, and the heat isn't running the show. July and August are wonderful too, and they pair best with a venue that has shade or air conditioning. Allen Centennial Gardens is beautiful and has no shade for a ceremony. Monona Terrace is the same at midday and comes alive later. The Public Library works any month of the year. So the real advice is to choose your month and your venue together, because some places are flexible and some aren't. Madison holds up in every season, frozen lakes included.
One more piece of timing worth knowing: a late-June sunset comes very late. That's a gift if you want a long day, and it's why a September ceremony can sit much closer to golden hour. We're happy to talk through what a specific month actually looks like here, rather than what it looks like in photos.
Saturdays downtown are busy. The square fills with the farmers market in the morning, parking mostly disappears near the Capitol, and the closer you get, the slower everything moves. None of that is a problem with enough schedule, and it's the kind of thing we work out with you well before the day. We've done the Terrace at its most crowded, found the shade as it shifts, and found the corners where nobody else is. We've jumped in a car to meet a bus on the far side of the square and gotten portraits done between the light and the crowd. We've shot around that Capitol building more times than we can count, on all four sides. It's a genuinely fun place to work, and after this many years we're efficient in it.
Madison Wedding Days
We know how the city moves
Lets talk about your madison wedding!
Send us a message to start the conversation
we usually write back within a day or two
