Weddings of Tumblr By: Riley Luebke

1. Weddings of TumblrBy: Riley Luebke Genre Analysis, A hypertext

2. As I reach my 20s, life is filled with new and exciting experiences, such as girls beginning to dream about their weddings and planning everything from the ring and the cake, to the venue. Often times, people will start to plan their desired weddings on blog sites such as tumblr. Tumblr is a blogging site that allows you to share photos and other types of media, on a page that you can completely design yourself. Viewers and visitors on Tumblr can chose to ”like” or “re-post” images onto their own tumblr pages. This is an endless website for those who enjoy searching the web for photos and videos of their favorite hobbies, interests, or events, and sharing them with the world.

3. Though tumblr does allow you to ad text to the multi media you chose, the main focus is the images that are posted and shared. It is amazing how the photos someone selects for their category, combine with the way they design their page , can give off a certain tone about the blog and, demonstrate the mood of the author. I am going to explore 5 different wedding blogs and analyze different components such as the author, content, structure, and design.

4. Future Wedding Just by opening this blog, you can tell that the author is most likely a woman, who has a distinct vision of what a dream wedding would look like. The purpose of this blog is to display a classic dream wedding of a woman from the authors point of view. This blog was published in the hopes that a young woman in the midst of planning her wedding would be able to get ideas from the photos on the page. The simple design of the page containing a solid white background with a combination of black and grey text keeps it calming on the eyes and attracts viewers that are trying to get ideas for a classy, stylish, and natural wedding. The author adds in the quote “the future wedding inspirations of that kind of woman.” The photos on this blog are a combination of black and white, and colored pictures. Its structure is organized and well put together, making it easy to skim the page and still get all the details. All the images portray calmness, happiness, love, and nature. The dresses posted to this page are all extremely glamorous and traditional. The venues are all set in the nature such as large grassy areas, the woods, or on a beach. This specific blog is mostly linear, because it has a central point and a pretty specific theme attached to it. Without words, it is easy to determine the purpose and mood of this first wedding blog.

5. Wistful Weddings This blog is another blog based on planning the perfect wedding. The author of this page is slightly different from the first blog we looked at. The creator of this blog isn’t planning their own wedding, but they are offering examples and suggestions of multiple different ideas, themes, and moods of weddings. The readers of this site are looking to get multiple different themes and ideas from this blog, rather than looking at one specific theme. This author is most likely more open to new ideas, and does not yet have a set vision of his/her wedding. This is a more interactive site, giving you the option to select different categories such as “proposal”, “engagement”, “rings”, “hair and makeup” and more. Each category is filled with hundreds of photos of a mixture of different ideas for all different types of weddings. Each tab is designed with a white background and all the photos places on the left side of the page which provides an easy way to scroll through the website and allow the readers to view each picture peacefully. This specific blog is non- liner, because it provides different different points and ideas rather than a central point. This blog along with the first one we viewed tells a story through pictures rather than words.

6. A wedding from behind the lense of a photographer This blog is one that I found to be the most beautiful wedding blog while researching. This blog was created by a photographer, Khaki Bedford. Her blog is also interactive, with different links to all her photos taken. The readers of this blog are most likely her clients and people who are trying to find a photographer for their own events. Young couples are the ones who would be able to relate to Khakis photography. I found her photography to be very unique, modern, and fascinating to look at. When I clicked the wedding tab, the only words on the page are “oct 16”, which is the wedding date of the first set photos that followed. Unlike the other blogs, the photos on this page were much larger, and only one image was shown on the screen at a time while scrolling. The images were also centered against a white background. The first wedding photographed was a young, hip, and fun couple. The photographs were very vibrant, and the style that the photographer used was much different than many of the other photos on the other blogs. I really loved how the couple is dressed in their wedding attire, yet their photos are natural and entertaining. This blog is not very linear, because there are many different themes and occasions being displayed, and it is easy to navigate from one page to another giving the reader the opportunity to explore as they please.

7. Sweet Success- A wedding recap This blog is far more casual and less professional than the previous blogs. The author of this blog is Sara Giboney, and she made a blog of photos and stories from her brothers wedding. The photos are unprofessional and looks like they were probably taken on her cell phone or personal camera rather than done by a photographer. This blog is harder to skim through, because a lot of the photos wouldn’t make sense without reading the captions and stories underneath. For example, there is a photo of a bag of almonds with the caption explaining how hungry she was after the ceremony. This blog is made for her enjoyment, and probably meant to share with close friends, family, and people who were at the event and can relate to the photos and stories she is sharing. The writing is just as casual as the photos, and gives a step by step description of how she was feeling and what she was doing throughout the night. The design of this blog is extremely simple, and is probably not designed with the intent to please random viewers, like myself. The other blogs made the weddings look so perfect, glamorous, and story-book like, while this blog showed the moments that normal wedding photographers would most likely not document which I thought was interesting.

8. An Indian wedding The last wedding blog I looked at was a high fashion magazine blog meant for Indian brides looking for their dream dress. The author of this blog is a wedding magazine in the US that specializes in Indian weddings. The Indian culture is all about color, glam, and tradition on their wedding day, which was exactly what the blog page represented as well. Unlike the other blogs, the background of this page is pink with a swirly design, which I think is more distracting to the eye. The photos are all in color and appear to have been taken on a runway or at a high fashion photo shoot rather than at a wedding. There are captions under the photos that say the designer of the dress, and also contains hash tags such as #couture and #love. Many of the previous blogs express love and compassion between two people, but this specific blog is all about the bride and her dress, without a groom in sight. The left column of the page has an “about me” section for the author, and shows the “followers” of this specific blog. The ethnicity of the author can greatly determine the style and the design of a blog, and I think this blog was a perfect example.

9. Everyone has their own dreams and opinions of what a perfect wedding would consist of. There are endless opportunities to make a wedding come to life by creating the ultimate theme, design, dress and venue. I believe a blog is the same way. The authors thoughts and stories can be brought to life on the web by piecing together photos and text, and designing a page to match the mood. Blogs are the perfect way to share your life and ideas with friends, family, or strangers from all around the world.