Guides
How to set up a disposable camera for your wedding
By the Unveil team · Published July 27, 2026
A shared disposable camera is the rare wedding job you finish before the wedding: four decisions in the app, a code on the tables, and the day runs itself.
This guide walks through those decisions in order, with the reasoning behind each default. It assumes a camera app built around a sealed reveal; we build Unveil, so the numbers below are its wedding preset, and every one of them is yours to change.
Decide the shot limit first
The shot limit is the whole trick. Give a table unlimited frames and you get burst photos of the centrepiece; give each guest ten and they start choosing. Choosing is where the good photos come from, the same way it was when the counter on a physical disposable read 27.
Ten per guest is the wedding default for a reason. Fifty guests at ten frames is five hundred photos, which is plenty of album and still few enough that people aim. Drop toward six for a small dinner where everyone shoots a lot, or add the unlimited-shots option if scarcity genuinely stresses you, but try the counter first.
Open the camera when the guests arrive
The camera window is how long the roll accepts new shots. Twelve hours covers a wedding: open it as guests arrive for the ceremony and it runs through the last dance without a thought from you.
The one real decision is the starting point. Opening at the ceremony catches confetti and the awkward-lovely milling around afterwards. Opening at the reception keeps the whole roll in one room and one light. Either works; pick the one that matches where your guests will actually be holding phones.
Schedule the reveal for breakfast
The preset unlocks the album at nine the morning after. That timing has a logic to it: the couple wakes up to five hundred photos of their own wedding from fifty angles, and going through them together over coffee becomes the weekend's second event.
The other honest choice is the end of the night, for crowds that would rather relive it before bed. What we would argue against is revealing during the party. The seal is what keeps phones in pockets between shots; open the album mid-reception and it becomes a feed.
Put the code where hands already are
Guests join by scanning one QR code, so the setup question is placement. Place cards and menus work best, since everyone sits down and looks at them; a welcome sign catches the ceremony crowd. Print sizes and free templates are in the wedding QR code guide.
Then have exactly one person say it out loud. A single line from the toastmaster (scan the card, you get ten shots, the album unlocks at breakfast) beats any amount of signage. On an iPhone the code opens a small native camera with nothing to install; on other phones it opens in the browser. Scanning a code is the whole tutorial, which is why grandparents manage fine.
On the day, do nothing
There is no live album to babysit and nothing to moderate, because every photo is sealed the moment it is taken, from you too. Shots taken in a signal dead spot upload themselves when the connection returns. Your photographer keeps the ceremony and the portraits; the shared roll picks up the eighty conversations behind them.
The one thing worth doing is a test roll in the week before: create a free event with your partner, shoot a few frames, and watch the album unlock on schedule. Five guests are free, so the rehearsal costs nothing.
The wedding preset
- Ten shots for every guest
- A camera window that runs twelve hours
- Room for 50 guests, with bigger brackets a tap away
- The album unlocks at nine the morning after
Pick Wedding when you create the event and the app starts you here. Every number is yours to change.
The rehearsal is free. So are the first five guests.
Get the appQuestions people ask
No. They scan the code on their place card and the camera opens: a small native camera on iPhone, the browser on other phones. There is nothing to install at the table.
Ten is the preset and a good default: enough for the toasts and the dance floor, few enough that people aim. Small dinners can drop lower; an unlimited-shots option exists if you want the safety net.
The code works for as long as the camera window is open, so a guest who arrives at the party after dinner scans the same card and gets the same shots as everyone else.
Yes. Capacity comes in brackets, and a bigger bracket is a purchase in the app when the list grows. The photos already on the roll stay put.
An event is free up to 5 guests, which covers the test roll. Real weddings are one purchase sized by the guest list: $14.99 for 50 guests and $29.99 for 100, with brackets up to unlimited (US pricing).
They cover different ground. The photographer owns the ceremony, portraits, and light; the shared roll catches the tables from the inside. Photographers tend to like it, since nobody asks them for candids of table nine.