Wedding Photographers & Videographers at Moraine State Park, Portersville

A wedding at Moraine State Park puts Lake Arthur behind you. The lake covers more than 3,000 acres with 42 miles of shoreline, inside a state park of nearly 17,000 acres near Portersville, so your wedding photos and video can carry open water and wooded hills that most venues can't match. Your photographer will want to plan around the light over the lake, and a videographer can catch the breeze moving across the water as you exchange vows.

Here the park is clear about where weddings happen: at its pavilions. Moraine has seven pavilions that are popular for ceremonies and receptions, each with ample parking, and a pavilion reservation is required. Weddings aren't permitted in other parts of the park, so your wedding ceremony and the gathering afterward both take place at the pavilion you book. Every state park wedding needs approval from the park office first, and most parks charge a small fee to process the paperwork, on top of the pavilion rental.

Pennsylvania asks guests not to throw rice or birdseed and not to release doves or butterflies. With written permission from the park, guests may blow bubbles instead, which makes a cheerful exit for photos and film. If you're hiring a commercial photographer or a caterer, the park office wants to hear about it ahead of time. Outdoor sound carries differently near water, so talk with your videographer about microphones for the vows on your wedding day.

• Call the park office early for approval and a pavilion reservation.
• Tell the office about your photographer, videographer and caterer.
• Visit your pavilion at the hour of your ceremony to see the light.

A little about Moraine State Park

The land at Moraine was shaped by continental glaciers and later by coal mining and oil and gas drilling. Many people worked to restore it, and today Lake Arthur sits at its center, with marinas on the North Shore and at Watts Bay.