Time!

That’s what a cocktail hour is for, you provide drinks and appetizers for your guests while you take pictures. It shouldn’t be longer than 90 minutes.

Cocktail hour is typically one hour, 90 minutes max.

We aren’t doing a cocktail hour so we are only having a half hour between but we are also doing first look

It depends on if the wedding and reception are in the same place and if you are having a cocktail hour or refreshments hour.

We're going to schedule our day around the time we want the dinner. We know we need to end the reception by 10:00 as well. Since the ceremony and reception are both at the same place we are carving out 90 minutes for the ceremony and cocktail hour. Taking pictures during that time. I'm not big on pictures so I will probably only do 30-45 minutes max and try to relax and recharge before the rest.

We're taking 2.5-3 hours.
It's my wedding day. I dislike first looks. I want plenty of time for photos, and taking some time to soak things up with my nearest and dearest friend on the part bus. And the venue needs to be flipped.
We are also skipping the cocktail hour because I've only ever seen one and find the whole thing unecessary.

We’re doing a first look so a lot of our pictures will be taken care of before the wedding. Our cocktail hour will be between an hour-an hour and a half long so we can get all the pictures we want and flip the ceremony space to the dance floor room.

As PP have said we are alos having a cocktail hour. This way guests can mingle and enjoy some small snakcs and drinks while we tak epictures.

We are not doing a cocktail hour & our wait will be about 2 hours before we let people in the hall. We will have about 3 hours for pictures but will probably not take that much time & just go to the bar.