The debrief
What the questionnaire asks, how to change it, and everywhere the answers turn up once they land.
Updated Jul 27, 20267 min readApplies to 1.0.0
The debrief is a questionnaire you send your client. They fill it out on the web, you never chase a Google Doc, and their answers land against the job and stay there.
It is the single highest-leverage thing you can do for a job. Everything les Archives writes is downstream of it.
What it asks
One hundred and one questions across fourteen sections. Twenty-seven are required, and the rest are optional, so a couple can move fast or go deep.
| Section | What it is after |
|---|---|
| First, your names | Spelling, last names after the wedding, and how they want to be referenced in print |
| About you | Hometowns, professions, ages, handles |
| How you met | The bar, the classroom, the app. Who introduced them. The near-miss. |
| The proposal | Where, when, what was said, who was hiding |
| Why this wedding, this way | How they chose the venue, the design north star, the feeling they wanted guests to leave with |
| The weekend | Welcome party, rehearsal dinner, after-party, brunch, and what the weather changed |
| Ceremony beats | Date, guest count, officiant, processional, vows, and what went off-script |
| Reception texture | The signature drink, the dish that nodded to a hometown, the song that packed the floor, the getaway |
| What you wore | Designers, ateliers, second looks, what is embroidered inside, the rings |
| Family, heirlooms, heritage | What they carried from a grandparent, whose memory they honored, traditions kept or blended |
| In your own words | The moment no one else saw. The tiny imperfection they now love. |
| The team | Twenty-two vendor slots, each taking a website and a handle |
| Publications, social, permissions | Whether they want to be featured, where, and what to leave out |
| Anything else | The open door |
Two things about the writing worth knowing. It is gender-neutral throughout, and the questions carry name tokens rather than "bride" and "groom," so the form addresses your couple by their actual first names from question three onward.
The permissions section is not boilerplate. It is where a couple tells you to use first names only, keep an employer out of print, or hold everything until a publication has had first look. Read it before you post anything.
Sending it
Open the send sheet
Two ways in. NEW JOB then Send a debrief first, for a couple you have not shot yet. Or open an existing job and use Send Debrief in the Output & SEO card.
The job needs a client name. Without one the tile is disabled, because the public form would otherwise greet your couple with a folder name.
Edit, then send
Subject and message are written for you and the link is generated the moment the sheet opens. Change any of it. The questions sit below the email fields if you want to cut or add something for this couple specifically.
Then Copy the link, or press Open in Mail to hand off to your mail client with everything filled in.
Watching it come back
The job card carries the state. Awaiting Debrief before you send, Debrief Sent after, then Awaiting Photos once the couple finalizes.
The job's reference documents area grows a Client debrief tile with a matching subtitle: sent, client opened the link, in progress and saving as they type, or finalized with the date. Click it to read every answer.
The Dashboard keeps the running count. There is a Debriefs card with three buckets, out, in progress, and back, and the three most recent arrivals by name. The week's summary line at the top counts debriefs back. The activity feed logs each one as it lands.
What a finished debrief changes
Cataloging. Up to five of the highest-signal answers ride along with every frame we write about. We reach for how they met, the ceremony, the reception, what they wore, and the in-their-own-words section.
Captions and carousels. The same answers, so a caption can name the song or the dish instead of describing what is visibly in the frame.
Submission Brief. The branded PDF for editors is built almost entirely from the debrief. Couple bio, love story, design vision, the full vendor list, three quote-worthy lines, exclusivity status.
Quote Library. Quotable answers become tagged, searchable lines you can drop into any draft with attribution back to the couple.
Fixing an answer after the fact
Open the Client debrief tile and edit. A couple who forgot a vendor or misspelled an atelier is the usual case. Your edits are stamped separately from theirs, so the record still shows what they wrote, and everything downstream picks up the change immediately.
Changing the questions for good
Catalog, then the Templates tab, then Default Debrief. Two things sit there.
The Studio Master is the set we ship with every install. View only. It is the floor you can always get back to.
Your Debrief is your copy, and you can do anything you like to it. Reorder, reword, delete, add. Eight question types, from short text through vendor blocks. Changes flow into every job you send from then on, and never into a debrief already sent.
Jobs that will never have one
Old work, a couple who will not fill out a form, a shoot that was never a wedding. Write what you remember into About this job, or drop a planner's timeline into reference documents. It is not the same, but it is far better than nothing.
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