EXCLUSIVE: 18 Kids and Counting: How Josh Duggar was kept OUT of Jinger's TV wedding special despite being in the church - thanks to TLC's camera cuts, blocking and using toddler son Marcus as a face shield

  • Jinger Duggar's TLC wedding special aired last month and featured all of her siblings but Josh
  • Network sources said earlier this year that the 28-year-old was banned from being on TLC shows after his molestation scandal
  • Josh did however attend the wedding and sat in front of the altar in the second row, which meant efforts had to be made to keep him hidden
  • At big moments, like when he stood for Jinger's walk down the aisle, he held his 2-year-old son Marcus directly in front of his face 
  • Crowd shots that aired of the church would only show the back of his head, and he was seated at the opposite end of the pew from his other siblings
  • During the processional and recessional, the footage was edited and cut out the moment anyone walked by Josh in his pew
  • The were also strategic angles on some of the camera shots, which used other guests in the forefront to block out Josh in background
  • Of the 19 Duggar children, only Josh and sisters Jennifer and Jordyn-Grace did not have a role in the ceremony, but the girls were seen in the special 

The second season of the Duggar family's revamped TLC reality show, Jill & Jessa: Counting On, got a guaranteed ratings boost this past June with the news that Jinger Duggar and her soccer player beau Jeremy Vuolo would be tying the knot after a six-month courtship.

TLC was quick to capitalize on the good news by using the couple's engagement to promote the new season of Counting On, and making the decision to air the impending nuptials as a special finale episode as several wedding-themed episodes and a televised proposal.

The couple's rush to the altar made for a tight timeline however, with the production company given only 10 days to take the hours of footage filmed during Jinger's November 5 nuptials and edit that down into a little under an hour to air November 15 on TLC.

Further complicating matters was the fact that none of the footage could feature the oldest Duggar child, Josh. 

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Where's Josh: Jinger Duggar's TLC wedding special aired last month and featured all of her siblings but Josh (above holding son Marcus in front of his face)

Upfont: Josh did however attend the wedding and sat in front of the altar in the second row, which meant efforts had to be made to keep him hidden 

At big moments, like when he stood for Jinger's walk down the aisle, he held his 2-year-old son Marcus directly in front of his face

Bye boy: Network sources said earlier this year that 28-year-old Josh was banned from being on TLC shows after his molestation scandal

Network sources revealed prior to the start of Counting On's second season that Josh had been banned from appearing on the show because of his molestation scandal.

At the time, there were reports claiming Josh would be featured on the program with his siblings, but sources made it very clear that this was not the case and that the 28-year-old would not become a part of the new Duggar series.

As a result, the Counting On production team was forced to find a number of ways to keep the sex pest out of sight and off camera on Jinger's big day - despite the fact that he was seated front and center at the ceremony in the second row.

Not filming Josh at Jinger's ceremony was made somewhat easier thanks to the fact that he was one of only three Duggar siblings who was not part of the wedding party.

Jinger's matron of honor was Jessa and her bridesmaids included sisters Jana, Jill, Joy-Anna, Johannah as well as sister-in-law Anna, who is married to Josh.

Jeremy selected John-David as one of his groomsman, and Joseph, Josiah, Jedeidiah, Jeremiah, Jason, James, Justin and Jackson all served as ushers.

Rounding things out, the youngest Duggar, Josie, was the flower girl, while Josh's son Michael was the ring bearer.

This meant that of the 19 Duggar children, only Josh and his sisters Jennifer and Jordyn-Grace did not play a role in the ceremony.

Jennifer and Jordyn-Grace were however seen in the episode, sitting next to their older brothers in the church for the ceremony.

Behind you: Crowd shots that aired of the church would only show the back of his head (above)

Crew: Josh was seated at the opposite end of the pew from his other siblings, joined by three of his four children - Mackynzie, Marcus and Meredith Grace (above)

Prime real estate: Josh sat directly behind the parents of the bride and groom during the ceemony 

Keep it hidden: The were also strategic angles on some of the camera shots, which used other guests in the forefront to block out Josh in background (Joy-Anna above blocking Josh)

Masterclass: For the large family shot after the wedding a woman in a maroon dress stood incredibly close to the film crew (above), blocking out whomever was sitting next to Anna Duggar's family and Josh's children

Unfortunately for the production team, all of the Duggar children who were not on stage in the wedding party were seated in the second row for the ceremony, meaning that they were featured in all of the crowd shots and could be seen every time someone was filmed walking down the aisle.

In order to include shots of the crowd while still keeping Josh off camera, the footage used was from a moment when Josh had turned his head around to speak with the people behind him, thus obscuring his face. 

The wedding party and bride meanwhile used two of the aisles in the church as they made their way to the altar. 

Josh was seated to the far right of the family pew for the ceremony - alongside his other three children Mackynzie, Marcus and Meredith - making it easy to film members of the wedding party who walked down the left aisle of the church. 

Those who walked down the right aisle, including Josh's wife Anna, had their entrances edited to show them just before Josh appeared in frame and just after he was out of the frame.

In order to make this appear a bit less clunky, the procession was edited so that it cut back and forth between a bridesmaid walking down the right aisle and one walking down the left aisle as they made their entrances.

Jinger, whose entrance was the most important, came down the left aisle, far away from her brother's seat. 

Tight cut: During the processional and recessional, the footage was edited and cut out the moment anyone walked by Josh in his pew

Unique problem: The camera could not cut away from Jinger and Jeremy when the walked up to the alter despite Josh being behind them, so instead they zoomed in on the couple (above)

Lady in red: Josh's wife Anna, who was one of the bridemaids, walked by his pew on her way to the altar (above)

Jump ahead: There was then a cut to another bridesmaid when Anna got close to Josh's pew. She was seen walking again when at the front of the church and past Josh

Cut it out: The recessional also featured cuts when bridal party members got near Josh, then picking back up on those individuals when they were well past his pew (Jill and husband Derick above leaving the ceremony)

They're back: The married couple (above) were then seen again in footage shot by a camera placed in the back of the church, which would be unable to capture footage of Josh

The trickiest moment however came at the start of the ceremony when the mothers of the bride and groom met in the front of the church to extinguish the candles, coming together directly in front of Josh's seat.

With no way to edit around the moment, which was a key part of the ceremony, Josh took his 3-year-old son Marcus and held him in front of his head in order to hide his face.

Footage of Josh that made its way into the episode actually show that he employed this trick repeatedly during the ceremony.

That move came in handy when Jinger made her way to the altar at the start of the ceremony.

Josh, who at that point was standing, simply hoisted up his son to ensure he would not be seen in that moment. 

He was also obscured throughout the ceremony by the camera crew finding angles which blocked him behind members of the wedding party.

And in the end, the combination of editing, good camera angles and hiding behind a small child allowed TLC to air the special while continuing to honor their promise to keep Josh off the network. 

Family affair: Jinger's matron of honor was Jessa (fifth from left) and her bridesmaids included sisters Jana (third from left) , Jill (fifth from right), Joy-Anna (fourth from left), Johannah (left) as well as sister-in-law Anna (fourth from right) and Jeremy's sister Valerie (second from right)

Brother-in-law: John-David Duggar (above with Josh's son Michael) was one of the groomsman

Duties: Joseph, Josiah, Jedeidiah, Jeremiah, Jason, James, Justin and Jackson all served as ushers (l to r: Jackson, Jennifer, Jordyn-Grace, Josiah, Jedidiah, Joseph and Jeremiah)

Bringing the bling: Josh's son Michael was the ring bearer and stood on the altar with his uncle John-David for the ceremony

Smallest Duggar: Youngest sibling Josie, who is 6 years old, was the flower girl at the ceremony

One moment that did not make it into the special however was Jinger and Jeremy's farewell, which was captured by a DailyMail.com photographer the day of the ceremony.

For their big sendoff the two families all gathered outside the reception, with Josh front and center.

His position right behind the newlywed's car would have made it impossible to edit him out of the moment however, which may explain why that part of the couple's wedding day did not make it into the special. 

Jinger's November nuptials marked the fourth time TLC had aired a Duggar wedding special, with the first three all delivering huge numbers for the network.

This latest special kept that trend going, with 2.3million viewers tuning in, the biggest audience the show has had since its premiere this past March. 

It was not however able to surpass the 4.4million viewers who watched Jill Duggar and Derrick Dillard say 'I do' back in 2014.

That is still the most watched episode of any Duggar reality program, and a number which will likely be hard for the family to ever top. 

He has a face: Josh was seen after the ceremony smiling in the parking lot as Jinger and Jeremy left,. still holding son Marcus (above)

On it: The film crew (above) could be seen trailing some members of the Duggar family but avoided Joish

Off they go: Jinger and Jeremy's driving off footage was not included in the special, and the photos show Josh stood right behind the car as they left (couple above in car)

Date night: Josh went out after the wedding for a dinner date with wife Anna, Anna's sister Priscilla and her husband David Waller (above)

The Duggars have been hard at work trying to rebuild their reality empire over the past year, which was destroyed after Josh's child molester past was revealed by InTouch.

In the wake of that scandal, and the revelation that patriarch Jim Bob Duggar did not formally report the incident to law enforcement, TLC not only cancelled the family's popular reality show 19 Kids and Counting after nine seasons but also announced that they would no longer air any past episodes of the program on the network.

Things took another turn later in the summer with the news that Josh had been having affairs and allegedly paid at least one women for sex.

Soon after that revelation came to light, Josh entered a faith-based rehab facility in Illinois, where he stayed for eight months. 

The network did not keep the family off the air that long however, announcing just a few months later that a new show would launch that December which focused on sisters Jill and Jessa, who were both married and starting their own families.

Those two also admitted in the wake of the molestation scandal that they had been two of their brother's victims, and sat down for an emotional interview in June of last year with Megyn Kelly on Fox News to share their story.

Josh also molested two of his other sisters it was revealed at the time, as well as a fifth girl who was of no relation to the family.  

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