Wedding Photography

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ajobbins

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#153735 6-Oct-2014 16:18

I'm getting married in the Hawkes Bay next year and we are currently looking at photographers. My fiance is a graphic designer by trade and does a lot of photography based work, and is very competent both behind a camera and post production.

Obviously she can't photograph her own wedding, but at the same time it's somewhat frustrating that most (all?) photographers seem to charge a large amount and take lots of photos, but you actually get very little at the end, unless you keep paying. For example, you might pay a few grand for them to attend for the day, take photos and you get to choose a small few you get at full res/printed/retouched, and then maybe some more as low res/"web" images, and if you want more than that, you pay more.

We would much prefer to have someone who can take a good photo attend for the day and shoot, and then just hand over the memory card/copies of the raw photos at the end. My fiance can retouch as required, and we would have all full res images. I realise this kind of goes against the business model of photographers, but at the same time they charge a lot of money for skills we don't really need.

Is anyone aware of photographers (Preferably around the Hawkes Bay region) who might be open to a 'shoot only' kind of arrangement?

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#1148335 6-Oct-2014 16:23

Idea - but may not be ideal

Hire 2 professional camera's for a day. Get 2 photography enthusiasts ( they might have their own camera's too ) who will click double as many as a normal photographer would, from different angles, ask them to be as creative as possible. Give them unlimited supply of memory, food, drinks

= A tonne of photos which you can then swift through and tinker to what you want.

timmmay

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#1148359 6-Oct-2014 16:36

You're paying for experience and ability - wedding photography is one of the most demanding forms of professional photographer, blending landscape, portrait, product, and event photography. The photographer has to look happy and relaxed while they're trying to capture 3 things at once, manage 20kg of gear worth $20K, direct people, pose, ensure things are running to time, etc. A wedding is like a marathon for the photographer, mentally and physically difficult, and that's with an assistant. You really do get better with every wedding you've done - I've photographed 120 and I would't hire anyone who's done less than that, ideally more. Hire someone cheap or inexperienced and you'll likely regret the results. Use the NZIPP "find a photographer" feature to find someone qualified and experienced. I can highly recommend Eva Bradley, NZIPP qualified professional, or her other photographer Michelle. Both are great, if they match the style you like.

Amateurs will miss things. Two amateurs will get in each others way. Sometimes all you want is well lit, well posed, simple photos - that's a LOT more difficult than it seems in the chaos of a wedding, and often involves portable studio lighting. Sometimes you want arty creative photos. Sometimes you want candids. And all this needs to be done to a VERY tight timeframe. A good photographer will also help you plan your wedding day so it runs smoothly - don't trust the venue's timeframe, they're usually made to suit the venue, not you, or good photos.

Make sure you see a few full wedding albums. If the photographer doesn't have a few albums they're probably quite new and don't have the experience they probably need, including things like back up equipment which is really essential.

Unsure why you think you pay and only get a few images. Typically you'll pay the fee ($2K - $4K for a professional for 8 hours) and you get 300-600 images (culled down from 1000 - 2000+) processed and ready to print. No good professional will give you raw images to process yourself - if that's what you want you'll want an inexperienced photographer or a student, not a professional.

Albums are expensive, but you should see the wholesale price of good albums - that would knock your socks off. Add on the design time (many hours), rework time (I did 12 sets of changes once), processing the images for color matching on pages, retouching, quality control, getting anything not quite right fixed, etc, you're paying for a lot of time by a skilled person. But you can probably do that yourselves. There are some good cheap albums and books around, Blurb, Artisan State (where I'm doing some personal books soon), etc.

Source: I've been a wedding photographer for almost 8 years, currently on sabbatical. The reason for the sabbatical: I need a break, and there's bugger all money in weddings. Sure it may seem like a lot to pay $3K for a photographer, but we have a LOT of expensive equipment, it breaks regularly and has to be maintained, training to stay up to date, software, computers, wedding shows (they can cost thousands to get set up for, hundreds or more for each show), vehicle, accounting, telecommunications, professional body fees ($600 a year from memory), all regular small business costs, etc. Each wedding takes around 40 hours of effort, when you include meetings, scouting, a pre-shoot if that's done, culling, editing, etc. You have to sell yourself to get every individual wedding. All in all there's really not much money in it, especially since there are new "professionals" coming along each year.

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#1148361 6-Oct-2014 16:38

umm the composition and lighting would be all wrong making it unusable

ajobbins

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#1148401 6-Oct-2014 17:12

timmmay: You're paying for experience and ability....

I totally understand all of that, but there are two aspects here. Being able to take a good shot (A service we are more than willing to pay for), and the post production/touch up etc.

A lot of hours obviously go into the post production, and my fiance is more than capable to doing that part herself, hence we are paying someone for many hours of work that we don't necessarily need.

We won't be going down the route of having amateurs behind the camera.

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davidcole

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#1148405 6-Oct-2014 17:17

Also you're paying for copywrite also. In the olden days - ie when I got married, you paid $3k for your album of 100 photos....then big pictures were in the order of $50 - $200 each.

I doubt things have changed enough in the intervening 12 years, where the photog will real guise all that potential earning and just supply digital images free or for a modest cost. We were much that due to some stuff ups, part of the "go away" to us was supplied all negatives.

And I've also heard of buying the originals for an extra charge....you may be able to find someone "modern" who might do that.

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timmmay

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#1148406 6-Oct-2014 17:19

I doubt you'll find a professional willing to release images as shot and unculled. You can ask but it's all part of providing a complete service and also controlling how your work is seen. What if you processed it really badly and then published it (eg facebook, stuff wedding of the week) and the photographer's reputation was damaged? Years of hard work and building a reputation and business could be ruined. It's not likely, but you'd be surprised what some clients do. Also professionals tend to shoot knowing how they're going to process it - in some cases I'll underexpose an image deliberately because I want to keep the highlights, and in others I'll blow highlights. It all depends on what software you use, and the experience of the processor.

If you find a professional who will shoot and burn you might not get as much of a discount as you'd expect, and I really doubt you'll find anyone good who will do it. I'm sure you'll find someone, the key is the word "good".

If you want great images I suggest you find a photographer and engage them as per their standard terms. I paid in excess of $5K for my photographer for my wedding earlier this year, plus their $1500 fee to get them to Wellington from Auckland. It was money well spent IMHO. Most weddings cost $20 - $40K, so saving $1K here or there while nice isn't really that significant.

timmmay

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#1148414 6-Oct-2014 17:21

davidcole: Also you're paying for copywrite also. In the olden days - ie when I got married, you paid $3k for your album of 100 photos....then big pictures were in the order of $50 - $200 each.

I doubt things have changed enough in the intervening 12 years, where the photog will real guise all that potential earning and just supply digital images free or for a modest cost. We were much that due to some stuff ups, part of the "go away" to us was supplied all negatives.

And I've also heard of buying the originals for an extra charge....you may be able to find someone "modern" who might do that.

Photographers generally retain copyright so they can do things like enter competitions, display them on their website, etc. Most photographers supply couples with high resolution processed images along with personal usage rights, which basically means you can anything you like short of selling them or letting anyone else make a profit from them. For example you couldn't let a design firm make a profit with the images by designing an album, but you could design your own.

You don't need copyright, and you don't need "raw images". Negatives don't exist with digital.

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timmmay

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#1148419 6-Oct-2014 17:23

Another thought: processing ability and processing included is really critical. Some photographers will take the photos, discard duplicates and bad ones, and just throw the rest on a disk. That means some will be too bright, some too dark, and all kinds of bad stuff. All good photographers will spend 8-24 hours processing the images so each image is the best it can reasonably be. An experienced professional can do more in 8 hours than someone inexperienced can do in 40.

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#1148453 6-Oct-2014 18:11

timmmay: Unsure why you think you pay and only get a few images. Typically you'll pay the fee ($2K - $4K for a professional for 8 hours) and you get 300-600 images (culled down from 1000 - 2000+) processed and ready to print. No good professional will give you raw images to process yourself - if that's what you want you'll want an inexperienced photographer or a student, not a professional.

I would love to have been told there are photographers that actually give you the photos in a print-sized resolution. We only got 432x288 72dpi photos - and no option to get larger versions at 300 dpi.

timmmay: ... wedding photography is one of the most demanding forms of professional photographer, blending landscape, portrait, product, and event photography. The photographer has to look happy and relaxed while they're trying to capture 3 things at once, manage 20kg of gear worth $20K, direct people, pose, ensure things are running to time, etc. A wedding is like a marathon for the photographer, mentally and physically difficult, and that's with an assistant.

Sorry, but I am with Adam on this one. I agree photography is demanding in this situation but photographers are charging for the time spent there and their ability to perform. They also charge for the work on the digital images. But then don't give the option of getting larger images, which are just the result of the previous steps anyway.

timmmay

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#1148481 6-Oct-2014 18:30

Who gave you really low resolution images like that, and when? That's not standard practice but it should be checked in advance, before hiring someone.

I think you're generalising based on personal experience rather than industry practice. There are some photographers who will give low res images to try to make you pay more for the high res, just don't hire them.

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#1148484 6-Oct-2014 18:37

timmmay: Who gave you really low resolution images like that, and when? That's not standard practice but it should be checked in advance, before hiring someone.

I think you're generalising based on personal experience rather than industry practice. There are some photographers who will give low res images to try to make you pay more for the high res, just don't hire them.

Is there actually set standards in order for a photographer to call themselves a 'professional photographer'. I thought photography was totally unregulated, so no set industry standards, and no set qualifications needed either in order to call yourself a photographer

I don't see any issue with someone paying a photographer solely for their time, to take photos and simply provide the raw image files to the client. As long as they are aware that they won't be retouched. The best photographers shouldn't need to do that much retouching anyway. At the end of the day it is the client paying for the service, and if a photographer doesn't agree with the terms the clients sets down, then someone else will, as there are a lot of photographers out there.
My brohter was caught out by this when they had their wedding done. It creates quite a lot of bad will, when you have to pay hundred of dollars extra just to get a few image files to print out, when you have already paid thousands to get the photos taken. Ironically it was the photos I took at the wedding that were used a lot more, as the photographer had done a lot of arty farty closeups of random people at the wedding, 'capturing moments'. Mine were more conventional, and over time won't date.

timmmay

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#1148617 6-Oct-2014 20:58

NZIPP is the professional body in NZ, and has set qualifications and levels. You can read about them here.

There's no harm asking for a photographer to shoot and burn, but not many reputable professionals will do it. You're not hiring a plumber, you're commissioning a custom work with an artist who's going to be around you for the whole of a very special, high stress day. To be effective at taking these photos many photographers will invest time in getting to know a couple and making them comfortable.

There's a difference between processing and retouching. Retouching is pixels level changes, removing people, removing rubbish bins, etc. Processing is different. No image is ever perfectly exposed, the only question is how far off it is - 0.1 stops, a stop, three stops, etc. Then there's the process of compressing the dynamic range of the camera into what can be represented in a jpeg and printed on paper, which often means boosting the dark areas and bringing down the highlights. Plus sometimes you just need an area of an image to be a bit brighter, bit darker, remove a color cast from a strange bulb, etc, etc. I can't even give you an exhaustive list, it's something you learn over the years.

Photographers are small business owners, and they can charge however they want. It's up to the customer to make sure they ask for what they want and make sure the photographer supplies it. For example don't say "do you offer digital files"? You'd say "what size and type of digital files are included with your package?" If the answer isn't large enough for you then ask what they'd cost. Just make sure you 100% understand what you're paying for. It should be specified in the contract. For example my contract says I include jpeg files with no watermark. If anyone asked further I'd tell them they were native camera resolution, or whatever was left over after any required cropping and were sRgb. If a photographer can't tell you that level of detail I'd be concerned - not all photographers are that technical. I wouldn't hire a photographer that doesn't include high resolution processed images, these days. Retouching individual images can take a lot of time, so that should be extra and on request from the customer.

There's a lot to be said for taking nice, simple, well lit, well composed images. I found my wedding photographer went a bit over the top with the arty stuff, but I knew enough to ask for what I wanted so I got it.

ajobbins

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#1148656 6-Oct-2014 21:31

timmmay:

There's no harm asking for a photographer to shoot and burn, but not many reputable professionals will do it. You're not hiring a plumber, you're commissioning a custom work with an artist who's going to be around you for the whole of a very special, high stress day. To be effective at taking these photos many photographers will invest time in getting to know a couple and making them comfortable.

There's a difference between processing and retouching. Retouching is pixels level changes, removing people, removing rubbish bins, etc. Processing is different. No image is ever perfectly exposed, the only question is how far off it is - 0.1 stops, a stop, three stops, etc. Then there's the process of compressing the dynamic range of the camera into what can be represented in a jpeg and printed on paper, which often means boosting the dark areas and bringing down the highlights. Plus sometimes you just need an area of an image to be a bit brighter, bit darker, remove a color cast from a strange bulb, etc, etc. I can't even give you an exhaustive list, it's something you learn over the years.

That's the thing. My fiancée is well versed in both retouching and processing. She shoots her own photos in RAW and works with photos every day as part of her job. I think she may be happy with the regular photographers package, as well as a copy of all the .RAWs on top, so she can do her own processing and retouching in addition. While saving a bit of money would be good, it's also about her being able to apply her own creative style to the images.

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bluedisk

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#1148663 6-Oct-2014 21:43

You are paying a premium to capture a one off, unrepeatable event with very high expectations from the paying customers. The photographers that can do this kind of work well will charge accordingly, and good luck to them frankly.

It requires a very particular skill set with a good personality to carry this off well. There are plenty of photographers who will be able to record the event, but to capture it with an artistic eye in the heat of the moment is a special skill.

I wish you all the best with finding the right photographer.

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#1148697 6-Oct-2014 22:13

bluedisk: You are paying a premium to capture a one off, unrepeatable event with very high expectations from the paying customers. The photographers that can do this kind of work well will charge accordingly, and good luck to them frankly.

It requires a very particular skill set with a good personality to carry this off well. There are plenty of photographers who will be able to record the event, but to capture it with an artistic eye in the heat of the moment is a special skill.

I wish you all the best with finding the right photographer.

Unrepeatable? Some people do it many times.

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