Steel capped boots on, Polka Dot Hot Spot at the ready!
If there is one thing that polarises the wedding industry it seems to be the subject of photography. I seem to hear endless stories of couples being disappointed, of photographers feeling indignant at how little value is placed on their work. I’m a big lover of photography – I see hundreds and hundreds of weddings so I know what I like, I also know what I don’t like- it’s all relative I suppose!
So the question is, out of all the budgeting and spending you did on your wedding, was photography a priority for you? Did you spend hours searching for the right one? How did you find your photographer and determine what you were willing to spend?
Well said! I have to admit there is nothing better than a couple that has searched hard to find you and loves your work. It gives us photographers such freedom to be creative and produce our best work:)
Out of all the decisions we made for our wedding, the wedding photographer was the one thing above everything else that we agonised over more than anything (yes, even the dress!).
It was always a priority for us – and me more so. I think its because you don’t often get professional photos taken in your life (that you actually would want to keep – we’re not talking about school pictures here!). What better time to get professional photos, with ALL your loved ones, than on your wedding day? Photos are also a beautiful memento, something you can keep forever and display proudly in your home. And on the most basic level, my best friend doesn’t even have one single photograph of her cake, because she didn’t have a professional photographer – and no one, not ONE person thought to take a photo of it. So photography has been fairly important to me. (I emailed a photographer for a quote the day we got engaged. If that isn’t a sign….).
Finding the right photographer however was not an easy task. (Maybe I’m hard to please? Let’s not answer that). We’ve had about 18 months to plan and I’ve definitely been of the “research research research – and more research” bride extreme. I’ve religiously followed blogs of my favourite photographers. I looked at photographers from prices starting at $800 to prices starting at $5000. I did an excel spreadsheet to visually assess and compare the value of each (and I mean value, not just actual cost as there is a difference). I’ve spared my future husband the pain of assessing all of them, but he’s had his eye over my shoulder and noted his two cents on more than one occasion.
Word of mouth has been EXTREMELY important in the decision. A photographer fell off my favourite list when I heard first hand that a friends cousins wedding the photographers assistant yelled at the guests (ah, no thank you!). A photographer I was on the fence about went straight to the favourites after a bride told me story after story about how caring and considerate the photographers had been and how it had totally made her day (the photos of course, were also amazing!).
At one stage it LOOKED like we had made a decision – a photographer who ticked about 90% of all our boxes. After so long researching – and as you can tell, my high expectations – I thought we’d found the closest we’d find to perfection, and it was about time we made a decision. We had already sent the odd email to this photographer. While he had always been very slow to respond, but then (without ever offering an explanation I might add), the guy didn’t respond to my confirmation email for three months!
During this time of non-response, my friend asked me why I didn’t just pick up the phone and call him, and I realised – I was hoping that my dream 100% perfect photographer would some how come along in the mean time.
So I causally started looking again, and low and behold, I was referred to a photographer (via another photographer I stumbled upon who I loved but was unavailable on my date – ladies, don’t wait to inquire about these things!) and it was LOVE LOVE LOVE at first sight, and true love it seems as they ticked all our boxes. I couldn’t believe my luck! (Plus not only did these photographers respond to my email straight away, they were in ANOTHER TIME ZONE OVERSEAS, and continued to respond promptly and with attention to detail – you can see how I would love this). We locked them in with a deposit within less than a week.
Our wedding is in November, I’ll leave it to the professionals and at the very least I’m sure we’ll get a picture of the cake 🙂