WEDDING FAQ'S
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY.
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The questions below are the ones all the major wedding blogs tell you to ask your potential wedding photographer. Some of them are informative, and some of them are lame, but I would be a sucky wedding photographer if I didn’t make sure they were answered for you. These are the questions about wedding photography that I think are important for you to get answered, even though most people don’t know they should ask them.
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WHAT PRIMARY PHOTOGRAPHIC STYLE DO YOU IDENTIFY WITH?
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Making photos at your wedding requires me to be excellent at several styles of wedding photography. In a typical wedding day there will be times where I will need to work in a contemporary style, other times I will need to work in a photojournalism style. A wedding album isn’t complete without stunning portraiture, and Mom will kill you if we don’t get some traditional posed photos made. Generally, I consider myself a photography ninja. And, in the past, clients have been known to refer to me as a wizard. (True fact.) But if I have to label myself, I would say I’m a combination of documentary photography and contemporary portraiture.
WHAT DO YOUR WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY PACKAGES INCLUDE?
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All wedding photography packages include delivery of high resolution professionally edited digital files on a flash drive, with a personal use copyright release. Other available options are wedding albums, high quality photo prints, fine art photo canvas, custom graphic design, thank you cards, gallery wraps, acrylic and metal prints and more. Feel free to ask for more details or challenge me to make something new. I love a challenge!
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DO YOU HAVE EXPERIENCE SHOOTING IN VARIOUS LIGHTING SITUATIONS?
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Yes, I am very comfortable working in all types of lighting conditions. I can use available light (my favorite), or I have plenty of lights to create my own lighting.
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IS YOUR MEDIA PREFERENCE FILM OR DIGITAL?
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These days I work in digital, and I love the magic the little fairies in the cameras can do. This is the easiest format to photograph weddings in, so there's no concern with missing a moment due to "changing out" film. Although film is coming back and starting to become popular again - I'm choosing not to tackle that or venture back in time.
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HOW MANY PHOTOGRAPHERS DO YOU WORK WITH?
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Most of the time I am a one-woman wolf pack. However, if your wedding needs additional photographers (like if you have more than 200 guests and/or a really big wedding party, or we'll need to travel to several locations on your day), I know many great second-shooters to invite. Then the wolf pack would grow by one.
DO YOU GUARANTEE YOUR PRESENCE AT THE ACTUAL WEDDING?
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Absolutely! I wouldn’t miss your wedding for anything! Not even a hurricane.
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DO YOU HAVE A REPLACEMENT WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER IN CASE YOU BECOME UNAVAILABLE ON THE DAY OF THE EVENT?
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Yes, I have a network of experienced colleagues I can call upon, and I’m always making more friends. In this business, you can never have too many friends. Actually, I’m pretty sure that’s kind of true about life in general. This situation has never happened to me (knock on wood), but know that you're covered if it happens.
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WHAT KIND OF EQUIPMENT DO YOU TYPICALLY BRING WITH YOU ON THE DAY-OF?
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Equipment needs vary pretty wildly from one wedding to the next. But I always prepare (for everything in life) by packing way more stuff than I expect to need. And then when I think I have everything I could possibly need, I pack some more.
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DO YOU BRING BACK-UP EQUIPMENT TO THE EVENT IN CASE OF MALFUNCTION?
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Yes. Always. I’m a chronic over-packer. See above.
HOW SOON AFTER OUR WEDDING WILL OUR PROOFS BE READY?
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Within four weeks of your wedding, I’ll make a blog post of some of my favorite finished images, usually 15-20 images. A few days after that your proofing gallery will be available online. Your photos will be finished within 30 days of your wedding, and once you choose any of your additional print products, I will process and ship everything.
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DO YOU RETAIN THE COPYRIGHT FOR THE PHOTOS?
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Yes, as your professional wedding photographer, I will retain copyright of all your wedding images, however I always provide an official copyright release for you allowing unlimited personal use and printing of your wedding photos. Since copyright stuff is pretty serious and dull, I can’t really make any good jokes about it. Bummer.
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DO YOU RESERVE THE RIGHT TO PUBLISH THE PHOTOS?
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I prefer to; however, this is negotiable. I respect your privacy and I will never insist on retaining any right to publish photos of you. But I hope you’ll agree that your photos are amazing enough to share!
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WILL OUR IMAGES BE AVAILABLE FOR VIEWING ONLINE?
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Yes. First I’ll make a super awesome blog post about your amazing wedding day. And you will have an online private proofing gallery to review your photos and share with family and friends, and also allow everyone to purchase prints or digital copies for their own use, saving you the work of distributing the photos.
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HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TAKING PHOTOS PROFESSIONALLY, AND HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN A PROFESSIONAL WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER?
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Long answer: I learned film photography in middle/high school - a really long time ago, and have been in love with photography ever since. In 2009, I became a professional photographer. Shortly after that, I began assisting other experienced professional wedding photographers around my area. In 2010, I photographed my first wedding as a professional working under my own name, although I’ve photographed many weddings over the years as favors for friends. Basically, I’ve been a professional working artist for 20 years, and a wedding photographer for almost 9 years. I’ve photographed over 200 weddings as the primary photographer.
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WHY SHOULD I HIRE A PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER?
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The most important thing to remember is that you’re not hiring a professional wedding photographer for only what they do when you can see them, you’re hiring them for the finished product. You’re hiring them because you want someone at your wedding with a camera (or four) who knows how to make a good photo no matter what happens, what time of day it is, whether it’s dark, or raining, etc. You’re hiring a professional because you want jaw dropping photos and because you don’t want to have to worry about this one thing. And of course, that's the kind of expertise that only comes from years of perfecting a craft.
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HOW MANY HOURS OF COVERAGE DO I REALLY NEED?
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There are a lot of variables involved here, but the short answer is probably at least 8. I offer an hourly package, and that’s tempting to a lot of people, but a few hours of coverage is really best for people who are having very small weddings with very few guests, and very short receptions, or no reception at all. If you want photos of things like getting ready, details, and reception coverage of at least the toasts and cake cutting, then you need to plan to book one of the larger two packages. If you’d like to have the least amount of stress, or if you’ll be changing locations during the day ( such as from hotel to church to reception venue), then my "Traditional" and "Full" wedding packages are more what you're looking for.
If you ask me what I would prefer that you book, I’d say that I want you to book whichever coverage will let us plan to have at least an hour to make creative portraits together, and plenty of time to make portraits of your wedding party and family. It’s not that making photos takes a long time, it’s getting ready to make a photo that takes up all our time together. Walking from one area in the garden to another takes time. Arranging the train of a wedding dress takes time. Helping you relax takes time. All those little things add up quickly and before you know it, portrait time is over.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN WHEN YOU SAY THE PHOTOS ARE PROFESSIONALLY EDITED?
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Photos don’t just come out of a camera ready to hang on your wall. Unless it’s a Polaroid. Truth is, a professional SLR camera actually takes a pretty boring photo. Shaking it like a Polaroid won’t help, either. The image is meant to be a blank slate so that the photographer can have complete artistic freedom. So I take your photos into my secret photography laboratory and I process them. I prefer a bold look to my wedding photos, so I keep the colors clean and the skin tones natural. If you have a blemish, my magic wand makes it disappear. If there’s a spot on your suit, I use a spot treatment to remove it. If there’s a random street sign in an otherwise perfect photo, I chop it out. There’s lots of little remodels that I do to make your images just right. It takes a village… of software programmers… to create a finished wedding photograph.
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WHY DO YOU TAKE SO MANY PHOTOS, BUT GIVE US SO FEW? CAN WE HAVE ALL OF THEM?
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On a typical wedding day, I will take about 2000 photos, but the majority of those photos are taken in big bursts. Anytime I have a group of people in front of me, I will take 10-15 (ok, 50) photos every time. That’s because it’s really hard to get a photo of a group of people with everyone’s eyes open and their mouths closed. So, out of that burst of photos, you’ll get 2-4, because in all the other photos people are blinking or reciting epic poetry or whatever they’re doing that isn’t what they should have been doing. It’s kind of the same for pictures of people doing anything. Have you ever seen a series of photos of your someone dancing? It takes a few dozen shots to get a good one because people always makes weird faces at the camera. And since it takes a bunch of time to edit all those photos, only the good photos are pulled out and edited for you. In the end, you get a beautiful set of perfect photos showing everyone at their best, and you don’t have to weed through a bunch of crummy ones to find them. That’s why professional wedding photographers are so awesome.
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WHAT DOES THE COPYRIGHT RELEASE ALLOW ME TO DO WITH MY PICTURES?
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The copyright release gives you personal use rights to your photos. This means you can plaster them all over Facebook and Instagram and Facebook until your heart’s content. You can blog about your special day. You can run down to the local Wal-Mart and order 150 wallet prints and send a copy to every one of your guests.
What you can’t do with your wedding photos is say that you took them, re-edit them in Instagram-o-matic splendor, or post them anywhere that requires that you claim sole ownership of the photos (you know, pretend that you made them). That includes entering them in most contests.
However, I do really want you to be excited about your wedding photos, and if you want to share them on your favorite forums and blogs, we will just need to communicate about it first. Most blogs just want to be sure they have original content, and not images that are already on 17 other blogs. So if you want to share your pictures somewhere more public, just send me an email and we can discuss how to get it done just right.
ARE YOU WILLING TO ACCEPT A LIST OF “MUST-HAVE” PHOTOS?
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That’s a loaded question, and the answer is, it depends. I always ask my wedding couples for a list of family poses and any "idea" poses that they think are the most important photos for me to make. When I arrive on your wedding day, you and I have already created a wedding photography schedule for the day and I have a plan of what kinds of photos need to be made based on our talks. We’ll do group photos and individual portraits and detail shots and all of that stuff. But if you need to hand me a seven-page list to follow with checkboxes and you’ll be crushed if I don’t get every single one, then I won’t be able to make any of the wonderful candid photos that you see in my portfolio for you because I’ll have my nose buried in that list all night. This is one of those defining moments where you have to decide if our philosophies match or not. However, rest assured that you won’t have to tell me to get the standards, like cutting the cake, or the first kiss. If I didn't know that, I wouldn't still be in business.
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WHAT SHOULD I DO TO KEEP MY PHOTOS SAFE?
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Once your wedding photos are edited, you will get a copy of each photo on a custom flash drive, a large file for printing your images crisp and clear. Your flash drive is stored in a beautiful box that is custom made for you, so you can leave it out on the bookshelf and show it to all your friends. Over. And over. And over. I also currently store your edited photos online in your gallery so that you can share them all with family and friends.
However, I all know how fleeting things in the interwebs can be, and obviously I can’t promise to keep your files forever, or even for very long at all. So the first thing you should do when you receive your files is make a copy. You should put this copy in a safe deposit box, or something equivalent (not your sock drawer) in order to protect your data from getting lost. You should also copy the photos to your computer and back them up again. That’s your safety net, in case anything happens to one copy, you have multiple back ups of every file. As far as keeping your prints and/or wedding albums safe, all the common sense stuff applies; don’t get them wet, don’t put your coffee cup on them, don’t prop your television up with them…..you know the drill.
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WHAT CAN I DO WITH ALL MY PHOTOS?
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The best thing to do with them is to PRINT them and frame them and hang them on your wall. Or even better, since you’re going to have so many amazing photos that you’ll run out of wall space, you should make a wedding album. Or get one of those neato digital photo frames. But whatever you do, don’t just leave them on your hard drive all alone and never let them feel the sweet kiss of daylight. That’s just sad.
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HOW DO I KNOW IF YOU’RE THE RIGHT PHOTOGRAPHER FOR ME?
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If you’ve read this far, you have learned a lot about me, and what a professional wedding photographer should do for you. Do you feel like I’m someone you would want to spend a day with? (Remember, your wedding photographer is a vendor you’ll actually spend time with on your wedding day, so it’s important that they don’t creep you out.) Do you think I seem like someone you trust to make the kind of photos you want to see of your wedding day? If the answer is yes, or even maybe, you should email me right now. We should have a chat and get to know each other a little better. If you live near the Kahoka/Canton area, we can meet up and have a cup of coffee and talk about your plans. If you live elsewhere, we can chat over the phone.
Also, it’s ok if I’m not the perfect wedding photographer for you. Hopefully you’ve learned a little something here to help you find the perfect professional wedding photographer for your day. No matter what, remember: It’s your day, and it should be perfect on your terms.