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Bit of a blow up the last couple of days over a Craigslist ad.
The ad in question has been taken down. Here’s what it said:
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WHY is finding an amazing wedding photographer so difficult? :/
I am a Bride who is getting married this summer and have yet to find a decently priced, exceptional, amazingly talented, fun photographer.
WHY because the word “WEDDING” is involved photographers think they can change you $ 3,000.00 for wedding photos? Oh, because no bride is going to go without so they are going to pay it, because they HAVE to. They are ripping people off for all they have! Why when you want to get married it costs you AT LEAST 15 grand after all is said-and-done? Its such CRAP!! I love all you $ 3,000.00 photographers out there but i think your prices are WACK. All your doing is hanging out at a wedding taking tons of photos and editing them.. and thats owrth 3 GRAND!!! You’re making so much money its crazy. I just wish people would be more realistic. I mean the “average” persons salary for 1 freaking month is somewhere around 3 grand. (Thats making 19$ an hour) So you’re going to take someones WHOLE MONTH paycheck for one flippen day of photos? Just because you CAN!!?????? So that maybe they will not be able to feed themselves or pay any other bills they have, right? It makes me SICK!
I know im speaking for more than just myself right now. Alot of brides out there think the same thing. & I bet all you fancy photographers wont even read this. oh-well.
Maybe there are cheaper photographers that will read this and LOVE to take my photos
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To start, I sympathize. I really do. Weddings are expensive. Always have been. Likely always will be.
(Quick point: be thankful the practices of the dowry, dower, or brideprice are no longer common!)
But the above contains a whole load of misconceptions. Let’s tackle some. Not necessarily in order.
1. “All your [sic] doing is hanging out at a wedding and taking tons of photos and editing them.”
Sounds easy, right? Just hanging out? It’s like a vacation and a party all at once! WOOHOO!
My wedding coverage ranges from 8 hours to all day. Regardless, my day starts early and ends late.
At the wedding, I’m on my feet almost the whole time. More than that, I’m working. Organizing people, posing people, figuring out shots, staying out of the way, rushing to where I need to be, setting up equipment, taking down equipment, lugging equipment around, and so on. If I’m lucky, I get a minute to sit down and inhale some food.
By the end of even a short wedding, I need a shower. Bad.
Think about it. Your wedding photographer sticks with you the entire day. Make up artist? Pre-wedding. DJ? Reception. Baker? Not even there after delivering the cake. Florist? Sets up and leaves. Limo driver? Now that’s a guy that spends a lot of time hanging out. Sure, most of these people have prep work before the wedding, but we’re talking about the “just hanging out all day” notion.
I love this work, but no lies: it’s exhausting.
And then editing and retouching the photos. Sounds simple.
When I go on vacation or shoot for fun, maybe I take a few dozen or even a few hundred photos. I’ll pick a handful, do something with them, and maybe post ‘em to Flickr or Facebook. Easy peezy. That’s the frame of reference most people have.
A wedding is a different animal. A WAAAY different animal.
I take a lot of photos. No, you don’t understand. A LOT of photos.
From those, I cull out the bad stuff. You know: eyes closed, extremely unflattering expressions, or where some guest’s flash blew out my shot, or any other technical problems.
What remains is still a lot. I put my “touch” on those. Every one of them. I have my trade secret shortcuts, but it still takes time. And unlike personal photos, I can’t do them whenever I feel like it. Maybe get to them in a year, or maybe not at all. My clients are excited and want their wedding photos NOW. I don’t want them waiting any longer than absolutely necessary.
And don’t forget the engagement session, the meetings and all that other stuff. Which brings us to the second point…
2. “You’re making so much money its[sic] crazy. I just wish people would be more realistic. I mean the “average” persons[sic] salary for 1 freaking month is somewhere around 3 grand. (Thats making 19$ an hour) So you’re going to take someones[sic] WHOLE MONTH paycheck for one flippen[sic] day of photos?”
I get where this one comes from. It does seem like a lot of money.
Thing is, we aren’t just talking about “one day” of photos. Not even close.
Let’s break down a typical wedding:
- Initial e-mail contact. I respond and set up a meeting.
- Meet with the bride and groom.
- More e-mails or phone calls to set up engagement session (included in all packages).
- Engagement shoot.
- Editing, retouching, and delivering disc of engagement photos.
- Pre-wedding meeting to go over final details.
- Wedding day.
- Editing, retouching, and delivering a disc of wedding photos.
- Most of my packages include an album and prints, so there’s set-up/design work there.
I’m not listing the exact hours. It varies anyway. But it’s safe to say that it’s a bit more than a day’s worth of work.
3. “I am a Bride who is getting married this summer and have yet to find a decently priced, exceptional, amazingly talented, fun photographer.”
It’s hard to address this one without sounding like a jerk.
It’s the qualifiers here that trip it up. The bride wants premium work – “exceptional” and “amazingly talented.” But she doesn’t feel those qualities should cost much.
That’s kind of like saying you want the quality and prestige of a Rolls Royce, but at the cost of a Kia.
A Rolls is hand made to exacting standards. A Kia is mass produced on an assembly line by machines. You’re not going to get the quality of one at the price of the other.
Not everyone can afford thousands for their wedding photography. That’s cool. But it’s not fair to get pissed at the photog charging $3000, especially if you agree that the photos fit your criteria of exceptional and amazingly talented. Nor should someone expect an established photographer to match the prices of someone trying to break into the business by portfolio building.
Some responses I’ve seen to this try to break down all of the photographer’s expenses to every last dollar. This is ridiculous. My expenses are different from the guy down the street. Whether our prices are wildly different or virtually the same, what’s the point in justifying that? Clients don’t care about business expenses. They don’t care about how much I work.
And they shouldn’t.
They should care about the photos.
And this is the part where I have to be careful to not sound like a jerk. People who don’t see the value in photography aren’t my customers. I’m not interested in people like this Craigslist person, who thinks wedding photography is a rip off. I want couples who come to me because of the work.
When it comes right down to it, nothing said about what it costs to run a business is going to sway someone who views wedding photography the way this Craigslist ad does.
Professionalism.
I think it’s important.
I can’t always control what’s going on around me, but I can c
ontrol how I react to it. This is especially true when you encounter rudeness or when a situation is just entirely out of line.
Ignore it and move on. Generally the best policy.
I’m not hired by my clients to settle scores, or be macho, or try to out-tough some jerk. I’m hired to take photos.
But sometimes…
Sometimes… you just can’t walk away. There’s that jerk that gets under your skin. It gnaws at you. Eats away. You just HAVE to do something.
I knew when we walked by the first time that there was going to be trouble. I mean, really? Picking a fight with me when I’m obviously with clients? Come ON!
I brushed it off and did my best to ignore it. Took a few more shots with the clients. Good shots. I didn’t let the incident influence the job I had to do. But then it was time for the clients to step out for a few minutes to change outfits. And I just couldn’t let this go. With the clients gone, it was time for the gloves to come off.
I went back around the corner and of course he was still there. Still mouthing off.
It’s on, pal! On like Donkey Kong!
And of course, I photographed it…
I’m pretty sure it was my flash that really made him mad. So he decided to just attack it directly…
Been awhile since I’ve updated around here.
That’s what happens when you get crazy busy. It’s a blessing and a curse. I’m more than a little annoyed that we live in the “future” and I can’t yet clone myself.
Oh well.
What got my fingers fired up today was an excellent article over at the Offbeat Bride. It’s about the disturbing abundance of cameras at wedding ceremonies these days. You should go read the article yourself. It’s ok. I’ll wait.
Done? Good. If not, I’m carrying on as if you did. I don’t want to rehash what was already said so well. Instead, I want to relay my own experience.
I spend a lot of time behind a lens. I know. It’s a shock. Take a deep breath or two.
But I love taking photos. It’s true.
If I’m not shooting a wedding, or portraits, or some other paid gig, I’m finding some other excuse to drag out my camera. Bugs. Zombies. Amazing skies. You name it.
Last year I was invited to the wedding of a couple of friends. I shot some Save the Date photos for them. I was not, however, their wedding photographer. They’d hired someone before they met me.
I looked at it as an opportunity.
I couldn’t remember the last wedding I had been to as a guest. I decided to fully play the part. I wasn’t going to be “that guy.” You know. The one who brings his pro gear. I’m certainly savvy enough to stay out of the hired photographers’ way, but I wanted to embrace the chance to have zero obligation (self-imposed or not) to hide my face behind the camera.
I won’t lie. I won’t try to pretend that I didn’t feel naked most of the night. I won’t hide that I couldn’t help but look for shots. And I certainly won’t deny that I might have spent a minute or two comparing what the hired pro’s were doing to what I would do.
Part of my passion for photography is to always jones for a camera when I see a great opportunity. This is why I love shooting weddings. Many great opportunities, many great moments. My trigger finger was a bit twitchy all night.
Even so. Even without my mechanical security blanket, the night was fantastic.
I felt like I was a part of the event. I wasn’t living it through a viewfinder, or experiencing an LCD instead of a wedding.
I was engaged in the evening.
And it was refreshing.
If you’re a bride and groom reading this, I encourage you to urge your guests, not their cameras, to be present at your wedding. If you’re going to be a guest, I’d remind you that the couple getting married want to see “you” and not “you staring at a screen.”
Getting the photos is what people like me are for.
So step away from the camera. Enjoy the moment.
Photo 10: Brody and Tsura
Taken on November 7, 2010
There was no question that one of the shots on this list would have to be of the new puppy, Tsura. But which one? I mean, I’m a photographer. Taking pictures is what I do. So I have a lot already of Tsura. Picking just one? Impossible. I had to try.
When we first got Tsura, she was 9 weeks old.
She was so cute that I can’t be so cruel as to put one of those photos here. Seriously. The cute would melt your brain. I can’t have that on my conscience.
So I chose a shot of her at around 5 months. Still stupid cute. Thing is though, I also took one of my other dog at the same time. I couldn’t leave him out. That means this is another cheat. Two shots for the price of one.
On the right is Brody.
Want one word to describe him? Here you go: goofball.
Brody is all gazelle legs and gigantic bat ears. Those ears. He hears conversations in China, I’m sure. And about the legs? He wasn’t built for the wood floors in my house. Doesn’t stop him from racing for the door to make a new best friend when someone visits. Brace yourself. His brakes don’t work very well.
On the left is Tsura. It’s a gypsy name that means “light of dawn.” Tsura is doing her best to redefine it to mean “ridiculous.”
The most cruel thing to do to her is to make her lay down and be still. She’ll manage for a second. Then the tail twitches. Then it’s swishing. Then she’s Army crawling across the floor toward you. “Still laying down, dad. See?”
But for all of her energy, she’ll happily crawl up beside you and go to sleep.
Both of these shots were in the front yard. The light and colors were perfect. I had to grab the camera.
Weird fact: my pets always seem to be test subjects for new gear. This time it was the 85mm lens (on Brody – used the 135L on Tsura).
And that, folks, brings us to the end of this journey. If you’ve been reading all of these, then thank you. I had fun putting it together. I plan to do it again next year.
Now, before I go, and in the spirit of every great television infomercial: But wait! There’s MORE!
Bonus shot: “TK-817 has been wanting the Jedi Telescope for months, but sadly, Imperial payday isn’t until Friday.”
Taken on December 4, 2010
Strategic Air and Space Museum. Ashland, Nebraska. Home to planes, rockets, and… Imperial Stormtroopers?
I ventured up to the SAC museum to find that it had been overrun by the 501st Legion. I would have had to instantly cut up my photography geek card had I missed this boon of awesome absurdity.
Great photos were everywhere. Mine for the taking. But my favorites were of a random Stormtrooper and his son shopping in the gift store.
Gas from Ashland to Lincoln and back: About $3.50
Admission to SAC Museum: $18.00
The sublime oddness of a Stormtrooper gazing longingly at a stack of Star Wars toys: PRICELESS
Photo 9: Mallory and Tim, commitment ceremony
Taken on August 21, 2010
9 billion degrees of sticky hell.
That about describes August in Lincoln, Nebraska. It may not be exactly like living on the surface of the sun, but that’s only because the sun is a dry heat.
Yet that didn’t stop Mallory and Tim from making the best of it and having fun with their formal shots just prior to their commitment ceremony.
Technically, we weren’t supposed to be in this location. That always adds to the fun. The threat of a trespassing ticket just adds to the romance. Or something like that.
Everything about this shot makes it one of my favorites of the day. I love the corrugated metal of the industrial bins.
The gravel road. Mallory and Tim standing almost too far apart to kiss, but Tim leaning forward to make it work anyway.
This is the sort of fun couples should aspire to for their formal shots.