How to choose your Wedding Photographer - Top Tips and Trade Secrets

I'm going to cheat today. Hope you don't mind. I have been asked to write an article for a wedding magazine on the above topic. As it's a subject I thought would be of interest to many of my blog readers I'm simply going to publish it here first, which of course saves me some extra writing. The final version may of course get edited, altered or even spiked! :O Fortunately none of these affects my fee, lol ;) So here goes with the original and full 1200 word version...



On October 5th 2009 newly weds Mark and Sylvia Day made history by becoming the first couple to successfully sue their wedding photographer for "woefully inadequate" service. No doubt you will recall all the news and media coverage this generated both in the UK and across into the USA, too. After seeing this item headline the BBC news I decided that I’d write an impromptu blog article that week on the subject. To be honest because it was done on the spur of the moment it wasn’t the best article in the world and it wasn’t really intended to be. It was simply a few brief thoughts on the hot topic and some comments that I thought may help other couples in the future from booking the wrong kind of photographer. However, somehow google quickly found and indexed my article and it suddenly started appearing on the first page of their results for "couple sue wedding photographer". My visitor stats for the next few weeks went through the roof! The piece very soon became my most read article by a country mile and continues getting many hits even now, over two years later. Of course if I had known this was going to happen I wouldn’t have thrown the feature together so quickly!

What is interesting though is despite all the publicity generated and subsequent advice that proliferated wedding magazines, websites and blogs we’ve seen at least three more couples since then sue their wedding photographer and according to what you read in online wedding forums there’s many more couples preparing to do likewise! So what exactly is the problem and how can you avoid experiencing the same disappointment?

The first thing I must say is that there are a great number of superb wedding photographers out there! Sadly, however these are greatly outweighed by the poor wedding photographers. Why is this? Well the wedding photography industry in the UK is un-regulated which means that quite literally anyone can buy a half decent camera and then declare themselves to be a professional wedding photographer. It is estimated that in the UK well over 60% of those purporting themselves as wedding photographers are in fact Weekend Warriors (part time Saturday snappers). With so many excellent online resources it is possible for a first timer to instantly create a very impressive and business like website, too, which can make it quite hard initially to determine exactly who or what they are. How then can you separate the wheat from the chaff?

It is most important that you learn to develop a discerning eye for quality. Many people make the mistake in thinking that all photographers are very much the same. This is far from true! Just as a perceptive person can distinguish between Banana Split Delight and Chanel No.5 if you learn what to look for you can do likewise when comparing photographers. Here’s a few tips...

Study the photographs carefully. What is your first impression when looking through an album or gallery? Are the photographs eye catching and pleasing or are they lacklustre? Do they have impact and do the people in them look good? Now study them more closely.

In the reportage type photographs (also known as photojournalistic where the couple have been photographed unknowingly) has the photographer consistently made the couple look good throughout the whole day or is he a 'warts n all' snapper? Do these images tell a story in their own right or are they merely candids that could have been taken by anyone? Can you see clearly the reason why the photographer has taken each shot or do some images leave you somewhat mystified?

In the staged or posed photographs, particularly the bride and groom set, are these photographs fashionable and stylish? Do the people in them look good? Does the lighting and angles used make the couple look flattering? How are they posed? Do they look natural and relaxed or stiff and awkward? Remember, if a lot of the couples look ungainly and frumpy it is highly unlikely the photographer is going to suddenly learn a whole new style and skill set for your own wedding.

You can also learn a lot about the photographer from his main portfolio or his adverts. The photographs that he has chosen are the shots that in his own mind are his very best photographs. Look at them carefully based upon the questions considered above. If you feel these images do not meet the criteria then there is probably no point looking any further. Just an aside, I often get asked about unusual photographs such as where everyone is asked to start jumping up and down, all the guests being asked to charge across a field, or all the ladies kicking their legs in the air, and similar. If you look through the portfolio’s of the top wedding photographers in the country you will find that virtually none of them do this type of photograph, which may reveal something about their creative merits.

In addition to the above there are a few other 'tells' that can help you avoid post wedding disappointment. One of these indicators can be price. In the UK the average spend on wedding photography is approximately £1500. All photographers set their own prices so they will do so generally based upon where they perceive themselves to be on the market ladder. If the photographer himself estimates his own value as low as say £500 obviously that does not reflect well on his competence or skill levels. Another necessary consideration is insurance. All bona fide professional photographers will be fully insured. The account of a wedding photographer who slipped while taking a shot and stepped backwards into the cake is of course a rare occurrence but one that emphasises its importance. For a wedding photographer insurance is a very expensive item yet one that many part-timers decide they can do without. Make sure your photographer has both Public Liability and Professional Indemnity Insurance.

I don’t want to bore you with talking about equipment but here’s something you may never have thought about previously. Your wedding day is of utmost importance and to ensure we capture it to the highest standard possible we invest in the very best equipment costing several thousands of pounds. We have to have two or three of every item for backup purposes. This also includes our hard drives where we store your wedding photographs after and during their editing and our monitors and printers which are carefully calibrated to make sure that our albums and prints are perfectly and accurately produced. Again, problems of a technical nature occur very rarely but it is worth while checking your photographer has everything covered just in case.

I hope some of the above is of help in weighing up and choosing your photographer. Whilst some couples have been successful in suing their wedding photographer that can never alleviate their disappointment or bring back their precious memories. By contrast there is nothing more thrilling than when you see your photographs or album on your return from honeymoon and seeing just how stunning you look and what a fantastic job your photographer has done in capturing all the magic of your special day! Choose your photographer wisely and you’ll never ever regret it!

A Melville Castle wedding

Well I have no more weddings at Melville Castle this year but no doubt will have many to look forward throughout 2012. There will be a new team in place in the new year and this beautiful wedding venue will be taking bookings once again for weddings and events.

Lynne and Alasdair booked me for their wedding at the beginning of 2011 and their original wedding date was May 2012. However, when the Aurora Group made the decision to pull out of Melville Castle at the end of this year they moved some of the wedding dates they had booked for 2012 forward into 2011 and so Alasdair and Lynne ended up tying the knot several months sooner than they had planned. Although that of course generated a lot of frantic work and effort for them, in the end it was such a fantastic wedding I’m sure they didn’t mind one little bit!

Lynne and Alasdair had booked me for just about the whole day, starting with pre-wedding photographs through until the first dance. When they booked me they were both living and working up in Aberdeen and came down to Edinburgh one weekend to do some wedding organising. After using the internet to search for and then compare wedding photographers in Edinburgh they finally narrowed down their shortlist to three and thereupon had made appointments to meet with the three of us over the weekend. Unknown to me at the time I was the Edinburgh wedding photographer who had the first appointment on the Friday afternoon with the other two photographers scheduled for the Saturday. However, Lynne and Alasdair phoned me later on the Friday evening to say after meeting and chatting with me and looking through my albums they had cancelled their meetings with the other two photographers for the following day and were going to book me. Well I just LOVE clients like that! :)

I was due to start the photography from 12 noon at Melville Castle. So I duly arrived in good time to find I was actually there ahead of the bride! It’s not often that happens! lol Lynne had gone into the city to get her hair and make up done and ended up running a little late. She arrived at around twelve thirty and we went down to the bridal suite where upon I began doing some dress, shoes, flowers and other detail shots. As Lynne had already had her hair and make-up done there wasn’t opportunity to get this type of 'getting ready' shot but instead that gave a little extra time which I used to do some pre-wedding bridal portraits. If you read my blog regularly you will be aware that I am currently competing in the Society of Wedding & Portrait Photographers - Photographer of the Year contest. Each month the SWPP runs a monthly image contest across the main wedding and portrait categories where all professional photographers can enter one photo per category. These are then judged and the results announced the beginning of the following month. So far this year I have managed to win awards in one category or another every single month, which I am absolutely delighted about! One of the photographs from Lynne’s pre-ceremony set scored me a 'Bronze' in the Traditional Portrait category. Little did I know at that point that I would end up entering four more photographs from this wedding with all five of them winning awards! (The categories I entered were Weddings Traditional, Weddings Photojournalism, Weddings Contemporary, Monochrome and Traditional Portraits)

The first photograph in today’s blog is the one from the Weddings Traditional category. All the other shots today are all reportage or photojournalism shots, as I promised last week that I would use more of this style in my next blogging. I did a tiny bit of cheating with the girls on the staircase photograph as I quickly asked them to pause for one second when they had all reached the perfect spot so that I could see all their faces at the same time in the picture. Strictly speaking this doesn’t classify as a photojournalism image as the SWPP contest rules are quite rigorous and state that a 'photojournalism' shot must have no intervention whatsoever by the photographer. Knowing this of course meant I wouldn’t try and enter this particular photograph into that category but it wouldn’t stop me shooting it nevertheless as it still is good Storybook photography. All the remainder of today’s photos definitely do fit the photojournalism criteria and as you study them you will see how none of them have been staged, faked or re-created. Personally, I never try to re-create or stage a supposedly storybook moment as I believe to a discerning eye you can always tell that it isn’t really authentic. On the other hand a truly genuine spontaneous moment is absolutely priceless!

The second to last photo shown in this blog is the shot that won me the award in the Weddings Photojournalism category. It occurred a split second after the first kiss and capturing it was purely down to experience and timing. As the ceremony is progressing towards its conclusion most wedding photographers are readying themselves for the first kiss photograph. You never know for sure at what exact point this will occur as every officiate differs as to when they will utter those immortal words "You may now kiss the bride". Some of them never say them at all which makes things all the more harder for us! lol You also never know for how long the first kiss will last. Some couples will linger their kiss for several seconds which is great for us photographers allowing us to shoot several photographs possibly getting both full length and close ups. For other couples, particularly if they are feeling quite nervous, the first kiss can be the briefest moment imaginable and then we have to really be on our toes! So you’re doing your best trying to anticipate when the moment will come and then of course making sure you are in the right place at the right time and fire the shutter at the perfect instant. This happens very fast and there is a natural tendency for a photographer to instantaneously check the back screen on his camera to see if he caught the moment or not. However, from experience I have noted how on many occasions immediately following the kiss the couple will share a warm, intimate gesture which is often more emotional than the first kiss itself. This may be an embrace, a touching of heads or the whispering of some private words. For this reason I never lower the camera but instead am more alert than ever. I think the shot here from Lynne and Alasdair’s ceremony really illustrates the rewards of this and shows the difference between simply a nice wedding snap and an award winning image. It has captured the full gambit of emotions - happiness, joy, contentment, love and excitement that the couple have for one another and that they are feeling at this exact, precise second. This instant in time lasted for literally a split second and will never ever occur again. I can tell you it is exceedingly rewarding capturing these never to be repeated, fleeting moments and one of the reasons I love my job so much!