Top Five Questions You Should Ask Your Wedding Photographer Before You Hire Them

Here’s the thing: there is no standard in the wedding photography industry. You can find anybody for any budget at any experience level in this industry. There is no formal, widely-accepted certification for becoming a wedding photographer. For me, my experience is a bit different than most. With my bachelors and masters degrees in photojournalism and over 8 years experience as a wedding photographer, I know that my background isn’t common. However, it has definitely given me the ability to handle literally anything that a wedding day can throw at me! But there are people who are like I was 8 years ago – those who just picked up a camera one day and started photographing weddings. You can find a wedding photographer at any part of the spectrum! So if you are one of those couples that’s just looking for someone to show up, photograph, and leave at their scheduled time, this may not be as helpful to you. But if you are one of those couples that really considers photography an investment in your relationship, then this is going to be very helpful in finding your perfect wedding photographer.

So to make sure you’re taken care of on your wedding day, here are the top five things you should ask when interviewing potential wedding photographers.

A Full Gallery

Ya know what? Better make it multiple full galleries – and make sure you like what you see.! This proves that they can photograph the whole day, that they can do more than just get the pretty photos for Instagram, and that they can handle any lighting scenario that may happen on your day. You can see how they handle reception lighting after dark. You can see how they handle direct sunlight, especially if your ceremony spot is in direct sunlight. This is crucial to seeing exactly what you're going to get from them because anyone can show the highlight reel on their website. A real photographer can document a whole day.

Back Ups

What happens if your photographer gets sick the day of your wedding? Especially in the time of Miss ‘Rona, what’s the “oh shit” plan? What happens if a camera fails? What about a memory card? Where do your photos go after the day is done? How many places are they backed up to? For me, I have answers to all of these questions and more! I’m super Type A, and I’m an Enneagram 1, so every emergency plan has been thought of.

Delivery Times

How long do you have to wait to get your photos back? For me personally I send sneak peeks within 24 hours because I know how exciting it is to have some of those professional photos ready to go! Sometimes you get a blog post a few weeks later, depending on my workload, and then within 6-8 weeks of your wedding day, you'll get your full gallery from me. Sometimes it's sooner than that, but it’s never more than 8 weeks. This should also be written into your contract so that your photographer has to adhere to that deadline as well.

Education / Experience / Editing

What's their background? What's their photography education? What's their experience photographing weddings? How do they approach weddings? Are they very directive, where they’ll tell you exactly where to put your pinky so that it looks natural? Or are they more laid back? For me, my background is in photojournalism, and I have two advanced degrees in it, so I'm very laid back and will let the day happen as it’s going to. However, if you're about to walk down the aisle and you accidentally have a hair tie on your wrist, I'm going to grab it for you. 

Similarly, you should also ask about their editing style, or you should at least like their editing style. You shouldn’t have to ask your photographer to change their editing style for you, and if that is a question that you have to ask, maybe find a different photographer because it's very hard to change a photographer's editing style when they’re attached to it. For me, I consider myself to edit in the style of “true to color with an edge of warmth.” If someone asked me to edit their wedding dark and moody, I wouldn't do it because it doesn’t look right to my eyes, and it’s not what I typically like.

Planning Style

This last component is more for your benefit as the couple, but how involved does that photographer expect you to be in the planning process? For me, when we hop on a call, I basically create a timeline for your day of how it'll shake out so we know exactly how many hours of photography coverage you’ll need to capture the entire day. After we book, I send that timeline to you, so you have it for planning purposes. You’ll also get my wedding planning guide, affectionately dubbed my Big Day Bible, as well as my recommended vendors, too! I give you all the resources that you're going to need from me over the next year or so, so then you can properly plan your wedding with photography in mind. Beyond that, I don't really need anything from you until about two months before the big day. So with that being said, my couples are pretty hands-off with me until that two month period. Once that rolls around, then we focus on nailing down the details, like figuring out exactly when I'm going to arrive, what we're going to be doing at what time, where we’re going, and all that good stuff! My couples won’t hear from me very much between booking and that two-month period, but I’m always available to help with planning and questions they might have. You should absolutely ask your photographer what they expect from you!

Obviously this isn’t an exhaustive list, and there are plenty of other things you need to ask your photographer. For example, “Are you available for my date?” That's a big one! But I felt like that was kind of obvious so I didn't (formally) include it here. But if you’re ready to get on my calendar, shoot me a message and let’s do this!