How I came to shoot weddings and not much else...

[Baron C]

Thanks Lol, yes it was.

I knew it!!!

Do I get a prize.. ?

 

[Rojin]

Nice thread AE, it has been very interesting watching you progress over the years You've got a good eye for the shot.

If I'd got into photography when I was younger I'd like to think I may have gone into it as a career. I'm too old now with responsibilities blah blah blah to make the jump. I'd have to do an awful lot of work to match the wage I am on now, and I don't have the skills to charge top dollar!

 

[An Exception]

Nice thread AE, it has been very interesting watching you progress over the years You've got a good eye for the shot.

If I'd got into photography when I was younger I'd like to think I may have gone into it as a career. I'm too old now with responsibilities blah blah blah to make the jump. I'd have to do an awful lot of work to match the wage I am on now, and I don't have the skills to charge top dollar!

Thank Rojin, nice to know I wasn't always a royal PITA.

I wouldn't take the risk either if I was in your position. I imagine once you have children your priorities change, and what you want takes more of a back seat in the grand scheme of what's really important.

 

[Rojin]

Yeah, I did consider carrying on with the weekend warrior approach but when you take into account the PP time it just took away too much family time so I had to knock it on the head.

 

[D.P.]

True, but unless you take that step you won't know if your 'one of those people'
It is true what they say, that its better in the long run to enjoy waht you do. Most work, tends to be a long drawn out slog..right?

There is more to it than that. I have a mortgage and bills to pay, food to put on my families table, child care and education costs and since I have a nomadic lifestyle my retirement has to be entirely from private pension schemes and earned equity.

I can't easily guarantee mortgage payments if I drop everything and try my hand at freelance photography.
If I do go independent then my main priority would actually to do something more lucrative like consultancy.


Once I have paid off the mortgage then I will likely reconsider my options.

 

[D.P.]

Yeah, I did consider carrying on with the weekend warrior approach but when you take into account the PP time it just took away too much family time so I had to knock it on the head.

yeah, I'm stopping soon after starting i think. I have done a few paid events which were fun enough (2-3hours of photography) but then spent most of my free time for the next days editing (or working through the night, one client requires next day delivery ready for their publication). I do minimal PP but even just selecting the best photos and doing some light adjustments will chew up a few hours.

I have a few more gigs though (Autumn) and turned down a few more. I wouldn't mind doing a couple of weddings a year to pay for some equipment but I can never really commit to these things. I have to regularly work weekends without any notice.

 

[Baron C]

There is more to it than that. I have a mortgage and bills to pay, food to put on my families table, child care and education costs and since I have a nomadic lifestyle my retirement has to be entirely from private pension schemes and earned equity.

I can't easily guarantee mortgage payments if I drop everything and try my hand at freelance photography.
If I do go independent then my main priority would actually to do something more lucrative like consultancy.


Once I have paid off the mortgage then I will likely reconsider my options.

I understand completely, just sewing hopeful and positive seeds.

 

[ElDude]

Wedding photography does seem to be the way out for a lot of photographers. I've rejected several requests to do people's weddings as I'm really not comfortable with the idea. I know I'd do a decent job, it just doesn't sit right with me for various reasons, one of which being it only takes one accident to wipe out a couples special day.

Still, after recently getting totally shafted by a bloke from a PR company I'm wondering whether I should just accept whatever work comes my way. Bizarrely he couldn't be arsed sorting out the event and went to Glastonbury, leaving myself and the journalist in the lurch 3 days before the event, with both of us booking time off work to cover the event, and didn't even arrange for anyone to cover it at all. It was a HUGE deal for us as it was a band known the world over. To say I'm having words with him when I see him next is an understatement.

The whole gig photography scene is very hit or miss recently. A lot seem to be using the theme of promoting the local area as an excuse to use inexperience, free, students from the local media sections of colleges/Uni's. That results in average photos constantly and the handful of decent photographers not getting a look in.

Now I've decided to look at aerial photography as well, in order to expand a bit, knowledge wise, in the hope of nailing down some work. Add to that the problem that I've had to reduce my work hours due to an illness that unless there's a huge leap forward in medicine in my lifetime, won't be changing any time soon, I now more than ever need to find payment for work. I spent 2-3 years helping people, doing charity shoots, etc, only to be repeatedly shafted by people either stealing photos, not giving credit or not getting back to me after I tell them I don't do photography for free. This last one is amazingly frequent. I get about 10 queries a month asking for free photography for events or bands, or "I'm sure they'll get you a few pints"! Seriously, the amount of people that take the **** asking for free stuff is astonishing.

So yeah, woo! Photography rocks!

 

[An Exception]

Wedding photography does seem to be the way out for a lot of photographers. I spent 2-3 years helping people, doing charity shoots, etc, only to be repeatedly shafted by people either stealing photos, not giving credit or not getting back to me after I tell them I don't do photography for free. This last one is amazingly frequent. I get about 10 queries a month asking for free photography for events or bands, or "I'm sure they'll get you a few pints"! Seriously, the amount of people that take the **** asking for free stuff is astonishing.

So yeah, woo! Photography rocks!

Sorry to hear about your health problems. Health is something you take for granted until it goes on the fritz. I'v had a few pretty bad injuries over the last few years, although they are mostly better now. But I do know bad health/fitness can get you down after a while.

Wedding photography isn't much different tbh. Plenty of brides and grooms try to take advantage of photographers. Often if they have booked a nice venue, they think the photographer will discount or even do it for free because they will want it in their portfolio. Others will seek out noobs/students for their free photography.
For allot of photographers wedding photography is hell, and brutally competitive.

When I started out I made a conscious decision to price myself out of that BS (or at least most of it) and just try and deal with the shortage of bookings. I was pretty short of cash for a while, and it would drive my mum crazy when I would turn down offers from B&G's looking to book me at a discount. My mum would be like that's £350 your flushing away when your not even doing anything that day.
I never actually explained this fully to my mum other than say I had a strategy. So she pretty much stayed angry and frustrated with me for quite a while, and thought I was just lazy. I was just worried my strategy might sound a little bonkers.

Basically I'm fairly self aware of my strengths and weakness's as well as certain quirks. Generally I often lack motivation and focus in mundane things and do everything at the last minute. However I knew from previous experience that I become a bit obsessive over anything that becomes a hobby. EVERYTHING.. even tiny things become a big deal to me and I can't help but dedicate huge swathes of time learning/practicing. It's why I'm sure numerous people here have wondered why I have spent so much time arguing over relatively tiny insignificant details in sharpness, dynamic range, autofocus and so forth.. I can't help it.
So basically the plan was to use my OCD/perfectionist tendencies to my advantage.. but in order to do so, wedding photography needed to remain a hobby. This meant I had to try and avoid weddings I wouldn't enjoy.

The main goal was to increase demand by improving my portfolio (I should improve my marketing as well as I suck at that). This meant I placed allot of pressure on myself at weddings. As far as I was concerned I needed to make every one of them count, as my back was pretty much against the wall.

Nowadays things are allot better. Still things are always changing, competition is always getting stronger. I'v noticed some local togs are blatantly copying me. It's to the point where I see they have shot at the same venue as me, but they have used the exact same pose and almost the exact same framing, only more crooked. I'v 'borrowed' allot of ideas myself, but I at least try and add my own spin on it, else it's just a cheap ripp-off.

Also I'm happy that without explaining it, my mum kind of 'gets it' now. I heard her having a conversation with someone who was saying my photography was progressing quickly. She said that's because he becomes a little 'obsessive' with hobbies. Apparently it runs in the family.

Right now the plan is still the same.. treat wedding photography like a competitive hobby and respect it. It's why I set myself a limit of 20-25 weddings a year.

 

[And]

@An Exception
Nice to hear you're doing something you enjoy and that it's working out well for you. In all sincerity good luck with it man.

I'd go the same way myself (not weddings) but a wall of text about my own self confidence and doubts et al to partly justify why I stay in the job I'm in wouldn't make good reading

 

[mr tommo]

Decent read! I also do wedding photography, but as I work full time as a photographer in the week, I can't take on more than 10 weddings a year.

I started doing wedding photography with a friend (we already had a photobooth business together) after second shooting for around 3 years. Theres advantages and disadvantages of it being the two of us. We can share the workload, we both have the same vision and style but obviously you only get 50% of the profits as you can't charge double!

This means it can never really be a full time option for us, but we both absolutely love it, it doesn't actually feel like work anymore. I remember we used to get nervous on the day of a wedding but now I can't wait to get started on the morning.

We have taken on 12 weddings this year but to be honest that will be a little too time consuming. With editing/viewings/meetings done at weekends they can take up quite a bit of time when trying to juggle a full time job.

I don't plan on getting rich from weddings, our main aim is to get the nice venues/fun weddings and have enough demand to pick and choose, and earn a bit of holiday money. (we have been able to do this in our second year which is nice)

I like your wedding stuff, it's right down my street. When we started second/third shooting, the style was rather formal and it really did feel like a job then. However when we started up on our own, we covered both formal and our style on the side. Only the informal style would make it onto our website and eventually everybody started to contact us for the style that we enjoyed.

 

[An Exception]

@An Exception
Nice to hear you're doing something you enjoy and that it's working out well for you. In all sincerity good luck with it man.

I'd go the same way myself (not weddings) but a wall of text about my own self confidence and doubts et al to partly justify why I stay in the job I'm in wouldn't make good reading

Well if you are in a job you don't HATE, and you can shoot whatever you like as as a hobby anyway, then in your particular case there may be more risk than reward.
You don't have to be as brave to make the jump when you don't have much to lose.

 

[An Exception]

Decent read! I also do wedding photography, but as I work full time as a photographer in the week, I can't take on more than 10 weddings a year.

I started doing wedding photography with a friend (we already had a photobooth business together) after second shooting for around 3 years. Theres advantages and disadvantages of it being the two of us. We can share the workload, we both have the same vision and style but obviously you only get 50% of the profits as you can't charge double!

This means it can never really be a full time option for us, but we both absolutely love it, it doesn't actually feel like work anymore. I remember we used to get nervous on the day of a wedding but now I can't wait to get started on the morning.

We have taken on 12 weddings this year but to be honest that will be a little too time consuming. With editing/viewings/meetings done at weekends they can take up quite a bit of time when trying to juggle a full time job.

I don't plan on getting rich from weddings, our main aim is to get the nice venues/fun weddings and have enough demand to pick and choose, and earn a bit of holiday money. (we have been able to do this in our second year which is nice)

I like your wedding stuff, it's right down my street. When we started second/third shooting, the style was rather formal and it really did feel like a job then. However when we started up on our own, we covered both formal and our style on the side. Only the informal style would make it onto our website and eventually everybody started to contact us for the style that we enjoyed.

Sounds like you have the best of both worlds, regular income as well as some independence/nice holidays!

 

[Raymond Lin]

Price is relative.

Some people think £500 is expensive, some thinks £5,000 is reasonable. But the common theme is that they all want nice photos no matter on the price point. What you need to look at is what market segment you want to be in and whether your photos can survive against the competition against others in that segment. Obviously location makes a big difference, shooting in NYC the average tog would command $5k+ compare to another city (I didn’t pull this out of thin air, there was a workshop on Creative Live).

Photography being a subjective art that it is, it is hard to say one is better than the other if we all shoot documentary work, some people will just prefer certain people's work. Therefore what one need is a style that immediately set you apart. It is not enough to have "nice" images, it is important, from a personal and business' perspective to have signature work. Something that identifies who you are. It is that element that people are willing to pay premium for. I learn that before I started out worked very hard at getting it that way. It is akin to liking an artist and he creates a piece of art specifically for you, with you being the subject and that you are the Mona Lisa in the painting.

Obviously pricing yourself higher means a less number of people who can afford you, however, it also means you don't need to shoot that many weddings to survive. I put the same amount of energy and work into all my shoot, whether it was when I was starting out or now and whether it is the cheapest package or the most expensive one. It is not in my interest to produce lower quality work because the fee is lower. I have brides who asks if I won't shoot bridal prep…that actually upsets me a little as I do like it, I try to explain it to them the advantages of having the morning set of photos taken both in terms of memory, and also on the day it gives them a chance of getting used to me moving around them and later on they are less aware of me. I don't see it as I don't have to work as much for the wedding, the opposite in fact.

The target for me is getting a quality portfolio, I want a killer set of pictures first and foremost. My heart jumps a little when I look at the LCD and sees a good shot, sometimes I go "wow" out loud, the client then go "what?", there are times I make a little smile. It is like a high that I am constantly chasing. Every shot I click has that small chance of me getting that wow, a gasp, and almost like getting high from it , it is this never ending chase that I crave.

The money is a nice bonus.

 

[An Exception]

I have brides who asks if I won't shoot bridal prep…that actually upsets me a little as I do like it, I try to explain it to them the advantages of having the morning set of photos taken both in terms of memory, and also on the day it gives them a chance of getting used to me moving around them and later on they are less aware of me. I don't see it as I don't have to work as much for the wedding, the opposite in fact.

Yeh I occasionally get that. Usually I think it's because the bride is nervous about having her picture taken, as well as nervous about getting ready for the wedding and wants to eliminate at least one area of stress in order to make things easier.
I tell them being photographed is a bit like jumping into a cold swimming pool. It takes a minute or two to get used to, before you can enjoy the swim. I then suggest maybe it would be better that happens during the morning, than when she's walking into church.
I also advise it's not just beneficial for her (the bride), but all the bridesmaids etc. as for them it's worse as I'm a complete stranger.

The target for me is getting a quality portfolio, I want a killer set of pictures first and foremost. My heart jumps a little when I look at the LCD and sees a good shot, sometimes I go "wow" out loud, the client then go "what?", there are times I make a little smile. It is like a high that I am constantly chasing. Every shot I click has that small chance of me getting that wow, a gasp, and almost like getting high from it , it is this never ending chase that I crave.

+1