Understanding the Investment of Wedding Photography

Trust me when I say that your wedding vendors 100% understand that your wedding day (no matter how large or intimate your celebration might be) costs money. We are SO incredibly appreciative that you’ve not only chosen us among our peers to be alongside you on your day, but that you’ve also invested in us. When you put a team of wedding professionals together to execute your celebration flawlessly, it’s important to know that we do more than just show up, do what you hired us to do, and go home. There is SO much more that we work on behind the scenes to make sure your experience with us is a fantastic one! This blog post in particular is highlighting what your investment covers when a couple books Arturo and me as their wedding photographers, but the same overall idea can be applied to many of your other vendors too.

Time

I’m sure you’ve heard the term, “Time is money”. It’s true! If there’s only one thing you walk away with after reading this post, it’s that Arturo and I put hours and hours of love and effort into ensuring each of our couples has a wonderful experience with us. The amount of time we actually spend photographing our couples is a fraction of what it takes for us to run our business. What else are we doing with our time, you ask? I spend time tending to my inbox and emailing with clients every day. We’re also answering inquiries, scheduling calls, writing up contracts, answering questions, writing timelines, and more. We check our gear and pack our bags to make sure we have everything we need before heading out to photograph an engagement session or wedding day. After an engagement session or wedding day, we’re often culling, editing, and prepping our couples’ images for delivery. Of course, we have other tasks we perform in creating an experience for our couples, but I don’t want to ruin those little surprises for our couples who are reading this!

Assistant Photographer

I always say that Arturo is much more than an assistant photographer, because he is… I just haven’t been able to think of a better title for him yet! Nevertheless, we work as a team on our couples’ wedding days, and because they’re getting two photographers when they hire us, we need to compensate ourselves accordingly. There are other wedding photographers who run their business without a partner, and therefore need to hire an assistant photographer for the weddings they’ve booked.

Travel

As I mentioned above, we spend a good amount of time on the road traveling to and from our couples for their portrait sessions and events. On average, we travel anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour and a half (one way) to engagement session locations or wedding venues. Can you guess how many miles we drive each year?

Gear

Did you know that professional-level cameras can easily cost $2500-$3000 each? And that’s a conservative number! Now multiply that number by 4, since Arturo and I each have a camera with us, plus 2 backups. Lenses used by professionals can range from anywhere from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars. Arturo and I generally use 3-4 flashes on a wedding day, which cost about $500 each. We also have to account for our miscellaneous gear (camera bags, memory cards, batteries, light stands, light modifiers… the list really goes on and on!), which also adds up quickly. Let’s not forget about our computers so we can edit your photos! Why do we need all of this, you ask? Everything we use before, during, and after an engagement session or wedding day helps us create beautiful and professional images for our clients.

Skill, Knowledge, & Education

I may have a college degree with a concentration in photography, but that doesn’t mean I stopped learning when I graduated. In fact, most of what I know about wedding photography was learned in classes I invested in AFTER college from some of my favorite educators in the industry! I’ve been photographing weddings since 2010 and still make it a point every week to spend time learning something new that I can use in our business.

Editing

While the first portion of the art of photography is actually taking a photo, the second part is editing! Arturo and I don’t heavily edit our couples’ photos, as we try to get everything as accurate in-camera as often as possible! However, we do adjust for exposure, color balance, contrast, and more as needed. There isn’t one photo that we deliver to our couples that doesn’t go through our editing workflow. That’s thousands of photographs per year that we review! The editing process starts with culling images, which is the process of selecting images that we plan to keep and deliver while weeding out any we have no use for (test shots, portraits where someone was blinking, etc). Then the actual editing starts, which can take several hours to days for engagement sessions, and a few weeks for weddings!

Engagement Session

Yes, our clients’ engagement session is complimentary with their chosen wedding collection, however, we still spend time working on it before and after their actual session date! Beforehand, I’m emailing with each of our couples to help them choose a time and place, while also discussing other small details regarding their shoot. Then of course there’s the time we take to photograph the engagement photos. As I mentioned above, it also takes time for us to travel to and from the portrait session location. Afterward, I spend time culling the images, editing them, uploading them to a gallery, and emailing our couples to notify them when their photos are ready to be downloaded. Though the actual engagement session itself may only be about an hour, the pre- and post-work that goes into it can easily add up to 5+ hours.

Wedding Day Coverage

Now that you know how many hours go into preparing for a 1-hour engagement session, imagine the number of hours that go into preparing for a wedding day with 8+ hours of photography coverage! About 2 months before each of our clients’ weddings, Arturo and I send a questionnaire to collect all of the important details regarding the day, organize a portrait shot list, and create a photography timeline. On average, our couples book us for 8-12 hours of wedding day photography coverage (and that doesn’t include our drive to and from their event!). The post-wedding workflow is also more extensive than what takes place after an engagement session, because we’re culling and editing more photos, organizing a bigger gallery, and often designing an album (or two, and even three!) for each of our couples.

Your investment in your wedding photography isn’t just a few hours with your photographer. You’re investing not only in your wedding photos, but also an entire experience so the time leading up to your wedding day is as stress-free as possible. So remember, when you’re planning your budget, be sure to book wedding professionals who are not only masters at what they do, but can also make your life easier and deliver you an unforgettable wedding day!

ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPHERS

Shaina Lee Photography is a husband and wife photography team serving Connecticut, New York, and beyond.  We specialize in timeless, elegant, and romantic weddings while celebrating all couples in love. 

Are you planning a proposal, engagement session, or wedding?