Thread: Darwin Wedding Photograpers

A lot of that is standard practice Harbinger and generally isn't any different anywhere for professional work. (keeping raws and limiting distribution of digital copies). That said... while I wouldn't say many of the photographers here are that bad (a handful do leave a lot to be desired), I personally don't know any who specialise in wedding photography and do a comparable job cost wise down south. I've seen work of some of the full time pro's up here and while some are not bad, there are others I feel shouldn't be a primary photographer.

Originally Posted by Kagetsu

A lot of that is standard practice Harbinger and generally isn't any different anywhere for professional work.

I disagree. A vast majority of commercial photography is the opposite of what you're saying. When you pay someone to photograph something, you're paying for... *drum roll*... photographs. High-res, low-res, what-evs.

It is ONLY in the wedding industry that they try and milk it (like everything else with weddings). You can however, find photographers (at least in the bigger cities) who are reasonably priced AND include everything basic you would expect - like hi-res photos. We just paid under $3k for a dude called James Field who was with us from 10am til 11.30pm. He also provided a photobooth for people to take photos of themselves (well it was a DSLR on a tripod with a 19" LCD attached to it for instant proview - with a wireless remote). He was the equivalent skill level of a photographer who would cost well OVER $3k for 4 hours.

My suggestion is to either pay the money to fly someone up, or just make do with everyone's photos from the day.

I was only referring to the wedding industry, as it works significantly differently to most other photographic based businesses. As for commercial photography, it's a mixed bag, depending on what you're working on... generally speaking, in commercial shooting, yes, you're paid for a product, which is usually the image so they can use as required. (ie, advertisement, magazine, commercials etc). I'm not saying there isn't value in the industry either... All I'm suggesting is generally speaking you get what you pay for, and especially so in wedding photography.

Keep in mind... weddings you're after an entire album + extra's. Giving the client raw's is akin to giving them unprocessed negatives (film days)... sure we here understand the basics of it, and some understand the complexities... but generally speaking, most will not. And as a photographer, if I've spent my good time and they've paid for a good product, and then they take the 'raws' and print them out at Harvey Norman and they look like shit, and then slander me because they can't print them well enough (and it DOES happen) then of course I don't want my work being displayed incorrectly.

Packages | Gallery Two Six

this guy did a great job at our wedding, i dont know photography but he captured every moment and and i think he shopped me a bit so i dont look so ugly next to my beautiful wife

we got the dvd ans books made up as well

My professional wedding shots are weeks away yet, you guys (Milenko inparticular) might be referring to the four photo booth shots Elle put up which we got from Simon Bills as a preview - the DVD with the rest is in the mail. But that's just the photo booth, not even the "proper" professional shots. Or, you may be referring to Grandinferno's wedding photos which I've been tagged in many of?

The guy we hired was David Sievers. Have a quick click on some of the menu categories for a look at his work: David Sievers Photography. We explained we didn't really care for prints. We're getting a coffee table book with a selection of photos, but otherwise we just wanted his photos provided digitally as we haven't owned physical photo albums for many years and any singles we want we'll print ourselves. He was understanding and tailored a package for us.

Flying someone up for the day is probably a good move considering that return flights might be as much as $600, but the alternative is that you pay a premium for sub-par results.

In regards to the wedding industry trying to milk you, indeed they do, but you really just have to do your research and know your stuff when hunting for photographers.

E.g. We spoke to Benjamin Liew regarding a photo booth who said it would cost $800-$1100. That included up to 700 low res images and "300 digital images for Facebook." He said images would be available for guests from $5 each!? If we wanted high res photos it was $1100 and we would only get 100 photos.

Strangely and undesirably his photo booth setup only took a photo every 30 seconds. It seemed he was trying to spin high dollar value due to the fact he claimed to "process the images" and delivered "Facebook versions." The processing claim really irked me. These photos wouldn't be taken by the creative eye of a human, it's tripod mounted with a static lighting arrangement. We didn't want these doctored, just set it up right initially and they'll all be fine. Copy from card to disc and you're done.

Anyway, we replied explaining that we don't require his "processing" and didn't really believe there's value in his package. We also noted that Facebook will provide Facebook versions for us by itself. We went on to explain what we did want: push button shots, unlimited digital photos in high resolution jpg, delivered via DVD for $500~ optimistically, which he wouldn't accommodate. The sad thing is he probably takes many people for that ride of his.

We then found exactly what we wanted for $550 via Simon Bills - who was awesome to deal with - and the four preview shots already delivered look great.

I'm a bit confused, you said you hired David Sievers, but then you say you found exactly what you wanted from Simon Bills? So who did you eventually go with?

Both. Bills for the photo booth, Sievers for the professional photos.