Wedding Photography

[ahorne]

**I know alot of you are going to say I just shouldn't do it, but when I got into this, I thought it was going to be a tiny wedding (and it may still be, I'm not sure) and the lady has a small budget and waited until about 10 days before the wedding to even contact me. So while I understand this is a HUGE undertaking, it's either me or a family member who doesn't know what they're doing AT ALL**

Let me start off with a little back story. A lady from my church contacted me about 3 weeks ago wanting to know if I could do the photography for her friends wedding. I told her to make sure the friend understood that I had never done this before and to make sure she had looked at my other work and knew what to expect. I chased her down twice trying to find out what they had decided, but she never let me know the friend even liked my work until Saturday. Friend finally called me last night. I didn't have a chance to get back to her, so I have to do that today.

When the lady from church contacted me, I figured it was going to be a small wedding, since they waited so long to contact a photographer. I was thinking maybe 2-3 hours, so I said I'd do it for $20 an hour, again, thinking it was going to be informal and that if I said $300 for two hours that would be ridiculous. (I hate that I gave her an hourly price, and if I hadn't been caught off-guard with it, I would have told her something like $200 for the day) Then I find out that she's got this formal dress and probably wants me for 4-5 hours, and she wants the cd. I don't usually give it or sell it, I offer a cd with watermarked, web-ready images, and individual prints with VERY little profit for me, we're talking I make 27 cents on every 4x6. I don't usually give printing rights away, because I like quality-control. I don't want them to have horrible kodak-kiosk prints that they say came from me. That's why I offer prints so cheap.

So anyway, I live in Alabama and she lives in one of the Carolinas, so she's right, it would be easier to send her the cd. But, I don't know how much to charge for it! Even if I only had 100 pictures from the whole day, and she only ordered one 4x6 of each, I'd make $27 on that. So I was thinking maybe sell it for $50, but that seems really low too...and my mother in law thinks it is....I need some guidance! I mean, it is my first wedding...but IDK....help please!

[Gulf Coast Girl]

I'm not a professional photographer so maybe I should just keep quiet here.... but what the heck. I don't know what should be charged.... but it does seem that every price you listed up there seems WAYYYYYYYYY on the low side. $20 hr? By the time you take the photos, do all the post work, put together a CD and whatever else you will need to do, I'm betting that will really end up being about $1/hr. It seems to me most wedding photographers make around $2,000 as a starting point.

Being that you haven't done wedding photography before I can see why didn't want to charge an exorbitant fee.... but still... I think you are WAYYY undercharging at $20/hr.

I hope some experienced wedding photographers stop by to read this and give you some actual advice. Best of luck to you

I wouldn't do it.


~Eric


PS - Yes I did read your post.

[zona5101]

You haven't signed a contract or agreed to anything yet - you gave a quote based on the little info you had. You have every right and should re-evaluate your quote based on the new information and price it accordingly. Charge what you want. $300 for the shoot and CD is ridiculously cheap...even $500. So don't think your "gouging" them by asking for what is in essence the bargain of the year. Theres a quote around here that seems appropriate: "Lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part".
Charge what it is worth to you.

[thaoimage]

Having never done a wedding before ever in my life, I'm charging $600 for 6 hours and an additional $200 for the CD with 100 retouched photos (printing rights only because I still own the copyright to the images and it states that in the contract).... I think your prices are extremely cheap and she'd be a fool not to take it... like Bruce said though... "Charge what it is worth to you."

[ahorne]

Thanks for all your help guys! What I decided on was to go with what I had already told her, and ask for $50 for the cd. I've had two other couples ask me about shooting their weddings later this year and I haven't given them a price yet. I think I'm going to take next weekend as a chance to portfolio-build and then be able to price the next two appropriately according to my results

[ahorne]

Originally Posted by Gulf Coast Girl

I'm not a professional photographer so maybe I should just keep quiet here.... but what the heck. I don't know what should be charged.... but it does seem that every price you listed up there seems WAYYYYYYYYY on the low side. $20 hr? By the time you take the photos, do all the post work, put together a CD and whatever else you will need to do, I'm betting that will really end up being about $1/hr. It seems to me most wedding photographers make around $2,000 as a starting point.

Being that you haven't done wedding photography before I can see why didn't want to charge an exorbitant fee.... but still... I think you are WAYYY undercharging at $20/hr.

I hope some experienced wedding photographers stop by to read this and give you some actual advice. Best of luck to you

I know I'm going REALLY low, but in this area the average is around 800ish for a wedding I think (I'm in Alabama). One of the better-known photographers in this area starts at around 1000 for a wedding and offers an engagement session with that. I would love to be able to do an engagement session with this couple, but it's not an option since she called me so late...

[funcrunch]

$20 an hour is not an appropriate amount to charge for any kind of photoshoot if you're shooting professionally. As another poster said, by the time you add up all the time spent in prep and post you will be making a tiny fraction of that. Do carefully examine your pricing before you give any more quotes.

[thaoimage]

Originally Posted by funcrunch

$20 an hour is not an appropriate amount to charge for any kind of photoshoot if you're shooting professionally. As another poster said, by the time you add up all the time spent in prep and post you will be making a tiny fraction of that. Do carefully examine your pricing before you give any more quotes.

Agreed...

I'm only charging $100/ hr and I think I'm getting ripped off as is... but only because this will be my first wedding.

[candleman]

planning 2 hrs
researching poses 3 hours
scouting location and travel 2 hours
shooting time 6 hours
uploading/deleting and backing up 5 hours
editing 15 hours
handover 1 hour

(add that up and multiply by your $20/hr)

add in the cost of
2c for every frame you take as depreciation to your camera
travel costs and a few drinks during the day
extra bateries and memory cards
cost of cd's or whatever products you offer

that is the bare minimum to break even.. and a percentage on that to actually make a profit.


remember this is time away from your family that an never be replaced.. is it worth it?

are they a good looking couple?
if they fell on their faces from the ugly tree there's no point considering this a "portfolio building" wedding.
Sorry but it's true... you will only find young pretty brides on most established photographers websites.