This is why you learn your craft

[Sime]

I have started looking after customer service / experience for the dPS blog. Sometimes [daily] I receive questions relating to photography / photographers and what to do in a situation... This scenario (which the sender is happy for me to share) is one I hear so so very often. Photographers... or rather, people that have just bought a dSLR who have not refined the craft / are NOT photographers, should really think before they start charging to shoot weddings... This one made me a little bit cross.

Here's the message;

"Hi,
I wonder if you can advise me on what steps to take next.

After an agreement as we were on low budget we agreed to pay photographer who claim to be professional £400 for our wedding (50 pics plus disc)

Our photos are not of the same high standard as on their website and there are only three photos with full body shots of us (both of us not looking at camera..one i am and the other my husband and the third none of us)

There are so many things wrong with the others. My mother in law looking away. My husband in middle of saying something, me with eyes closed. My son yawning...These are supposed to be the official posing ones.

The group shot was taken on stairs against my request to be in main room (was told they would be in way of staff in hotel but manager confirmed this was not the case) so everyone squashed and heads cut off at top of stairs.

No table setting taken despite having complete access to room.

We have written several times and they have given us £50 back but we feel this is an insult as now we will have to get someone to sort some pics (move eyes etc and add and remove people from pics) We have asked for £150 more so we only paid half the amount.

As an amateur photographer my sons pics are near or better quality than theirs and we are seriously considering hiring the kilt and having pics of bride and groom only redone this summer so we have ones in which we are looking and more wedding like pics. I feel this refund would help cover the cost.

What kind of advice can you give to me on handling this matter correctly.

many thanks"

Here's a couple of images that were delivered as a final product to the couple...
I've opted not to post the company name - but really, I should... People that claim to be professional are hurting the photography industry...

What's your opinion?

[jamesev]

Ok heres my jumbled offerings...

I suppose it works both ways, as with any service. If a product is going cheap, its generally cheap for a reason (the phrase cheap and nasty comes to mind).

If a car is avertised as an Italian sports car for £1500 don't expect a ferrari, expect more of a fiat punto (sporting)

I don't think its just the photography industry that suffers from those who have dabbled a bit and then think they are experts and can start charging.

Having tinkered and toyed with my own PCs at home, I then used to get asked questions about software, then hardware and eventaully was asked to fix friends PCs, this snowballed and I then found my self fixing friends of friends PCs. The trouble was that if during the fixing process (eg a complete flattening of the PC and OS reinstall) something went wrong this could leave them in a worst situation (with no PC at all) it was then my fault / responsibility to sort it out, so what started as a favour became a full on weekend job.

slight digression, anyhow the basics are, from a photog point of view, if you are taking on such tasks, I refer to wedding photography, know your requirements and limiitations

however from the customers perspective don't cut corners financially, do your research and if you go for cheap and cheerful you need to lower your expectations

Until the industry is regulated in the same way others are then the customers will need to be more stringent in their scrutineering of the service provider.

[candidrachel]

I've seen far, far worse wedding snaps. The trouble is using the word "professional". That very word conjours up all sorts of connotations and expectations. It would be must better if someone just starting out explains that they are just starting out. That they are honing their skills and broadening their horizons as a photographer. Be honest from the start! That's what I did!

I've only shot 3 wedding (that was a couple of years ago now) and each time I was upfront and honest right from the first phone call and I didn't even have a portfolio to show anyone! You could say that their expectations weren't very high but I delivered photos that they loved.

The moral of my reply is honesty is always the best policy but I'm puzzled that the website photos didn't match the final photos. Almost like they talk the talk but can't walk the walk or did they syphon off photos from someone else in order to get clients?

[gturner]

There are heaps of new consumer protection laws coming into effect and maybe it is about time some gave one of these clowns a blood nose.

That said - People get what they pay for. They wouldn't go to have heart surgery with a witch doctor using a carpet knife just because it was cheaper.

[BigFuzzy]

In the end, I agree with Jamesev with some caveats. By this I mean that on one hand, you get what you pay for, ie 400quid is only 400quid. You'll get that amount worth of quality, which if you looked around, should tell you something. On the other hand, you MUST must must be able to deliver on what people see from your portfolio/website, and I somehow get the feeling these guys didn't.

Rachel - your portfolio and price should be enough honesty to tell people where you stand in terms of talent. I say "should" because you need to be able to reproduce the quality of the images you are using as your portfolio and if the client likes what they see in the portfolio, there is no need to talk your skills down.

In the end it makes me mad these "pros" are giving us a bad name especially when (allegedly) not living up to what they promised. But, I as well get frustrated when people get angry over 500e worth of wedidng photos because what do you expect from someone that only values themselves at 500e?

Still, Sime, name and shame and give them a chance to respond! Have you seen their website? Where the photos they produced that much worse than what was being shown on their website, as that's really really relevant.

PS the quality of the images shown, to me, are a perfect example of someone who thinks "wow, I have a nice camera and a pop up flash/limited flash knowledge, I can do weddings!" Grrrrrrrrr

[candleman]

Wow, I really feel sorry for people who get crap "photographers" like this.
My own wedding images were trashed thanks to an idiot with a white lens and an attitude.



In this situation, (and I'm unsure of consumer Laws outside of NZ) I'd say contact a Citizens Advice Beurau for information on your particular countries consumer Laws.

If money has changed hands, You are pobably protected against bad workmanship even if there is no contract.
If the work does not live up to the portfolio, then they certainly do have some explaning to do.

[candidrachel]

Big Fuzzy I wasn't trying to talk my skills down. It was an excersise that I just woke up one morning and decided to go and shoot a few weddings so I put ads in the local paper asking if anyone would be interested in my services - for free in return for pics for my portfolio. Bearing in mind that I hadn't joined this site at the time. Heck, I'd never have the nerve or audacity to do that now. Not since I now know what I still need to learn regarding compostion and lighting etc

You know what I was innundated with people! All wanting something for nothing! I even had to turn a few down because the weddings were in a non-descript registry office, followed by a few beers and something to eat down at the Nags Head pub! - no kidding!

Like I said, the people that I did the weddings for wanted nothing more than just a few snapshots of their wedding day.

[Vernian]

I'm looking at it a little from the other side. I hear what all of you are saying about customers that should not expect too much if they're paying that "little". But I think what a lot of photographers are missing is the fact that non-photographers don't know/understand why things are priced the way they are.

I do feel sorry for the couple, especially if the photos on the portfolio was much better quality - after all how else can potential customers judge who they want?

I got married 7 years ago in South Africa and back then I knew nothing about photography. At the time we went for a "cheaper" option too. We paid R800 (about equivalent to £60 at that stage). Now admittedly my entire wedding only cost R9000, so it was almost 10% of the total cost, we only had 18 guests and the photographer only did the ceremony, group/posed shots, and a number of after-ceremony shots throughout the gardens of my husband and I. She was there for no more than 2 hours. But the point is, as wedding photography goes that's pretty cheap, even taking inflation into account. And at the time I thought that was quite pricy for the 2-3 hours work. I had no concept of how post production works, how photographers take many more pictures than they need and all the work that comes after the actual shoot. I was lucky, I got fantastic photos and I've recommended the photographer to everyone in the area.

I know its the customer's responsibility to find out about stuff, but equally well its hard to find out the stuff you don't know if you didn't even know you didn't know about it. Non-photographers may well think the job is only the time the photographer spend at the wedding. Maybe if those photographers that really are proper professionals had a section on their website that explained it better, more people would feel that the high price was deserved.

Offcourse I don't have/ intend to have a business so this is all just my personal experience of things

[graciousness]

£400 is a lot of money for a lot of people. Granted that good, professional photographers cost a lot more than that, but the reality is that most people can't afford the price. Sure, one can say save up for it, etc, but sometimes, it really isn't as simple as that.

So with what you have, you look for someone who is willing to do a good job. And certainly if someone takes up the price you can afford to pay and shows a portfolio saying yes, their quality of work is good enough, in good faith, you should receive the good photos that you have come to expect from their portfolios. In this sense, no, you don't get what you paid for just like the case of the poor couple here.

I don't care, you just don't ruin people's special once-in-a-lifetime events like that out of greed and carelessness. That's just plain ripping off people.

I would threaten reporting this to the media if the company doesn't give them the £150 they have asked for back.

[candleman]

I'll just add, just because a photographer is expensive and has a good looking portfolio, it doesn't mean you're going to get something great either.

A Collegue recently got married, and they were considering me.. but went with someone else more than three times my price because they were "Professionals".

I felt sorry for them when I saw their photos.. there were probably only 3 in the entire set I wouldn't have been utterly ashamed of.

So, $$$ does not equal skill either.