Do I Need a Wedding Photographer

Let's see if I can help you decide if you do or don't and if your uncle or friend is up to the job of a wedding photographer.

Do I need a wedding photographer

If you’re getting married soon, or if you’ve been in a relationship for some time, and you’re looking to hire a wedding photographer, you’ll need to consider many things before making the final decision. For example, do you want someone who specialises in weddings? Or do you want someone who specialises in photography? Do you want someone who specialises in certain styles of photography? But even once you have found a photographer that you like, there are a few more important questions that you need to ask yourself.

Bridel Preperations

Those shoes were stunning.

But what if you have a friend or family member with a good camera.

It takes much more than a good camera to capture amazing wedding photographs. Anyway, how do you know it’s a good camera? Cameras look alike to most people. I once had an uncle at a wedding tell me, "I got a camera like that; it's in the attic". Little did he know that my camera was the brand new Canon R Mirrorless, which had only come off the production line three months earlier. I'm a "Gold" member of Canon Professional Services. This means that I have a lot of Canon equipment registered with Canon and maintained by canon.

Eyes2Me Photography: Canon Professional Services logo

Will they have any backup equipment on hand – I doubt it. Does photography equipment fail? Well, yes, they do. Professional Photographers will take good care of the cameras, lenses and flash etc. But they can still fail. That’s why a professional always got two or even three cameras. Most will have overlapping lenses to cover any individual failure. Often more than one light source too.

A lot of venues are now also asking to see a copy of the photographer’s insurance. Certainly, your good camera friend will not have this. This might seem a little unfair, but if any damage occurs at the venue by a photographer, the venue will want reimbursement for the damage. Let’s not forget the contract for the venue hire is with the wedding couple.

Regarding insurance, I highly recommend you take out insurance coverage for your wedding. If the venue close or any other wedding services fail before your wedding, its goodbye to deposits.

Here are some questions that you should be asking yourself when looking for a wedding photographer: Do You Need a Photographer? This may seem like a strange question, but it is one of the most important ones that you can ask. Do you want a photographer? Or do you just want a digital camera? While digital cameras can be used to take great photos, they aren’t as versatile as a professional photographer. So, if you only want a camera for your wedding, that’s fine. But if you’re looking for something more than that and you want to hire a professional wedding photographer, then you will need to consider the following things:

What Does Your wedding Photography Budget

Bridebook (2022) reports that 91% of wedding couples hire a Professional photographer, with the average spend on wedding photography being £1,200. My Cost for a day of wedding photography is £999 with a stunning chromed USB.

Your wedding budget will play an important role in what type of photographer you hire. If you have a small budget, then you may want to limit yourself to just one photographer who is starting his or her photography career. But if you have a larger budget, you may want to hire a professional wedding photographer to cover all of the different things that you want to be captured.

It's your wedding day. It's not a day at the beach. Hire a professional photographer.

How Do You Want To Be Photographed

How Do You Want To Be Photographed? This may seem odd, but you must consider how you want to be photographed on your wedding day. Some people love being posed, while others prefer to be more natural. But no matter what pose you want, you will want to be sure that your photographer understands what you want.

What Types Of Photographic Style Do You Like? When it comes to wedding photography, there are many different styles. Some photographers specialize in candids, while others specialize informal portraits. But whatever style you prefer, you will want to make sure that the photographer you choose can do the type of photos that you want.

Wedding Day in South Wales

Wedding Evening in West Wales

Choosing your wedding Photographer

Look At Their Portfolio. If you want to hire someone to photograph for your wedding, the first thing you should do is look at their portfolio. While many photographers will have their websites, many of them also have printed portfolios.

If they have a website or online portfolio, then you will want to take a look at it and see if you like what you see. But if they don’t have a website or online portfolio, you should probably ask them about it when you are interviewing them.

Ask For References After you have looked at their portfolio, you should also ask for references from previous clients. If you want to ensure that your photographer will be able to work with you for several years, then it would make sense to ask for references from several clients. This will allow you to see whether or not the photographer has had good luck with previous clients and whether or not he or she is willing to work with you again.

Ask About Their Experience Finally, you should ask about the experience of the photographer you are interviewing. This is important because if a wedding photographer doesn’t have any experience, it will be difficult for him or her to learn how to photograph weddings. So you will want to ask them how many weddings they’ve photographed and what types of weddings they have photographed. This will help you determine whether or not they have experience in the type of wedding you want.

Wedding Ceremony

Choose between the three main styles of wedding photography, There are other styles, but most are made of a combination of the three.

Reportage / Journalistic Photography. Captures emotion and story of the day. Works fast and might not include traditional shots (so check that the photographer will include these if you ask him/her too

Traditional Photography. Classic and timeless shots. Does take a lot of wedding time, and may miss some of the emotions of your wedding.

Contemporary Photography. Stunning and artistic shots could lose some personality and mood. Reminds me of photographs of advertising clothes.

Now it's your turn to do some research. Do you want a photographer? How much are you able to budget? What style do you want?

Eyes2Me Photography.

Reportage / Journalistic Photography style will include group shots and private moments of the wedding couple if required. They will be quick with very little intrusion of instruction from me.

Often Featured in South Wales Wedding Magazine

Confetti moment at Merthyr Castle

The confetti moments are always a hit with the wedding couple.

Journalistic style photograph for this lovely couple

You may kiss the bride

A true wedding moment

Do you need a photographer? Only you can decide. But my advice is to book a photographer. Go big or go home.

More information on Booking a photographer:

https://www.eyes2me.photography/post/looking-for-a-photographer