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I signed a temporary contract with my photographer but am still debating what to do. Our photographers have a one person deal (1 shooter) for $1750+13% tax for 8 hrs, plus free e session, photos copywrite free on a disk, etc, or 2 shooters for 6 hrs for $2000+13% tax plus free e-session, disk, etc. I am going with a cheap photographer (average I found for 6 hrs was around $3000) but I love their work. Our total budget is $20,000.
Our photography package we chose was $1,700. It's gone up in 2012, so we're glad we booked early, I think this particular package is now $1,900. That being said, our photographer had a number of packages ranging from $1,000 (for like 4 hours, 1 shooter) up to well over $3,000. We just went with the package that fit our budget and met our needs.
ETA: Our budget is around 8-10K. I LOVE our photographer's work, she's amazing.
This was the one thing where I took cost out of the equation. Pictures are so important and if you love the photographer then go for it. If they cost $2700, so be it. If you fall in love with a photog that costs $1500, well even better! If you can reasonably afford it the photog of your dreams just do it.
In general I do think it is worth spending the money on photography.
The photographer we had was $2,400, our total wedding cost about $22,000. Unfortunately we got a dud of a photographer personality-wise. The wedding planning for us was done long distance, so I was only able to speak to her over the phone. The phone conversations were fine, so I sent her the deposit ($1250) but when we met in person I knew I'd made a mistake with this particular photographer. Unfortunately the deposit was non-refundable. We received some beautiful photos from the day, but her attitude made the whole thing a sour experience for me. So my advice would be to meet with the photographer in person before booking.
Our budget is 26k. We're paying 5k for photography/videography. Your pictures are going to last far longer than flowers, cake, and food ever will.. so I think if you really love the photog, go for it.
Our budget is about $15 000. Our photographer comes in at around $2300, and that's for 8 hours of shooting, all the editing, and a HI-RES disc of our pictures. IMHO, photography is worth the money. It's the only thing you have to remember the day by. I am actually the most excited vendor-wise about our photographer - he does fantastic work and I am so excited to see how ours turn out!
Photography and viedography will come out to about $5300, and thats only after I negotiated to take off $1100 by paying cash. It's about 15% of our budget. I think it's worth it because it covers unlimited photography and videography for two days (reception and wedding on different days), 2 large canvases, engagement and bridal session, 1-40 page photo album, 2-20 page parents' album, raw and edited video, highlight video, copyright and usage rights to all my photos on a Hi-res CD. It was by far my biggest cost after food, and well worth it in my mind.
Our photographer is 10% of our estimated budget. We didn't so much focus on dollar amounts as we did quality of work, but we definitely got lucky and found a great photographer (a married couple!) who take amazing pictures for the right price. It exists, just take your time and look around.
And yes, 'proof' of the day is very important to me. We're also dropping serious cash on our videographer and I have zero regrets!
I'm in Chicago, and our photography costs were around 15% of our budget. I went a bit over budget for our photographer because it was a high priority of ours.
$1500. I'm so happy with my choice too.
I'm glad to have nice pictures, but even 6 months later, I rarely look at them anymore. I'm glad I didn't go overboard, especially now that we have found out we need to pay for IVF unexpectedly.
I'm an avid hobbyist photographer so it was the most important part of the day for me. That being said I'm also a realist and refuse to break our budget ($6k). I set myself at a goal of $1500-$1800 for a photographer with a good package and this is who I nabbed!...
http://www.ddophoto.com/3/artist.asp?ArtistID=8536&Akey=ALXEGR6V
I love his style. Communication with him has been great. I do like the fact that he was a photojournalist previous also. He seems very polite but also exuberant and his reviews on wedding wire were great. We are getting his 6 hr package ($1500) and he is charging $125 for travel (about four hours roundtrip from the Milwaukee area to Wallace MI).
He also included a link to other wedding proofs in his initial email. That way I could see what the day looks like overall, not just the pretty ones because, let's face it, they all don't end up stunning lol!
Btw the picture that really really sold me on him is in gallery 3, 4th row first picture. I love the tree and the editing on it and could totally see it blow up as art :)
Hope that helps and good luck on your search!
Rules of thumb are just a starting point, you definitely should adjust them according to what's most important to you. We are eloping so our photos are going to cost more than everything else combined! (Excluding travel costs since we count that as honeymoon.) It is really important to have nice photos. I saw some elopement photos from someone who charges $300 and they just look like snaphots a friend might take.
@Aure: I totally agree with this! We had our eyes on a certain photographer before we were even engaged. We contacted him soon after we got engaged, before we'd set a date or set a budget or anything, to find out his prices. And yes, there was a lot of sticker shock. But photos were the most important thing to us, and we found a way to make it work. We ended up going with his B team, which was quite a bit cheaper, and we worked hard to save money in a lot of other areas. In the end, I have absolutely no regrets. We loved working with our photography team (they are so kind and so much fun), and we have loved the pictures we've seen so far (still waiting for all of our pics right now). I would absolutely do it all over again.
@curse10kaia: There's a huge bridal show the 21st/22nd (this coming weekend) at the Frontier Airlines Center in downtown Milwaukee. I highly suggest you go if you can, DAVID TUTERA WILL BE THERE. Back to the post lol, there are always a ton of good people there and a lot from the Lake Geneva area will be there as well. Also Lake Geneva is such a popular place to get married, lots of the photogs here travel there for pretty much nothing. If you decide you still love the traveling photog, by all means go for it! There is nothing worse than looking at so-so pictures in 15 years when you're showing your children/family the pics. Good luck!
Our budget is right around $16,000 and we are paying ~1850 for 2 photographers and the e session as well as full coverage with a disk and the rights. I would say that it's really up to you and your FI. Photography was really important to us, so we were willing to spend a little more on the photography and cut back on things like the cake, accessories, decorations, etc.
I would do whatever you can afford. We were only 21 when we got married and just had my aunt take the photos. So sad! (they sucked) But I honestly don't think it would have been worth it to us to spend our life's savings on it.
I'm a photographer now, and I can tell you that there is a lot more to creating the album beyond taking the photos. Just to upload the digital images yourself, edit them all to be perfect, arrange them in a book...first of all, even when you know what you are doing, it takes days of work (super fun work, but time is money), and if you want it leather bound, wrapped in silk, in the keepsake box, with the thick gold edged pages....the manufacturer charges $700 for the product alone.
I now realize why photographers charge so much! Haha. It's a full week of effort, plus the cost of the album! So, if you can afford it, go for it. You will get what you pay for. The most experienced photographers know how to get those perfect creative shots, and it is something you will keep forever! If I were getting married now that I have some money in the bank, I would definitely not hesitate to invest in it. This is your chance to have your happy gorgeous youthful self memorialized for your grandchildren to see. :)
U should put 'other' as a option. My FI and I dont have the cash for such an expense(putting the money in other areas of the wedding), so we are paying my uncle $100 to take the pics for us.
I plan on giving him a list of the pics I want, Ive learned that the more u explain to your photographer of what u want, the more likely chance of u not being disappointed and know I will get some good ones. He's not a professional, but I have seen his pictures through the years and trust him more then lets say another relative. :)
Besides, we decided to put our money into other areas of the wedding. We figure we will look at the pics of the wedding, maybe once a couple years and dont consider 1,000+ worth it. My parents wedding album was on their shelf for years without being touched.....its good to get pictures of the day, but paying that much for it? Each person is different and what they want. Some brides want to pay the money, while others like me wants to put the money toward other parts of the wedding.
Good luck deciding. :)
Just ask for like four hours of coverage. You can pay a lot less if you will accept less coverage.
We found two great photographers for $1500 for a full day of shooting and an engagement shoot which is great value for our area. Their work is lovely - is it the most amazing thing I've ever seen? ...no, but we are not prepared to spend a fortune on photos. I know that they are so important to so many couples, but for us we just want to enjoy the day and have some nice photos that we can frame and then put in an album later. Although everyone says that they are the only thing that lasts past the wedding day, and there is some truth in that, you do have your memories and a marriage after the day so bankrupting yourself, or even denying yourself nicer wedding or honeymoon memories and experiences just to pay for photos that you will look at now and again isn't worth it to me. But I do appreciate that I am in the minority on this!!
@curse10kaia: Our wedding budget is not to exceed $15,000. We recently booked our photographer after an extensive search for the right photog and within our budget. Most couples in my area will spend $3,000 and up for photography which most include just the wedding coverage. To us, photography is important because it is the one thing (other than memories) that will have and share with family and friends in years to come...so we wanted the right photographer. Our package includes an all-day e-shoot, all-day wedding coverage, album, printing credits for family/friends, hi-res disc, rights to the pics and printing rights,no travel charges, editing to ALL of our wedding pictures and she is even giving us 20 edited pics that we can post on FB right after the wedding. We're paying $2,500 for all this and best part yet, she has an awesome personality and her work is truly great! She isn't one of larger or extremely well-known photographers in our area but her work is better than some of the photographers that were charging us an arm and a leg. At the end, we realized investing in an expensive photographer doesn't necessarily always mean that his/her work is worth a large investment. I'm sure you can find a great photographer within your budget. We found a photographer that her entire package was less than $2,000 but the photog lacked in personality and was not comfortable with our ceremony restrictions but her work was good as well.
Here are some links to help you on your search, good luck!
http://www.theknot.com/Vendors/Chicago-Photographers/Profiles/PHO/045?f=118:269
Overall budget $20-25k. Photographer budget was "under $2.k-ish." Lowest we found was an $850 nightmare. Ugh. So bad. We ended up with a $1,800 photographer. 6 hours of coverage, high def photos on a CD, and a $200 photo printing credit from smugmug.com (haven't used that site before). Note: Everything in the DC metro area is super expensive. My sense of a low budget for a photographer is def off.
Thanks so much for all the useful tips, Bees! I think we're going to go with the photographer I fell in love with, and just order the smallest package, ($2,000 for full day coverage and a disc of hi-res images, +$100 travel fee & hotel room). For $700 more they'll send 2 photographers, but I don't really see the need for that... right? Let me know if you disagree, & thanks again for the help... y'all are wonderful! :)
The only circumstances I would say merit 2 photographers:
The #1 reason I'm having only 1 photographer is that I picked one who normally works alone and I lovee the work I've seen. The #2 reason is that 2 of my friends are fancy-camera-amateur photographers and everyone in my group has a point and shoot digital camera. I know everyone will take hundreds of pictures during cocktail haha.
Photography is VERY important, and not all photographers are equal. Hire the best photographer your budget will allow you to hire, without compromising too much on the rest of your categories.
I'm flying my photog and videographer team in from New Jersey (aka across 2 countries, ha!) but it's going to be worth it. I LOVE LOVE LOVE her work (and his) and she's giving me a good deal since it's a destination wedding for her. Even with travel costs it won't cost me that much more than some local photographers charge and she's shooting the rehearsal/rehearsal dinner and will do a day-after shoot with us if we want. She also said we could try to squeeze in a quick b-session the night before the wedding and is being really flexible. Very happy with her so far!
We're spending probably about $5,000 on photography. We're getting a package that has 2 photographers, photo rights, DVD of prints, album, two parents albums, and an e-shoot with those pictures on disc as well. Photography is the one place I refuse to cut corners on! After the wedding, all you have let (tangible, at least) is the photos!
I think the price is prety ressonable. I live in New York City and payed 3,000 for my photograher! So I would say if you love them, then its great. I also got a great deal on my make up artist who was amazing. Jonny Polizzi @ Jonnypolizzi.com. My photographer I got through a google search, Amy Goldstein. Hope that helps!
I have the same problem! I sent a deposit to a photographer whose pictures I fell in love with! She charges $2500 and i was only planning to spend $2000-$2300 for BOTH photo and video. I'm still wondering if I should go with a company whose cheaper! Good luck!!!
P.S. I got an e-mail from Eivan's photographter in Chicagoland $1300 for 10 hours of photo AND video. George street has similar pricing.
I think the price is prety ressonable. I live in New York City and payed 3,000 for my photograher! So I would say if you love them, then its great. I also got a great deal on my make up artist who was amazing. Jonny Polizzi @ Jonnypolizzi.com. My photographer I got through a google search, Amy Goldstein. Hope that helps!
We have a similar budget - our target was actually 10K, but including the dress and rings and everything, we're probably coming in around 15K. We found a photog we really liked for $1000, but I was prepared to go to $2000 for our second choice.
I did fall in love with a $3500 photog pair, which I actually did not think was unreasonable for the work, but looking at the whole scheme of things and based on the fact I'd found three strong contenders for at or under 2K... I had to walk away.
Maybe you can keep them in mind at least, while you keep looking?
in my opinion it's worth every single penny. Our photography cost $4500..and they were 12% of our budget. You will have these pictures forever, if you can afford it, go for it!
I spent about $2800 for photography and together with videography, spent almost 5k.
But this is in DC and he was a very good photographer. I'd think in WI, you could find a more reasonable one since the cost of living is less?
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Hi Bees!
I'm wondering how much you're spending on a photographer vs. the actual cost of your weddings? I have an overall budget of $15,000 and was trying to keep the photography around $1,500, but I just fell in love with a photographer who charges $2,500 +$200 for travel fees, (they're not from my area).
Is it worth it to go so far above what I wanted to spend for pictures? Am I nuts for thinking I can get an above-average photographer for $1,500?
Thanks in advance for your help on this ladies!!!
p.s. Any photographer suggestions for the Chicago, IL / Lake Geneva, WI areas?