I am sure there is a new crop of newly engaged brides and grooms out there since I last wrote in. You are probably just starting to get your feet wet in wedding planning. Have you started looking to hire a wedding photographer and/or videographer? Let me write to you about our experience and the different wedding photographer tips you should know. So generally most people narrow down their vendors according to budget. That is what we did too, but even within our budget there is such a broad spectrum of services and you really need to know what you’re talking about.
I contacted over a dozen photo and videographers. First things first, vendors who took days to return our message or email were immediately cut. If they are hard to contact before we have a contract then who knows what sort of service they would provide after a contract was involved. From there I narrowed it down to those who fell within our budget. Here is where it stopped being so simple. We soon realized even if the prices we were quoted were the same and included the same photo and video ‘package’ there was a vast difference in quality and service. Naturally we started visiting vendors at the lower end of our budget, our thought was if we can get what we want spending the lowest dollar amount then there would be no need to go to the top of our budget. This is where we started really seeing the difference in quality. Out of the vendors that we saw, we quickly learned the lingo and what it all really meant.
Videography – is the process of capturing moving images on electronic media. It is also considered the more traditional approach. So anything from your uncle recording you during your speech to the hired professional is technically considered videography. Personally, what I found the most telling about a good videography is not so much how quickly they could name off the equipment they used but how well they recorded the ceremony. If there was sudden zooming in and out, heads being cut, poor lighting or focusing on the wrong object meant that we were not going to consider this videographer.
Cinematography – is the creation of motion picture images. You are probably thinking, is that not the same as videography? The answer is NO. Cinematography is considered more modern, more creative during the recording process and more frames of film involved per second, similar to an actual movie. You will notice that vendors that offer cinematography charge a premium for their services but we found that you can’t help but notice the difference in quality.
Fine art photography – photographs that are created in accordance with the creative vision of the photographer. So basically, when you are flipping through the photographers work you should love their style because their style will determine the overall look for your photos because they will be actively directing the shots.
Photojournalism – you will see a lot of photographers advertise themselves as taking photojournalistic images. What does this mean? It means they are trying to take a visual account for the event without much direction from the photographer. So again, if the photographers portfolio is strong you will see strong images because they have intuition of how to capture an image without their direct intervention.
So where did my fiancé and I end up amongst all these options? Unbeknownst to us before we got started we ended up using a vendor that specialized in cinematography and fine art photography. What drew us to these two is the overall look. They were less traditional, less structured and in our opinion more artistic. And the answer is YES, because we went this route we did have to spend the top of our budget but, hey, you only have one chance at capturing your big day, right?
“What led you to your dream wedding photographer? Share your experiences or ask me questions below.“
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