After Jess and TJ’s guests thoroughly wore themselves out in the field day tournament, everyone dressed up for a tented rehearsal dinner party.  It was the weekend’s most formal event.  Guests dined in a tent that opened up on a little pond and it was embellished with dressy-up, woodsy decor and lots of sweet, handmade touches.  We especially loved all the wooden table numbers, the tree-bark wrapped “vases,” and the escort card heart made of stones with each guest’s name.

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We stole Jess and TJ away for a few minutes, just before sunset for photographs along the dirt road out to the horse pasture (and spa!) at C Lazy U.   Taking a few minutes here and there out of a busy wedding weekend schedule—particularly in moments with perfect light—to make some beautiful portraits always has a huge impact on the overall coverage of your wedding. We’ll hurry you back to your guests, promise …

I think getting great wedding photographs is one part trained eyeballs (by which I mean vision) and two parts time-management, both on the part of the photographers and on the part of the couple. One little great time-management helper with multi-day weddings is to space out the group photographs across the events.  Not every family photograph needs to be on the wedding day.  We photographed Jess and TJ’s extended families separately at the rehearsal and then TJ requested this lodge-style combined family photograph, which I just love.

Jess and TJ’s friends and families also made almost all their toasts at the rehearsal dinner.  Except for a quick welcome toast from the bride’s father at the wedding reception, this freed them up on the wedding day for an uninterrupted party (!) … a fantastic bonus since it always goes by too too quickly, even when you have four days of celebrating.   This was a sweet way for everyone to get to know each other, too.

~♥~

The event is also featured {here} on 100 Layer Cake!  Come back tomorrow for more from Jess and TJ’s wedding day!

photographs: Gia Canali

event design: Duet Events (the bride’s design company); planning, Stacy McCain Events; venue and catering, C Lazy U Ranch; florals: Lisa Anderson, Sweet Pea Flowers; dessert (aka tower of awesomeness), Shamane’s Bake Shoppe, Boulder CO.

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Nevermind talent (we’re assuming that you’re looking at hiring someone talented! With passion! And artistry!). And nevermind the staggering cost of gear (cameras, computers, etc), insurance, work space, self-employment taxes, education, and all the other things that go into running a legitimate business, here’s what is implied in a wedding photography fee (though you’ll never see it on the contract or invoice):

I. Your Wedding Photographer’s Time (and lots of it!)

Before the wedding, your photographer will probably have spent a considerable amount of time getting to know you and your fiance and learning the ins-and-outs of your wedding as it takes shape.  There will be phone calls and planning meetings (or phone dates if planning from afar).  Your photographer may drive to the locations to do some location scouting, in hopes of finding the best spots and the good light.  There will likely be a flurry of thoughtful emails composed, and more phone calls, and some sketching-out of your day, as far as it relates to photography.  If you have a wedding planner, some of this collaboration will be done with the planner instead of with you. Before the wedding, your photographer will do everything she can do to set herself up to give you the best photographs possible. And that includes getting to know you and what’s important to you.

Right before the wedding, your photographer will order film and supplies, check and prep gear and film for the wedding, charge batteries, clean lenses, dust sensors, and definitely double- and triple-checking packing lists!

On the day of the wedding, even if faraway travel is not involved, your photographer might have already put in twelve hours or so on your wedding before even picking up a camera.  She will arrive early to the event (we often double or triple driving time … just in case!).  There will be more scouting, setup, then the shooting that’s stated in the package (see Part I), tear down of all the gear, and travel home … in time to put on some really comfortable shoes and start post-production.

Post-production usually begins just after the wedding, with downloading and backing-up digital cards.  Then there are trips to the film lab, an organizing of images, editing and color-correcting digital images and film scans, posting images online, archiving the images to multiple locations and media, telling you and your spouse all about it, then printing the proofs, and—finally!— working on the album.  Most of our clients also have some custom handmade prints or vintage photographic processes as part of their package, so we’re usually busy working on those, too.  Many of those sorts of prints require studied work over a course of days or even weeks to complete.

The total amount of time your photographer invests in working on a wedding will vary from couple to couple, depending on the parameters and complexity of the shooting and what kind of album the client gets.  But it’s safe to say that a regular wedding, without any travel involved, is no less than a forty hour project.  Some weddings, and destination weddings for sure, often add up to much, much more than the forty-hour figure.  I think this is important to keep in mind when you’re looking at a wedding photography package or fee.  It’s anything but a day rate.

II. Your Wedding Photographer’s Experience (Which Equals Your Peace of Mind)

Your wedding photographer’s experience includes, but is not limited to, those weddings—and some of us have shot hundreds—where we’ve refined our eyes, our skills, our empathy; our performances, our shutter-fingers, our hearts, our blisters, and our minds so that you know and don’t just think you know that what we did for those other couples we can do for you.

Experience, and certainly not just what we learn “on the job,”¹ helps us as artists to make—to yearn to make—the images we know you’ll want to see in six weeks from now and in sixty years.  By our experience, we not only use really good product (like prints and albums!) that will last a lifetime,² we set ourselves about making images that are going to last a lifetime.

Just because someone is good with a camera, doesn’t make them good in the high-pressure, once-in-a-lifetime, action-packed, emotionally-wired, pressure-cooking, performance-driven, moment-after-moment-after-moment situation that a wedding is.  (Of course, we wedding photographers love that about our work! Weddings are an exhilarating challenge.).

You want to find a photographer with longevity—a long-standing, savvy business.  The longer someone’s been at this, the better they’ll be.  They’ll have learned from their experiences.  They’ll be smarter and better for you.  I wish I had known what I know now about making wedding photographs for people when I first stumbled into this, eleven years ago, snap-happy and indignant that nobody was planning to document my friend’s wedding, to show it for its hugeness.  For the momentous occasion that it was.  I wish I’d known these things at any of the zillion weddings between that one and the one I shot in December on the fair island of Anguilla.  And I wish I already knew what I’m going to learn this year and in five years so I could be that much better for my clients right now.

Longevity is also important because someone who’s been around—and done good business!— is likely going to be around and keep doing good business.  The ubiquitous starving artist is perhaps not quite what you want – rather, find someone who knows how to make a living making their art.   That kind of savvy and know-how speaks volumes without saying anything.

♥

The consumer adage “you get what you pay for” is wholly applicable when it comes to wedding photography, but if your taste and budget don’t align, there are a few options at the expense of peace of mind.  There’s always a fresh crop of up-and-comers on the wedding photography scene (probably partially fueled by their misguided assessment of the lofty so-called “day rates”).  You can get someone with lots of talent but not a lot of experience for a relative bargain rate. But, as I said, you do get what you pay for.  So as you search for a wedding photographer and begin sizing up packages and photographer’s fees, try to look at the information holistically.  Remember that saying? “Cheap isn’t good. Good is good.”

*If you missed Part I yesterday, find it {here}.

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¹ Truly, I think our wedding-day shooting experience is only the beginning of what shapes our artwork.  We photographers spend countless untold hours shooting on our own, roaming around with cameras, tinkering, learning to coax from them the sorts of images we want to make.  We bury ourselves in piles of photo books and prints, art books.  We wander museums.  We travel.  We take things in, sometimes with a camera.  We try things with the cameras, with the films, with printing, and editing.  We try them again.

² Really good photographers also invest time to cultivate a good working relationship with their album-makers, their labs—with all their collaborators.

photos: Gia Canali (the photographer and subject pictured are these guys!)

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Two looks are better than one!  This bride had her hair redone during the cocktail hour.  I love how something so simple as letting one’s hair down really makes for an entirely different look (and a relatively budget-friendly one, compared with buying two frocks, for instance).

photos: Gia Canali; hair, Dano Abriol

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The first dance is such a sweet moment in the wedding day.  It’s a challenge for shy brides and grooms (since all eyes are on you!), but I think it’s a particularly lovely tradition, one that can yield some fantastic photographs, and one that deserves some thoughtfulness in the planning of your wedding day.  Here are a few easy tips to get you started:

1. Choose that just-right song.

Emotion in real life = emotion in your real photographs.  The song can be magical or meaningful, sentimental or just plain fun, but definitely choose one that makes you two dance.

2. Consider the lighting and space you’ll use.

Lighting can add drama, but it also shows off your faces.  And I know I’m always reminding folks about their grannies, but your grannies will be glad they can see your faces, too.  This might mean planning your first dance just before or after sunset if you are planning an outdoor reception.  Or it could mean bringing in lighting to accent the dance floor if you’re planning an indoor or late night outdoor reception.

3. Practice!

I don’t necessarily mean you have to take dance lessons, though I have seen—and thoroughly admired!—some spectacular choreographed and rehearsed first dances.  Practice could simply mean slow dancing around your living room a few times before the wedding (which you’ll probably love anyway at that point in the planning!).

♥

photos: Gia Canali

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Two photographer coverage of your wedding day might sound like a nifty luxury, but in fact, it’s darn close to (or, frankly, is!) a total necessity.  Some photographers, myself included, work exclusively with a second photographer/assistant.*  And because it’s our job, as the professionals, to watch out for you guys, to set you up to succeed—and, truthfully, to set ourselves up to succeed on your behalf—I thought we should talk about why savvy couples book two photographer coverage of their weddings and why I require it for the weddings I photograph.

I. You Want Better Art

Two pairs of (trained) eyes are better than one.  Two photographers will see the same wedding entirely differently.  One of the reasons I love working with my husband is that he continually astounds me with how he sees what I see, but he sees it differently.  The coverage we offer together is more varied and more unique than what I could offer alone.

II. You Want a Better Wedding Day

Your day is better because we are efficient. When we’re working together, we can wrangle the zillion cameras and zillion people involved in a wedding day smoothly.  My shooting style requires two necks (at least!) to wear all the cameras I rotate through while I’m shooting.

And two pairs of hands mean I can keep shooting even when a roll of film needs changed or a new battery needs to go into a camera.

Plus, all the “organized” formal group photographs move along quickly and easily, which spells more time for you and your beloved with each other and with your guests.

III. Most Importantly: You Want To Protect Your Investment (And We Do, Too!)

The other reasons aside, the one that makes two photographer coverage of the wedding day a non-negotiable as far as I’m concerned, is that we all want to protect your investment in photography—in us. Sometimes a photograph of mine is better than my husband’s.  But sometimes his is better than mine.  Sometimes the shot or angle we thought would be the best, for some reason, isn’t (an overzealous aunt walked into the shot, say). But the other person got just the shot.  And that’s only thinking of normal shooting conditions.

What if a roll of film came out badly? What if one of the photographer’s shots were just slightly out of focus? What if something went wrong with a camera card? What if one of your photographers got sick at the wedding? Or hurt?  It would still be your wedding day. And, with two photographer coverage, you’d still have beautiful heirloom photographs of the entire day.**

Destination weddings, of course, up the ante on all these concerns because so much can happen when travel is involved.***

♥

In the end, I’m talking about you making sure we all get it right (and get it best!) the first time because there’s only one go at your wedding day.

photo: Gia Canali

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* Some weddings are more logistically involved than others.  So with really big weddings, I’ll bring a third person, just to assist me and expedite what we do.

** Okay, that’s not to say that we don’t still miss something every once in a while.  We aren’t robots, after all.  And we can only be where we can be and do what we can do.

*** Not to mention that my cameras don’t all fit in one person’s carry-on luggage.  But that’s a story for another day.

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Sometimes, getting the photographer of your dreams means going with partial day coverage instead of full-day coverage.  And if that’s what you need to do, do it.  But—if there’s any way you can help it—don’t skimp on coverage early in the day.  Unfortunately, photographs of getting ready are often the first thing to go with limited photographic coverage.  Not only is the getting-ready time a beautiful ritual in and of itself, but it’s one you and your fiance generally go about separately from each other.

Adding time on the day of the event won’t necessarily give you time earlier on in the day when you’d have really needed it. So it’s a good idea not to rely on adding coverage on the day of the wedding.  In any case, proper advance planning should tell you how much time you should budget for.

photos: Gia Canali

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Your wedding day will already feel like it’s moving by at lightning speed.  I can tell you that for sure.  And while nobody wants the ceremony to go on-and-on-and-on, the wedding ceremony is—truly—the wedding.  You want to remember these moments.  And not only by photographs.

But, frankly, you do want to give your photographer enough time to capture great images of all the goings on—not just with you and your beloved, but also with your attendants, friends, and family (sometimes the reactions are priceless).  So, take a deep breath and look around while it’s all happening.  Don’t rush yourselves.  And while you’re soaking up your real life ceremony, your photographer can work on creating a beautiful and varied record of those fleet-footed moments.

(I’m hesitant to put a number of minutes as a minimum on your ceremony, but I’d say: planning a ceremony that is shorter than fifteen minutes should give you pause.  Everyone is going to talk faster and walk faster on the day of the wedding.  They’ll be excited.  As a bride, I was so excited—and also so unfamiliar with the music—that my dad and I processed in at the wrong time.  Not that I really cared.  I just wanted to get on with it!)

photo: Gia Canali

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There are lots of different reasons people want engagement portraits.  Some people want to get practice in front of the camera.  Others want prints to display at the wedding.  Some folks want nice images to use for their save the dates.  Or they just want a few nice photos of themselves together in—if not regular—at least non-wedding attire.

In any case, planning engagement photographs is just like planning other sorts of portrait sessions, with a few special considerations, mostly in the interest of timing your session out before the wedding.  So these tips are also good for people looking to plan a bridal session, a family portrait session or a children’s session (well, except you want to keep in mind kids’ naptimes and happy vs. grouchy times in mind, too, not just lighting).

I. Imagine a Concept

I always think the most successful sessions have the simplest concepts.  Choose somewhere meaningful, like where you had your first date, or re-create your proposal, or take photographs at home, particularly if it’s a home you’ve built or remodeled together.  Choose something fanciful (you know, I’ve had a few couples choose underwater photographs).  Choose something you love doing together – my twin sister, Meghan, just did a portrait session with a couple skiing (so cute!).  Your photographer might be able to help you get your ideas flowing, so definitely ask for help if you need it.  She may be floating an idea around in her mind, just waiting to match it to the right couple.

II. Choose a Location

Your concept may dictate a specific location, but if not, it’ll certainly help narrow down to the type of location you want to find.  In Los Angeles, be mindful of location permits and use fees (insert groaning and rolling-of-eyes).  Other places aren’t so strict.  Your photographer may have some ideas – you may have some ideas – and scouting is almost always very helpful, particularly if you want to use a location you aren’t familiar with.

III. Think About Time of Day

There are a few times of day that are generally excellent to take photographs: early in the morning, during that last golden hour before sunset, and, in some locations— think urban locations with lots of lights—just after sunset when the sky is deepening blue.

IV. Think About What You’d Like To Do with the Images

This might be counter-intuitive, but with engagement photos specifically, planning ahead for the output is important in case you want anything ready in time for the wedding.  Do you want a single stand-alone image to print?  Do you want a collection of prints? Are you looking to make a book? Would you rather have one or a few handmade prints? Does any of this need to be ready in time for your wedding?

V. Plan Your Wardrobe / Look

I think the best looks for engagement photographs are flattering and special.  I’m not crazy about costume-like looks, but you want to look your best for sure! Note: though both partners should look equally dressy.

VI. Schedule Your Session

With all this information gathered, all you’ll need is to coordinate with your photographer.  If you would like prints or albums in time for the wedding, be sure to ask how much lead time your photographer needs to put those things together.  With destination weddings, “engagement photos” might not happen until the day after the wedding.  But otherwise: give yourselves plenty of time before the wedding, if at all possible.  And once you settle on a session time, stick to it!  If you’re planning photos during the busiest part of wedding season, missing a session might make rescheduling tricky.

We’ll talk about getting great results at your session soon!

photos: Gia Canali

* This couple opted to take their photos on the Malibu hillside where he proposed to her!

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