Wedding Photography Buzz - Digital Wedding Secrets

There are two types of wedding photography assistants who you can hire: ones who have great potential to branch out on their own as a wedding photographer – and ones who have their hearts set on being a good one but have not acquired the necessary skills yet.

I tend to look for that delicate balance between the two. So essentially, what I personally need in a wedding photography assistant or a second shooter is someone who can almost read my mind. When covering weddings, it is my camera as the main photographer who the couple and their families will look at – so the second photographer should be willing to take a backseat in this department. One who likes to hog the limelight, I would not be able to work with harmoniously.

More importantly, a wedding photography assistant and a second shooter should like be an extension of my own arm. He or she should anticipate which items I would need and where we need to be next. Not getting to distracted by the events, being able to control a crowd during group pictures and being the ultimate professional – these are the qualities that you also need to look for in a second shooter if you want to succeed in the business.

Are you the type of wedding photographer who barks out commands, or say them softly but firmly? If you want to be taken seriously in the business, there’s a need to convey your authority to the second shooter who you will be working with.

If you don’t want to come off as someone who’s abrupt, have a good, long talk with the assistant or second shooter who you’ll be working with. Tell him or her that unless you get everything right, you will be wasting everyone’s time – including the bride’s and groom’s – as well as that of their guests and families.

As such, everything needs to be done quickly and efficiently. Just imagine how disastrous it would be if you are unable to shoot the newlywed’s first kiss because your assistant forgot to load your camera’s batteries!

All in all, if you want to have a successful wedding coverage, preparation is the key – and hiring a good assistant or second shooter is also a must.

Here’s the thing. When you are in the wedding photography business, there are 1,001 tiny details that you need to attend to. But two of the most important factors that you should not forget if you want your business to take off the ground are your websites and wedding photography portfolio. Let’s deal with it one at a time.

First, you do need to have a website constructed so that your existing and potential customers will have a way to gain access to samples of your work, or simply get more information about your wedding photography business.

Second, you do need to have a portfolio which showcases a collection of your best work. Make sure that it’s a concise collection, about 15 to 20 of your best photos will do.

Now, here’s a collection of some links that will help you out when building a portfolio and a website.

- GoDaddy.com and 1and1.com are a couple of cheap yet reliable web hosting providers – which is the first thing that you need to look for when building a website.

- When purchasing a pre-made portfolio, check out BluDomain.com which is known for their higher-end portfolios.

- CarbonMade.com is a site similar to BluDomain.com where you can buy pre-made portfolios – it’s a slightly cheaper but less flashy alternative.

- SimpleViewer and AutoViewer are flash galleries which are easy to use and customizable.

- Also, check out this report created by Photoshelter which indicates the factors that image buyers look for in a photographer’s website.

As a final note, make sure that the domain name that you will choose matches your business name – then you’re all set!

When I was first starting out in the wedding photography business and I had zero clients, I remember trying to give away my services practically for free – just so that I can gain enough experience covering wedding events. But later on, I realized that I did need to put a tag price on my services if I want to be considered as a professional wedding photographer.

Basically, you need to create that delicate balance between a pricing that will you’re your wedding photography efforts financially worth it – while avoiding driving away clients because your prices are too high.

Here’s a great formula that you can use if you want to come up with a reasonable pricing for the wedding photography packages that you offer:

Price = Rate *(Expenses for Planning + Shooting + Editing + Travel) *(10% Incidentals)

To learn more about how you can properly create a price list for the wedding packages that you offer, visit FotoQuote which provides price quotations for various types of photography.

When creating a price list for the wedding packages that you plan to offer, make sure to include details like what is included with the package – and the rates for any additional services that they may require.

If there’s one aspect of running a wedding photography business that is bound to turn it into a resounding success, that is none other than networking. If you’re still in the startup process, go all out with your networking efforts. Use social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, Flickr and even Twitter to get your work out there.

Have your closest family, friends and colleagues spread the word about the wedding photography business that you have. Create a network of everyone who is connected in the wedding industry and make sure that they know what your business is all about. Word of mouth is still the best form of advertising.

If you know that you cannot handle a particular wedding event by yourself, refer them to other wedding photographers who can. The ‘competition’ will follow suit and start referring clients that they cannot handle to you. By harnessing the power of networking, your wedding photography business will grow in no time at all.

Fortunately for wedding photographers like me, there is no need to scout for photo shoot locations by foot. Thanks to the proliferation of the Internet, you can now do the scouting of beautiful locations right in the comfort of your own home.

And for this task, there is no better tool to use than Google Earth. The way that Google Earth works in showing online users a close up look at locations the world over is a combination of topographical maps and real-time satellite imagery. The good thing about using online tools like Google Earth is that you can visualize in advance what the photo shoot will look like, simply by browsing through their site.

Whether you are looking for creative ideas for the location of an engagement photo shoot or if you are scouting for locations for an unusual wedding photo shoot location as requested by your client, Google Earth will definitely come in handy.

Even if you are earning a living through creative means, it does not mean that you can do away with the legal mumbo-jumbo involved in the business. The same thing holds true if you are in the wedding photography business.

Basically, you do need to have a contract drafter if you are dealing with clients and you are delivering a type of service to them. The wedding photography contract should include the work being delivered, details like the date and time of the photo shoots, the rates, reproduction rates, copyrights and licenses that both parties should have.

To help you out, read the Business and Legal Forms for Photographers book by Tad Crawford.

One more thing – expert wedding photographers do recommend getting insurance. For a relatively low fee, you will have financial coverage in case something happens to your photography equipment or if something happens to you while you are out in an on-location photo shoot. To learn more about business insurance, check out Photo.net’s information page.

To start right off, what are the elements which should be combined if you want to establish branding in wedding photography? Naturally, you should first come up with the company name that you would like your wedding photography business to be called. It can either be your name, followed by the words wedding photography – or another, more innovative company name which reflects the style of photography that they employ.

Second, create a logo. This is something that should incorporate the image that you want to portray as a wedding photographer. Which type of design, what sort of colors and letter types can reflect the statement that you wish to impart to your niche market?

Finally, make sure that you will use a watermark – which is another crucial element of branding in wedding photography. Basically, the watermark is that stamp that you place on your photos as a deterrent to theft – and as a way of advertising your wedding photography business to anybody who looks at samples of your work.

When you put together all these elements of branding, you can create the exact image that you want to project for your wedding photography business.

Thanks to the improvements in digital photography, professional photographers no longer have to carry with them rolls of films when they are out covering weddings. There is no risk of the film being exposed to too much light and ruining the prints and there’s no need to get the film rolls developed on a lab – digital photos are just plain easier to take, print and publish.

It’s the last part that’s pretty interesting – because publishing your most treasured photos online and sharing them with friends, family members of even total strangers have become a must in this digital world.

I remember this one couple who had a pretty intimate wedding ceremony with only a few of their relatives attending. The first thing that the bride asked me was if I can upload all the wedding photos into an online account so that her friends and relatives who cannot attend the ceremony will have the pictures to look at. It turned out that most of her relatives are living in a faraway state and only a handful of them can make it to her wedding. Naturally, I immediately uploaded the pictures online so that the bride and her relatives can view the wedding photos.

No matter how opposed some photographers are to technology, it is a must to keep up with the times because doing so will allow you to keep up with your clients as well.

So to sum it up, here is a quick list of the reasons why sharing your wedding photos online is a must after covering a wedding. First, you can use the online photo gallery as a feature of the wedding photography packages that you are offering. If there are engagement shots, you can even create a movie or a slideshow which can be shown during the wedding reception.

Second, you can use an online photo sharing website as a convenient way to backup your clients’ wedding photos. Third, you can cater to the requests of the clients when it comes to how they want their online wedding photo galleries to be. Some couples choose to share their wedding photos with the entire world so it can be a public gallery – while others choose to keep the profile private so that only their closest family members and friends can view the photos.

All in all, sharing photos online is a safe, organized and fun way of letting others appreciate the events on a wedding day through the exquisite pictures that you took.

I first started my career in wedding photography by tagging along other professional photographers. Back then, I didn’t dare interfere with the pro’s posed shots so what I did was shoot from a different angle. Otherwise, I would be capturing on film the reaction that the guests have as a particular event during the wedding unfolds. Essentially, I became an unpaid second photographer until I was able to branch out on my own.

Now, does it really make sense for wedding photographers to come in pairs, so to speak, when covering a wedding event? For me, the rule is pretty simple. If it’s a pretty intimate wedding and the engaged couple is on a shoestring budget, I try my best to be everywhere all at the same time. This means that you can’t stay still even for a minute because there’s always a scene just begging to be photographed.

On the other hand, if it’s a medium to large event, I do encourage the clients to pay for the extra wedding photographer. This is especially true if the setting for the wedding ceremony and reception is large.

So what are the benefits that you will get to enjoy as a wedding photographer if you’re not the only one holding the ‘professional’ camera? First, it takes the pressure off of your being the only one who needs to capture the moments on film. You probably won’t even get to have a bathroom break if you’re the only go-to-guy when there’s a picture that the couple wants to be taken.

Second, an additional photographer would increase the depth and variety of the wedding photos that can be taken. For example, I tend to concentrate more on the shots with the bride and groom as the main subject. If the couple wants to capture the mood of the place, the romance of the day and the liveliness of the guests, the second photographer can perfectly capture these moments while I’m focusing on the newlyweds and the people who are physically closest to them.

Even the style that I can use for the photographs will differ from the one used by the second photographer. All in all, it’s a win-win situation as far as the newlywed couple is concerned because of the myriad of styles for the wedding photographs that they will eventually get.