Choosing Your Wedding Photographer // PART THREE

Before you read further, if you haven’t already, you can read the other parts of this little trilogy here: PART ONE and PART TWO!

Okay so you found your true match made in heaven... with your photographer. You love their personality, style, and the price is just right. You've asked all the right questions and you're ready.

What do you do now?!

You snatch them up because there are only limited weekends in a wedding season and you want to make sure you get your first choice *cough PICK ME! cough*. Basically you like it so you need to put a bunch of money down on it.

The typical wedding photographer will need between 30-50% as a non-refundable retainer fee. This is required for two reasons. The first is to secure your date. Unfortunately many photographers have been burned by not receiving any kind of payment for their work. The second reason is to offset loss of business if the event is cancelled. Since there are only a limited amount of weddings per year, chances are that after you book your photographer, they are getting more inquiries that they turn down because they are already booked. If for some reason, you have to cancel, they are most likely not able to rebook their dates. Some photographers have in their contracts (like I do) that if the event is cancelled or postponed within a certain timeframe AND the photographer can rebook the date, the retainer fee will be returned. While we are business owners, we are fair.

Speaking of the contract. Make sure you are sent one to protect yourself. If a photographer does not have a contract you might want to reconsider hiring them. The contract protects both the photographer and you! Make sure you read through carefully. The contract lays out all the things you can expect from your photographer and what they expect from you. This contract should list the time and date booked for, the wait time for post processing the images, payment schedule, cancellation and rescheduling policies, as well as print rights and model releases. As under copyright law in Canada, photography is considered an art and the photographer, the artist. Photographers hold all the copyrights to their images, even though they are being paid to create the art. So your contract should have a print release and a description of what the photos can be used for. Typically, they can be used for all personal reasons, on social media, printing for your house or albums, and sharing with your friends or family. You won’t be allowed to use the images for commercial gain or sell the images, those rights remain with the photographer only. As well as sharing with other vendors, leave that up to your photographer so that they can thank the others involved in your day as well as explain the proper use of images. And as always, do not edit or alter the photos!

Photography is such a fun thing to book for your wedding but these “boring” aspects cannot be overlooked. You are paying thousands of dollars and you want to make sure you are booking a trusted, capable, and responsible photographer. Make sure you look at reviews on their Google business pages as well. This will help ensure you are booking someone who is going to show up for you. However, be warned, sometimes people leave terrible reviews to photographers who they haven’t even worked with, so be mindful of both the positive and negative reviews!

And then, if everything checks out and you and your partner feel comfortable (and excited!) sign the contract, send the payment, and take a deep breath because you can confidently check off one huge decision off of your wedding planning checklist!

If you’ve read through this whole trilogy and you’d like to book me as your wedding photographer, click HERE to contact me!