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Help Choosing a Wedding Photographer: The Most Important Request

Last week, I discussed a novel method that you can use at the start of your search for finding a wedding photographer (view post here) that will allow you to narrow your choices quickly from absolutely everyone to a manageable number of candidates. For this article, I’ll skip to the end of the process and reveal the best method of choosing a wedding photographer from among those that you’re seriously considering.

When choosing a wedding photographer, always…

For the sake of this discussion, I’ll assume that you’ve done your homework and narrowed in on a small selection of wedding photographers. This process would typically have involved checking the following: confirming their availability; reviewing their services and prices; browsing their website to understand how they work; meeting them to discuss everything in greater detail, clarifying any points of concern, and seeing physical products in person; and, reviewing the contract terms. At this point, you’ll either find yourself sold on one of them or undecided about some of them. In either case, but especially in the latter, I recommend that you take pause and consider one more frequently overlooked criteria—their delivered work. When it comes to choosing a wedding photographer, this should be the pivot upon which you decide.

The most productive way to judge the quality of a wedding photographer is to look beyond their portfolio and see what they’re delivering to their clients. Contact every wedding photographer that you’re seriously considering and request for access to several full wedding galleries. Three or more should be plenty. I encourage you to take a close look at every one of them because it will help you judge the photographers on the consistency and quality of their actual work.

What’s the point? I already reviewed their portfolios.

The point is to make an informed decision when choosing a wedding photographer.

Such decisions shouldn’t be made lightly. At risk is a healthy sum of your hard-earned cash and, perhaps more importantly, your memories. There are certainly couples for whom wedding photos are of passing importance, and they won’t expend much effort on choosing a wedding photographer. Clearly, you’re not that kind of person, since you’re taking the time to read this advice—and, hopefully, acting on it.

Such decisions shouldn’t be made lightly. At risk is a healthy sum of your hard-earned cash and, perhaps more importantly, your memories. There are certainly couples for whom wedding photos are of passing importance, and they won’t expend much effort on choosing a wedding photographer. Clearly, you’re not that kind of person, since you’re taking the time to read this advice—and, hopefully, acting on it.

Relying exclusively on portfolios when choosing a wedding photographer is like judging a film by its trailer. While some of them will be great, the rest will leave you feeling cheated—lured in by a flashy display composed of the only outstanding parts they had to offer. Anyone can return from a wedding with a couple of beautiful images. The challenge is delivering more, and that relies on choosing a wedding photographer whose portfolio is an accurate representation of the work they don’t publicly display but which ends up forming the bulk of the photos their clients receive.

choosing a wedding photographer - plagiarism
Visit his website and behold “good selection” of work, three photos in total. Bravo!

To be fair, when wedding photographers deliver hundreds of photos per wedding, most of the images won’t be those stunning portfolio gems, so you must tune your expectations to the reality of the work. I’m not aware of a single wedding photographer capable of pulling off such a feat. However, a skilled photographer should provide photos that conform to their advertised aesthetic and of a consistently good quality throughout the entire gallery.

Avoid plagiarism when choosing a wedding photographer

Reviewing full wedding galleries will help you separate the seasoned pros from eager amateurs, but perhaps more importantly, it will help protect you against choosing “wedding photographers” that plagiarise others’ work. Think they don’t exist? In addition to a popular blog that exposes these misfits, I had an encounter with just such a photographer last June. One night, in a fit of boredom, I decided to run a reverse Google Image search on some of my photographs. What I found stunned me. Several photography related blogs had used my pictures and articles without permission. I swiftly filed several DMCA takedown requests (because U.S. servers hosted the content). Then I happened upon a Vancouver-based photographer plagiarizer claiming to shoot portraits, events, and weddings. Low and behold, he was passing one of my favourite wedding photos off as his work. I filed a DMCA takedown request with his server host and decided to send him a message via his Facebook account.

The brief conversation in the screenshots above demonstrates precisely the type of laissez-faire attitude towards portfolio padding that some ‘fauxtographers‘ exhibit. Do your due diligence and review full wedding galleries before choosing a wedding photographer.

But the photographer claims it’s a breach of their clients’ privacy/trust/whatever

Bullshit. Serious wedding photographers that are proud of their past work will gladly share it with you. While some photographers may be apprehensive about sharing their work online, especially with strangers, it’s entirely reasonable for them to suggest that you view several galleries during a meeting. Other wedding photographers will have no qualms about sharing a handful of full online wedding galleries with prospective clients as long as the inquiry is serious in nature. I fall into the latter category and encourage inquiring couples to peruse full online galleries.

The truth is, every professional wedding photographer’s contract secures the rights to display their work for promotional purposes. It also states in no uncertain terms that they retain the copyright to every image. This right allows them to share their work with prospective clients. Every Toronto wedding photographer worth doing business with will gladly share several wedding galleries with you; if they refuse, they risk losing a potential commission to another photographer who has no such qualms. And to be honest, if they’re stonewalling on this particular request, they should lose your business because you can never be confident about what’s driving their avoidance.

Without access to full wedding galleries, you’re left to make an important hiring decision based solely on the portfolio. It’s a risky gamble, and the stakes are too great. Before choosing a wedding photographer, always insist on reviewing several full wedding galleries. You’ll be glad you did.

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