It never fails to astound me when people inquiring about professional photography (wedding photography in particular), are shocked that the rate is much more than they’d expected.

It’s not as though the cost to hire a professional photographer has suddenly skyrocketed. It’s not an inexpensive service, it never has been. Pretty much since the invention of the camera, professional photographers have had to charge a within a certain range.

This pricing is to cover the costs of our equipment, our experience, our time and our operating costs, as well as all of the work required to process the images and deliver them to our clients. As with any specialized profession, minimum wage is not an option.

Even after years of being in this business, I’m always amazed when people don’t realize what I assume is a commonly known fact. Professional photography isn’t cheap. Never was, never will be…

But let’s say most people don’t realize that. OK. But when I’m looking online to hire any kind of service provider or even just shopping online, the first thing I check is the price. Doesn’t everybody? And I – as most professional photographers do – list my starting prices on my website, on a very easy to find page called ‘services’.

You can almost always find a list of photography prices on the photographer’s website. If it’s not on a page called ‘services’, it will be on a page called ‘rates’, ‘pricing’, or ‘investment’.

If it’s so easy and simple to find this information, then why are so many photography clients taken completely aback by the cost?  Apparently they don’t bother to look at the pricing information available to them, they don’t comparison shop, they’ve done no research and they’ve already arbitrarily placed an unrealistically low value on this service before they begin making inquiries.

This drives me utterly bonkers. It’s lazy, it’s uninformed and it wastes everyone’s time. If you have no idea what something costs, take five or ten minutes to look it up PRIOR to contacting professional service providers with your inquiry.

Here’s the thing. A conscientious photographer will always give a detailed response to an inquiry. Whether it’s on the phone or by email, the average inquiry takes at least twenty minutes to reply to. And the issue of price rarely comes up at the beginning. It’s not something we generally start off with, because there are several things we need to know before we can give you an accurate quote.

Maybe twenty minutes doesn’t seem like that much time, but when we’re responding to several inquiries a day, or a week, it adds up. So when we’ve given our time and energy to you (for free) to answer your questions, to get your details and to describe our services, it’s incredibly frustrating and irritating to be told ‘Oh, that’s much more than I expected’ when we do tell you our rates.

Photography is always a collaboration between the photographer and the person (or people) being photographed. Good communication and a sense of comfort and compatibility are crucial elements to getting the best possible results.

So here are two simple ways to avoid annoying your potential photographers…

1- Do some research before-hand. If you’re getting married, before you contact wedding photographers, take the time to educate yourself about what to expect. Ask married friends what they paid. Read wedding blogs, wedding magazines, wedding boards… If you do, you’ll quickly realize that a wedding photography budget of less than $1000 is wildly unrealistic, as is expecting to hire a photographer for two hours or less.

If you’re hiring a portrait, headshot or corporate photographer, take the time to comparison shop online. Check at least four or five local photographer’s websites and take note of the starting prices. They’ll generally all be within the same range and no, it’s not going to be as cheap as Sears Portrait Studio.

2- Always check the ‘rates’ or ‘services’ or ‘investment’ page BEFORE contacting a professional photographer. This will prevent you from wasting your time (and the photographer’s) if their rates are too far out of your price range.

If you find that all of the good photographers are ‘too expensive’, then you need to realize that you’re underestimating what professional photography is worth, and you’ll have to readjust your assessment of its value.

Finally, here is a breakdown of what it costs to hire a professional photographer…

As with most things, photography prices do vary. There are basically three tiers:

Tier one - The ridiculously low prices of hobby or amateur photographers: If someone is charging less than $200 to $300 per hour, or under $1000 for wedding photography, they are NOT a professional photographer. No grey area here, it’s that black and white.

I’ve written before about the many, many reasons why hiring an amateur or hobbyist photographer is almost inevitably a choice you will regret. I’ll not belabor the point again, as it should be obvious that hiring a bargain basement photographer, will result in very poor quality equipment, poor quality services and poor quality images. When you hire the cheapest photographer you can find, you’re wasting your money instead of investing it. But I digress…

Tier two - The average price of professional photographers in most major cities across North America: For portraits, headshots and corporate photography, rates range between $200 and $400 per hour.

For professional wedding photography, the average starting range is between $1500 and $2000. That’s for six hours or less. For anything above six hours, you’re looking at between $3000 and $4000.

Tier three – The high end prices of status photographers: These are the very well established professional photographers who are almost celebrities within their field or their local area. They can and do charge double and triple the price.

This is because there will always be people who want to pay a squillion dollars to wear designer labels. Those same people want to pay exorbitant prices to hire a status photographer. Starting prices for weddings are usually at least $8000. Portrait and headshot sessions are usually at least $800.

So there you have it. Professional photography isn’t cheap. Deal with it.

The quality of your profile photo can quite literally make all the difference to whether or not your potential clients and contacts will choose to hire or work with you. It may be shallow, but we humans base a lot of our choices on visual information.

Here are a few tips that will help you to ensure that your online profile photos generate the right response from the people who view them…

1 – Hire a professional to look professional:

If you’re presenting yourself as someone with expertise or qualifications of any kind, your online photos need to reflect that. There really is only one right way to do this. Use an image taken by a professional photographer who specializes in business and/or headshot photography.

2 – The kinds of photos you do NOT want to use:

• Candid photos taken at a social event.
• Arm’s length self portraits.
• Webcam shots.
• Professional photos that are clearly over 5 years old.
• Photos that you think look convincingly professional, but in reality, were taken with by a family member or friend who was using an automatic point and shoot camera.

Here’s why not… Would you hire someone who gave you a first impression that they don’t make much of an effort, even in how they present themselves?

3- Why it’s worth investing in a professional photographer:

When someone is considering either hiring you or working with you, they want to know that you’re a skilled, talented, successful person who offers something of quality. Someone with a good professional profile image is much more likely to be seen as a person with something of value to offer their contacts and clients.

Yes, hiring a professional photographer does come with a bit of a cost, but when you consider the benefits, and the fact that you can use those images for up to five years, it’s an investment that absolutely will be worth it.

Tamea Burd is a Vancouver portrait, wedding, corporate and headshot photographer. Her website: www.tameaburdphotography.com

Tamea Burd is a Vancouver wedding photographer, portrait, corporate and headshot photographer. Her website: www.tameaburdphotography.com

On the day of your wedding, chances are you’ll have at least one unexpected little emergency… A rip in someone’s dress. A paper-cut, a headache, etc.

Although there are many, many things to remember when it comes to planning for your wedding day, bringing a small wedding emergency preparedness kit can eliminate the stress of unforeseen little disasters for you and your entire wedding party!

So, when you’re packing all of the things to bring to your wedding location, be sure to include a small bag (make-up or toiletry bags work well for this) filled with the following items:

• Band-aids
• Aspirin, Advil or Tylenol
• Clear nail polish (fixes runs in stockings)
• Nail file and nail clippers
• Sunscreen (if your ceremony or photos take place outdoors)
• Lint brush
• Deodorant
• Small scissors (for cutting any stray threads)
• Bobby-pins and safety-pins
• Cough-drops
• Dental floss
• Anti-histamines
• Eye-drops
• Hand sanitizer
• Breath mints
• Flip-flops or some form of comfortable shoes to slip into in case your wedding shoes give you blisters.

Having these things on hand, just in case, can make a world of difference to how smoothly your wedding day will run!

Tamea Burd is a Vancouver wedding photographer, portrait, corporate and headshot photographer. Her website: www.tameaburdphotography.com

Last week I had the privilege of doing a photo-shoot for cartoonist Doug Savage, author of the wildly popular ‘Savage Chickens‘ cartoons.

Doug’s work has just been published as a book, so he needed some promotional shots done.

Anyone who is a fan, will understand the presence of the yellow sticky notes!

These are my three favorite photos from our session.

Tamea Burd Photography

If possible, I think photographers get asked to work for free more often than any other professional service providers…

As a professional photographer, I offer competitive and all-inclusive pricing. But far too often, I find myself dealing with the issue of potential clients (or occasionally even friends) basically saying “I want you to do a bunch of work for me, but I place little to no value on your time, or your skill, or your knowledge, or your effort.”

It boggles my mind that people think they’ll convince me to give them something for nothing by saying things like: “It’ll help build your portfolio” or “It’ll be good exposure for your business” or “It’s a great networking opportunity” or – my favourite – “We can’t afford to pay much, but…”

I often wonder why the person asking me to work for free or for a fraction of my cost, thinks that they’re the only one with bills to pay and a living to earn?

For my good friends, I will offer a substantial discount, or offer an exchange of services if they can provide something of equal value. Occasionally, if a close friend just really needs help and can’t afford to pay or trade, I will shoot a few photos for them for free, but that’s only for the special few who offer me something of great worth just by being my friends.

With potential clients, if they have a service or product that is of interest to me, I’ll occasionally offer a 50% trade. Meaning they pay half of my rate in cash, the other half in trade of their product or service.

Volunteering is entirely different. As with anyone who volunteers, that is something I choose to do for free, to support causes I believe in.

For everyone else though, my standard answer to anyone who attempts to convince me that they shouldn’t have to pay me to do my job, is this:

“Would you do your job if you didn’t get paid for it? How about if you were asked to do your job for less than a quarter of the wage you normally earn? If I asked you to give me several hours or days of your time for free, or for less than minimum wage, would you? Nope? Well neither would I.”

I already have a great way to build my portfolio, to get networking opportunities and to create exposure for my business… It’s by getting paid for my work.

Even though I find these requests insulting and occasionally infuriating, I do remember that we’re each of us responsible for the choices we make.

Yes, there are always going to be amateur or newly starting photographers who haven’t yet learned that working for free is almost never a good idea. They’re the ones who get taken in by the empty promises of ‘really, your unpaid labor is going to be a big boost to your career’.

It’s largely because of the abundance of inexperienced photographers who don’t know better, that so many people do get away with paying nothing or almost nothing for photography. In that case, both parties lose… Using an inexperienced photographer, is a surefire way to get poor quality service and poor quality photos.

Oh well. Even though the pattern will keep repeating, people do figure things out eventually. As for me, I figured out some time ago, that the best choice is not to be taken advantage of. I only offer my services to those who understand that anything of value is worth paying for.

More and more couples are choosing to have green weddings these days. This doesn’t mean their color theme… It means that they’re making environmentally conscious choices about their wedding favours, wedding vendors, wedding food, etc. Here are some tips on how you too, can have an eco-friendly wedding:

1- Your wedding invitations, guestbook, programs and place-cards: You can either make them yourself, using recycled or hand-made paper products, or do an online search for ‘eco-friendly wedding paper products’. There are several companies who will supply you with customized, environmentally friendly products for all of your printed wedding materials.

2- Your wedding favours: Instead of using plastic or non-recycled materials, why not consider giving something more sustainable? Mini plant pots with a packet of your favourite flower seeds or bulbs. A jar of local honey with a specially printed wedding label. A nicely wrapped tree seedling. Bamboo coasters, bamboo salad sets or bamboo napkin rings.

3- Your wedding flowers: Look for vendors who supply organic and/or locally grown flowers. Or – depending on what time of year you’re getting married – you could even consider growing your own wedding flowers either in your yard, on a balcony, in window boxes or a greenhouse.

4- Your wedding food: Look for caterers who work with organic and locally grown suppliers. If you’re having friends or family help with the food, choose things that can be made with locally grown, in-season fruits and vegetables. For your meats, dairy and baked goods, purchase from organic, local small businesses or from a market like Whole Foods, which provides sustainable, eco-friendly and cruelty-free food products.

5- Your wedding vendors: When you’re looking at who to hire as your videographer, your photographer, your dj, etc… Do a search for ‘eco-friendly’ photographers, videographers, etc. What this means, is that they use environmentally sustainable products for their own businesses and that they provide you with eco-friendly services for your wedding.

6- Your wedding travel: To reduce the amount of carbon emissions from all of your guests travelling to and from your wedding, set up a car-pooling system in advance. You can use a social networking site like Facebook or Twitter and invite your wedding guests to join your private wedding page. From there, you can encourage or arrange car-pooling options for your wedding guests. Or if you have your own private wedding website, have a special area that discusses how your guests can make car-pool arrangements.

7- Your post-wedding cleanup: When you’re arranging the cleanup, be sure to recycle as much as you possibly can. Paper products, containers, plastic, etc. Bring labeled recycling boxes to your reception location for your cleaning helpers to use. Donate your uneaten food and beverages to a local food bank or homeless shelter. (You can even contact local shelters to pre-arrange someone coming by to pick up the left-over food at the end of your reception dinner.) Compost your left-over floral arrangements and the food you can’t give away.

8- Hire an eco-friendly wedding planner: If you don’t have the time to arrange all of these details yourself, look for an eco-friendly wedding or event planner who can handle these things for you. Be sure to mention all of the wedding elements that you want to be sure are environmentally friendly.

Weddings are a lot of work. You always have to go through the process of choosing your flowers, your food, your favours, your vendors, etc. Remember that it takes no extra time or extra effort to make sustainable, recycled and eco-friendly choices. It’s just as easy to be green.

Tamea Burd is an eco-friendly, professional photographer from Vancouver, BC. She specializes in portrait photography, headshots, corporate and wedding photography. Her website: Tamea Burd Photography