What to Look For When Hiring Your Wedding Photographer
Table of Contents:
- What to Look For When Shopping for a Wedding Photographer
- 3 Wedding Photographer Red Flags to Look Out For
- 12 Key Questions to Ask Before Hiring Your Wedding Photographer
In this blog post, I’ll be walking you through exactly what to look for when hiring a wedding photographer, red flags to watch out for, and giving you a list of questions to ask before you sign the dotted line.
After all: your wedding is probably one of the ONLY times in your life that you’re going to be throwing a big, fancy party of this size, and it’s essential that your memories are captured and protected correctly. The stakes are high, so I want to make sure you’re equipped with the right tools to hire the photographer of your dreams!
What to Look For When Shopping for a Wedding Photographer
Capability
You are undoubtedly going to be served with every single lighting scenario under the sun at your wedding, so it’s important to know, as a prospective client, if you’re going to vibe with how they capture certain scenarios.
Be sure to look at not just their photos that were taken in a perfect lighting scenario, but photos that were taken in:
- Full sun
- Shade
- Harsh shadows
- Overcast light
- Indoors
- Outdoors
- With & without flash
Pay attention to how they use their flash in those late night moments; how they’re capturing toasts under the soft light of a candlelit reception; how they shoot a sparkler exit in full darkness.
Make sure you’re jiving with all the different ways that they are capturing the different lighting scenarios
Bonus points if the galleries they share with you are in line with the type of venue + lighting scenarios you’re going to be having.
For example, if somebody inquires with me for a beach wedding in Hawaii, I want to make sure that the sample galleries I’m sharing with them are beach weddings, not ballroom weddings! I think this is the best way for my clients to fully understand how I would go about capturing the look and feel of their day that has a similar vibe to weddings I’ve shot in the past.
Shooting Style
Next, it’s incredibly important (possibly MOST important) to pay attention to what kind of shooting style you’re drawn to, and make sure you hire someone whose style aligns with that. If you’re looking for a photographer who you can simply hand a shot list over to, and who will snap every shot on that list by the end of the day, you need to look for a photographer with that type of shooting style. Someone who has the types of shots you’re looking for in your gallery, shown across their previous galleries.
Here’s the thing: as photographers, we don’t typically like to work off a very specific shot list. It stifles us creatively, and limits the range of emotions, styles, and moments we’re able to capture on your special day.
So if you, as a bride, are expecting to get that full-on shot of you smiling at the camera, make sure that’s reflected in your potential photographer’s galleries—because some photographers (and some couples) don’t even really value that kind of photo! You’ll see it evident in documentary-style photographers, for example, that those photos are probably few and far between. . . or don’t even exist altogether.
Your photographer is an artist, and excels at a certain style that they are hopefully consistently showcasing across their portfolio—so you should expect them to deliver on that style for you.
Common Wedding Photography Shooting Styles
Before we move on, I wanted to give you a quick breakdown of common shooting styles you can be on the lookout for! There’s no “official list” of the current photography shooting styles, so I’m drawing upon the ones I see most often and giving you my point of view as a photographer.
Most of the time, photographers will use shooting styles to describe their own work—often in their social media bio, or on their website—so these are words you can use to spot how a photographer self-identifies.
—Documentary: A very candid, hands-off approach. It’s not asking you to redo moments for the shot; it’s letting things unfold naturally, and the photographer is really good at catching those moments as they occur. Maybe they bring a second shooter along so they can really make sure they don’t miss anything the first time around! The end result is very emotion-forward photos that you can really feel through the screen—and those emotions are the hero of documentary-style photography.
—Editorial: All that the word “editorial” really means is storytelling—but in the context of how wedding photographers would describe their style, it’s a very fashion-forward, Vogue-inspired kinda vibe. They probably source a lot of their inspiration from how Vogue weddings are photographed, almost giving a paparazzi feel to the photos. There’s posing involved, but every shot still looks very candid, relaxed, and natural, despite the amount of work that may have happened behind the scenes. It’s not as hands-off as a documentary style, as you’ll have some creative direction and posing prompts, and is super design-forward. Editorial photographers will have a really strong attention to details, capturing the little details of your outfit, your tablescape, your ceremony design, etc. Everything is told in a very Vogue-esque manner, like you’re your very own celebrities/stars of the show (which you are!).
—Cinematic: A photographer with a cinematic style approaches your wedding day almost as if it were a movie. You’ll have varying degrees of wide photographs that really set the scene and show where you are; that show the scale of the venue and showcase the setting. You’ll also have really up-close shots, exactly how they would shoot a movie—watch The Notebook or the Great Gatsby to see what this style might look like. Focused on the beauty and the context of storytelling around your wedding day, it feels super romantic and dreamy when you’re experiencing the photos—almost art directed, again like a movie set! You may also see a focus on horizontal images, which is a really fun and needed departure from the typical verticals we’re all used to shooting now for social media.
—Fine Art: Fine art is very classic and has probably been around the longest, offering a super meticulous, intentional, and highly-produced approach. You’ll see a lot of stopping to pose, intricately set up shots (whether it be portraits of the couple, or of the ceremony), as well as big teams of photographers with large lighting sets & equipment setups, if you’re in the luxury market. Overall, it’s a more high-end, very produced approach to photographing a wedding day.
Editing Style
Editing is the signature of the photographer you are choosing. We’ve all learned from Sepia bride on TikTok that editing plays an enormous role in the way your gallery turns out, so it’s crucial that you go into your search for a wedding photographer with proper expectations.
It’s unrealistic to expect a photographer to completely change their style for you—it’s not how the art form works. So when you’re checking out full galleries, you need to look at how they’re coloring the different photos across ALL different lighting scenarios.
Here are a few key things to pay attention to:
—Skin tones: Your wedding is probably going to have folks of multiple different races involved, so you want to make sure your photographer edits in a way that flatters everyone’s unique skin tones.
—Colors: If you’re featuring certain colors in your wedding (e.g. your husband is wearing a green suit), you want to look at how the photographer edits those specific colors. Greens and pinks can differ significantly across photographers, so if you want those rich, emerald greens or those bold, bright fuschias, make sure that those tones are reflected in the example galleries you’re getting.
Personality
Aside from all the technical stuff, you HAVE to like your photographer as a person. They are one of the few people that you will be spending the majority of your wedding day with, often more so than many of your guests! You need to make sure you like the energy they bring, and that your energies complement each other well. Don’t worry about forcing anything if it doesn’t feel like a natural fit—there are thousands of photographers out there, and it’s important for both you and your potential photographer to feel like you can be yourselves and work together seamlessly. The photographer you hire should also be a great team player, and be able to collaborate well with the rest of your vendors.
3 Wedding Photographer Red Flags to Look Out For
Lack of professionalism
There are a few things I’d look out for to ensure your potential photographer has the right systems in place to support & protect you as a client:
—Client relationship management system: For me personally, my CRM allows me to keep all of my projects throughout the year very organized. Between contracts, invoicing, and scheduling, it helps me make sure that I never double book a date, and that I know when projects are coming up. It also automatically sends out invoice reminders to my couples when they have payments due!
—Contracts: On that same note, let’s talk contracts—and this goes for ALL of your wedding vendors. If your wedding photographer is not providing a contract to you, I would see that as a potential red flag. Contracts are amazing because they explain so much of the fine print around things like cancellation policies, rescheduling fees, etc. and they ensure that both you & your photographer are protected.
—Pre-wedding meetings: I really recommend scheduling some time to meet with your photographer before you book them. This is pretty commonplace with most photographers, but you may run into some people who are okay just going straight to booking without having a chance to meet you—and that’s totally your prerogative. However, scheduling a meeting can give you some insight into their reliability as a professional: do they show up on time? Are they organized? It’s a really good sign that they’ll continue to follow through for you throughout your entire planning process!
Lack of technical ability
Wedding days present photographers with every lighting scenario you could imagine, so it is CRUCIAL that your photographer is able to photograph low-light scenarios. Weddings will push you outside of your comfort zone as a photographer, so you should be experienced in capturing every single lighting scenario that could exist. Whether you’re on the East Coast, West Coast, Midwest, it doesn’t matter: your photographer should know what to do in every single situation.
Another thing to think about is what your photographer will do in situations with very low light, or no light! Will they be able to provide their own artificial light? How do they handle flash—on or off-camera? How do their flash photos look, and does that match the style you’re looking for?
I would see it as a red flag if there are only examples of natural light photography in their portfolio because weddings have SO many different unideal lighting scenarios that we have to navigate regardless of the setting.
Lighting is also an incredibly important part of choosing the right getting ready space for your wedding—read my best tips here.
Lack of backup & protection
Before hiring anybody, you NEED to make sure that they have a backup system in place to ensure that none of your precious files will be lost if something goes wrong. You don’t necessarily need to get into super nitty-gritty details, but I would at least get a little insight into what type of equipment they use day-of.
This might look like:
—Shooting on two cameras that they can work between on your wedding day
—Using multiple different lenses
—Carrying multiple different batteries & memory cards
—Using a camera with dual card slots in case of memory card corruption
Essentially, your wedding photographer should have a backup for every single thing that they bring with them on your wedding day just in case something goes wrong.
It’s also important that they back everything up into multiple places after they get home from shooting your wedding so that, god forbid anything happens (e.g. a tech malfunction), your memories are safe, and they have duplicates stored somewhere.
12 Key Questions to Ask Before Hiring Your Wedding Photographer
Whew! We’ve gone through a lot already, but I wanted to end this with a list of questions you can bring with you to the meetings you schedule with potential wedding photographers. These will cover most of what I talked about today, but it isn’t like you have to absolutely interrogate every photographer with EVERY question—just ask the ones that make sense, and that are the biggest priorities to you. Most of this will very likely come up naturally in your conversation anyway!
- Can I see some full examples of wedding galleries you’ve delivered (bonus points if they are similar to your wedding venue/vibe)?
- Have you worked at our venue before?
- What is your turnaround time?
- Do you deliver any sneak peeks?
- How will we access our gallery, and how can we share it with our guests?
- Do you prefer to work off of a shot list, or take charge creatively?
- What is your approach to capturing a wedding day?
- What does your booking process look like?
- How often will we have communication/touch points leading up to our wedding day?
- What happens in case of an emergency, if you can’t shoot our wedding?
- Do you have a backup process in place to keep our photos safe?
- Maybe even ask them to describe their style as well! Even though you can see it through their branding and portfolio, it always helps to hear how someone sees their own work and if that clicks with what you’re looking for.
And there you have it, my darlings: everything you need in your back pocket to find the perfect wedding photographer for your special day. You deserve someone who shares your vision and is fully, wholly dedicated to helping you execute it—not for their portfolio or for their Instagram feed, but for your memories.
As a Seattle-based wedding photographer, I’d be thrilled to show up for you, support you, and capture your special day with my unique blend of editorial and documentary style. Let’s connect so I can hear about the magical day you’re dreaming up!
Plus, now you know exactly what to look for & ask me when we have our initial meeting 😉
Searching for a little real-life inspo now that you know what to look for in a photographer’s work? Here are a few recent favorites that I’d be glad to share:
