How much is your photographer costing?

[tinkerbelle93]

Another 'how much' thread lol.

I've looked a lot online and it seems that most photography packages are, on average, £700 or more.

How much are yours costing? Has anyone considered a cheaper alternative?

Advice appreciated! xx

 

[lozzy21]

Mine does 3 packages

£300, that gets you the ceramony up to an hour after and all your photos on disk

£600, that gets you the brides house getting ready up to an hour after, the disk and so many prints

£850, that gets you from the bride getting ready to the 1st dance, the disk and a large photobook.

 

[aly888]

Most photographers will do varying packages. Some will offer 'ceremony coverage only' which, like Lozzy says, will be the ceremony and then an hour or so after for formal photographs. Others will only offer 'full days'.

What are you wanting? Do you want an album (because that bumps the price up considerably!)? Do you just want minimal coverage? And when are you gettin married? Our photographer is costing £900 for images only but two weeks after we booked he brought his 2013 prices in, so if you book early enough then you will get the previous years prices, if you know what I mean!?

The true answer is to shop around. And don't just look at local photographers. A committed photographer will travel the country for a job (ask if and what they charge extra for this) so remember to look further afield.

Cheaper alternatives are; less experienced togs (uni students or new on the scene), get a friend of a friend to do it for discount, ask a guest to do it. My advice if you're asking a guest to do it is to make sure to all the other guests that they know who the "official" photographer is otherwise no-one will be looking the right way or will realise that they are in the formal photographs etc etc

 

[emyandpotato]

My post on photography: https://champagneandcrumpets.tumblr...is-is-a-decision-that-troubles-me-quite-a-bit

We're not having one But I'm crossing my fingers the photos will be lovely all the same!

 

[laura&faith]

Mine is costing £100 now £200 after the wedding when we have the photos and we are 100% happy she's coming before the wedding to get photos of putting the dress on haying through the church and full reception so she is doing a separate album of the night do when everyone's drunk she normally charges £450 for this package but she's a good friend so mates rates lol

 

[Mummy May]

Mine is costing £550 as we decided just to go for 5 hours with all images on a disk. We could have had 9 hours with all images on a disk for £850, 9 hours with 1 photo book for £700 or some deluxe package that I didn't even look at as it was over 1k lol! I know you pay a lot for photos but its the one thing you want to have right on your wedding day. There are a lot of very good amateurs out there (check family and friends!!) that won't charge the earth - just do your research xx

 

[tinkerbelle93]

My post on photography: https://champagneandcrumpets.tumblr...is-is-a-decision-that-troubles-me-quite-a-bit

We're not having one But I'm crossing my fingers the photos will be lovely all the same!

Just read your post and yeah that's pretty much the reasons why I'm considering an alternative to a professional photographer.

I do have a couple of friends and a cousin who do Art at uni and do ameatur photography as a bit of a hobby and have expensive cameras so I'm considering offering one of them money for doing the photographs, and asking them to research wedding photography beforehand.. I'm SURE they'd be able to do some almost-as-nice shots? As long as they take tons of pictures and there's a least a few nice ones to put on display in the house then I'll be happy!

Also like you said I'll be asking guests to take as many photographs as possible! It's just so tempting to get a professional.. I was at a wedding fair and they had all the photographers stands where they make those amazing photo book albums but all in all it would cost near enough 1500! xx

 

[Lauren25]

Ours is £895!

We chose our photographer and we wanted just the prints on a disk, he cost £1095 for that (he also had so many other packages above that) I asked him if he offered any discount and he mentioned he was someone who works for him and told me which weddings he did on his website, I looked and couldn't even tell the difference, they both done the same style work and then the main photographer does all the editing etc! This other one cost £895 so we decided to go with him!

About £1000 is the average round here for photographer! A good photographer was one of the top things on our list

 

[emyandpotato]

My post on photography: https://champagneandcrumpets.tumblr...is-is-a-decision-that-troubles-me-quite-a-bit

We're not having one But I'm crossing my fingers the photos will be lovely all the same!

Just read your post and yeah that's pretty much the reasons why I'm considering an alternative to a professional photographer.

I do have a couple of friends and a cousin who do Art at uni and do ameatur photography as a bit of a hobby and have expensive cameras so I'm considering offering one of them money for doing the photographs, and asking them to research wedding photography beforehand.. I'm SURE they'd be able to do some almost-as-nice shots? As long as they take tons of pictures and there's a least a few nice ones to put on display in the house then I'll be happy!

Also like you said I'll be asking guests to take as many photographs as possible! It's just so tempting to get a professional.. I was at a wedding fair and they had all the photographers stands where they make those amazing photo book albums but all in all it would cost near enough 1500! xx

The only ones I really loved were asking about £3000. It's unreal. Even Marianne Taylor, who's photos I adore, has some ugly face shots, and it would break my heart if that happened, all I'd see would be my double chin! I've made a Pinterest board of the styles of photos I like and given it to my photographer/friend to look at. Gonna do a practise session too at some point.

 

[kmbabycrazy]

My post on photography: https://champagneandcrumpets.tumblr...is-is-a-decision-that-troubles-me-quite-a-bit

We're not having one But I'm crossing my fingers the photos will be lovely all the same!

We're not going to have a photographer other than for the actual ceremony. We're going to make a list of pictures we'd like to get and put them on the table and hope our guests get them, also, instagram. We'll create a hashtag and an account for it xx

 

[mara16jade]

Hmm, things must be more expensive in USA.

The average cost out here is $1500-2000. The average wedding is like $20-25k! lol

 

[lozzy21]

I dont think its that they cost more, its the conversion rate, $15,000 is about £9500

 

[aly888]

Hmm, things must be more expensive in USA.

The average cost out here is $1500-2000. The average wedding is like $20-25k! lol

If anything thats cheaper for photographers Over here the average tog is between £1000-£2000, which when converted is more in $. But of course you can get it cheaper and likewise can spend more. The photographer I fell madly in love with was £3000 for four hours but it was beautiful work!!

ETA: We didn't go with that photographer, of course I'd have to sell an organ to afford a wedding that expensive!!!

 

[mara16jade]

There is another thread asking about what people are spending on weddings and I was seeing some rather low costs - so I just assumed it was more expensive in USA.

The photographer we like is around $2500. I don't want them to print too many photos since we can do that once we get the DVD with edited pictures. But I do want a full day's worth of coverage (which would be about 8-10 hours). So we'll see how that goes. I think the $2500 cost is only photo coverage, no prints or books.

 

[emyandpotato]

There is another thread asking about what people are spending on weddings and I was seeing some rather low costs - so I just assumed it was more expensive in USA.

The photographer we like is around $2500. I don't want them to print too many photos since we can do that once we get the DVD with edited pictures. But I do want a full day's worth of coverage (which would be about 8-10 hours). So we'll see how that goes. I think the $2500 cost is only photo coverage, no prints or books.

Not at all, it's more expensive if anything! We're all just being frugal I think! The average wedding here is £22k which is $33k.

 

[JessdueJan]

We are just having two friends who have some experience and good cameras then getting all photos on discs for us to play around with and print how we like. Also putting disposable cameras out for those funny, spur of the moment shots and havin a basket near the door to collect them all in at the end of the night x