When we were engaged and looking for a photographer, we had a crash course learning experience on What to Look for in a Wedding Photographer. If you’re still on the search, we thought we could save you some time by sharing what we now know, while sharing some of our favorite images from Casey and Brendan’s Wedding at Main Street Ballroom in Ellicott City, Maryland.
Top Things to Look For in a Wedding Photographer
Is there more than one photographer?
One photographer is great but two can be even better. Why? Because we can capture both the Bride and the Groom simultaneously without feeling pressured, frazzled or rushed. And when it’s your wedding day, the last thing you want to feel is pressured, frazzled or rushed. With 2 photographers, you can feel confident that your memories are being captured smoothly by the designated photographer. When you hire Megapixels Media to be your wedding photographers, you have 2 full-coverage photographers (Garrett and Megan, husband and wife) to photograph both perspectives of your day.
Is my Photographer a “People Person”?
Oddly enough, a lot of excellent photographers shy away from a lot of people. When your looking for a Wedding Photographer for your big day, you need someone who can manage the intimacy of a couple as well as herd large groups of people in a hurry. You should be looking for a photographer with strong communication and interpersonal skills to conduct certain parts of your day, like during formal family portraits. Can your photographer professionally direct your family? (Even if Uncle Jimmy already started partaking in the open bar?) Can your photographer be personable with your family, enough to make them genuinely laugh for photos? Can your photographer be fearless enough to stand up for you as a couple when it comes down to creating innovative portraits? Do they know how to evoke beautiful emotional responses without being awkward? (These are all great questions to ask when considering a wedding photographer)
What makes your Photographer unique?
What’s different about your photographer? What makes them stand out beyond the rest? Is this the artist that you would be proud to have at your wedding and trust with your memories? What we believe makes us stand out beyond the rest is that, not only is there two of us capturing photojournalistic moments, but the fact that we seek out beautiful light through the day and think of interesting ways to manipulate it. We love creating photos that have never been made before, to give our clients and viewers something that they want to stop and look at to appreciate. Besides just focusing on composition, we like creating images that make people pause and wonder “How did they do that?”. That’s the kind of photography that we enjoy seeing and that’s what we aim to give our clients.
What Incentives does your Photographer offer outside of their paid services?
There are perks to hiring a photographer who has been in the wedding industry for a long time. Not only the ease and expertise that they bring on the day of, but the connections and future opportunities that come along with being their client. For us, when we first meet a couple, we give them a client guide that includes a lot of helpful information to use throughout the wedding planning journey. This client guide also includes a list of helpful resources and vendors that offer discounts to our clients only. Once the couple is booked, they become part of our family and receive discounted services for life. They also receive referral bonuses for whenever one of their friends book us for a wedding!
Know what’s important to you.
The best advice that we can give to engaged couples is to know your own value when it comes to your most precious memories. Your photographer already knows their value and their prices will reflect it. “Good photographers are not often cheap and cheap photographs are not often good.” Is a quote that I first heard when shopping for my own Wedding Photographer and it still rings true today. There’s a reason that our photography packages range from $1,500-$6,000. It’s because we wish to serve a diverse variety of couples while offering an unwavering high-quality product. When you pay a photographer, you are not only paying for the hours they spend at your wedding, but for the hours they spend editing, the time they spend with you during the wedding planning process and even for the equipment and software that they use and maintain throughout servicing you (not to mention taxes). That’s a whole other blog post lol But we say all of this to say that every photographers prices are there for a reason, we all bring something beautiful and different to the table so it’s worth looking around (stalk their blogs, read about them, check out their reviews, ask questions, etc). When you find what’s important to you in a photographer, what kind of experience you wish to have and know what kind of photographic keepsakes you want to have after your wedding day, the investment is worth the ease of mind on your wedding day.
Hope you all found this helpful :)
LOVE DEEPLY,
Megan and Garrett
If you would like to read more informative blog posts by us to help plan your dream wedding, CLICK HERE.
Naima + Gary