Being asked to shoot a wedding when you aren't a wedding photographer
TTLKurtis wrote:
You need to make sure in whatever contract you have that you make zero guarantees about client satisfaction and that they understand you are not a wedding photographer or even a professional photographer and that you can not be held liable for any damages should the pictures be terrible, should you lose the photographs, whatever... This needs to be very clearly understood, because you could be sued personally. Not to mention the fact that it could potentially affect your wife\'s employment or at least her work environment. In that case, the liability insurance thing is less of a concern and so far as I\'m aware nobody is going to want to insure you \'for the day\' - that\'s not how insurance works (to my understanding). You will want equipment insurance however if you plan to do photography for money.
I do plan on making all of this clear.
Have you had to deal with the types of lighting you\'ll be dealing with at a wedding before? Or the quantity of images you\'ll be producing?
I don\'t know the venue, so I can\'t comment on the lighting, but I have dealt with massive amounts of images before in a short period of time.
Depending on how picky you are and how much you want to put into it, it could certainly take you a lot more than a couple of days. I would give yourself a pretty big safety net just in case you end up needing it. 30 or 60 days isn\'t too bad in terms of a \'standard turn-around\' and leaves a lot more time for \'oh shit\' moments.[/quoted]
30 days is definitely more than I need, but I\'ll be sure to keep that time frame in mind. Sounds fair.
So taking it a step further, when you shoot a wedding, how do you go about picking the images you want to edit? Do you pick your best and show her and let her pick, or do you just pick the ones you think are the best and edit them. Also how many good pictures should you have for a 3 hour reception? Any links for wedding albums?
This varies for every photographer and ultimately if you were going to continue doing this you have to figure out what makes most sense for you and how you prefer to do things and what aligns with your values etc... Personally, I cull the images (select them) before I edit them and with two photographers I can end up with anywhere from 400-800 photographs on average. I do not show them anything I\'ve culled, as far as they are concerned those images don\'t exist.
So if I\'m going to edit 600 pictures, I\'m definitely going to need that 30 days. I was thinking along the lines of 100-150 edited pictures at the most.
I think if you\'re going to do this, I would make it a condition that they need to pay you sufficiently for you to cover the majority of the day\'s activities from getting-ready to the exit so that this is a worthwhile learning experience for you. If this is just talking about doing the reception only, that\'s the biggest pain in the ass to shoot and in my opinion the least interesting.
Seems like I\'m not going to be much of a bargain after all lol.
In terms of wedding albums... well, there\'s a bunch of links in the read-me-first thread in this forum however the majority of the wedding album vendors are not going to work with you unless you\'re a working professional with a website and tax id, etc.
So you turned out to be the most helpful and informative person in this thread. Jerk.
Being asked to shoot a wedding when you aren't a wedding photographer
TTLKurtis wrote:
You need to make sure in whatever contract you have that you make zero guarantees about client satisfaction and that they understand you are not a wedding photographer or even a professional photographer and that you can not be held liable for any damages should the pictures be terrible, should you lose the photographs, whatever... This needs to be very clearly understood, because you could be sued personally. Not to mention the fact that it could potentially affect your wife\'s employment or at least her work environment. In that case, the liability insurance thing is less of a concern and so far as I\'m aware nobody is going to want to insure you \'for the day\' - that\'s not how insurance works (to my understanding). You will want equipment insurance however if you plan to do photography for money.
I do plan on making all of this clear.
Turn-around shouldn\'t really be anything more than a couple of days tops.
Have you had to deal with the types of lighting you\'ll be dealing with at a wedding before? Or the quantity of images you\'ll be producing?
I don\'t know the venue, so I can\'t comment on the lighting, but I have dealt with massive amounts of images before in a short period of time.
Depending on how picky you are and how much you want to put into it, it could certainly take you a lot more than a couple of days. I would give yourself a pretty big safety net just in case you end up needing it. 30 or 60 days isn\'t too bad in terms of a \'standard turn-around\' and leaves a lot more time for \'oh shit\' moments.[/quoted]
30 days is definitely more than I need, but I\'ll be sure to keep that time frame in mind. Sounds fair.
So taking it a step further, when you shoot a wedding, how do you go about picking the images you want to edit? Do you pick your best and show her and let her pick, or do you just pick the ones you think are the best and edit them. Also how many good pictures should you have for a 3 hour reception? Any links for wedding albums?
This varies for every photographer and ultimately if you were going to continue doing this you have to figure out what makes most sense for you and how you prefer to do things and what aligns with your values etc... Personally, I cull the images (select them) before I edit them and with two photographers I can end up with anywhere from 400-800 photographs on average. I do not show them anything I\'ve culled, as far as they are concerned those images don\'t exist.
So if I\'m going to edit 600 pictures, I\'m definitely going to need that 30 days. I was thinking along the lines of 100-150 edited pictures at the most.
I think if you\'re going to do this, I would make it a condition that they need to pay you sufficiently for you to cover the majority of the day\'s activities from getting-ready to the exit so that this is a worthwhile learning experience for you. If this is just talking about doing the reception only, that\'s the biggest pain in the ass to shoot and in my opinion the least interesting.
Seems like I\'m not going to be much of a bargain after all lol.
In terms of wedding albums... well, there\'s a bunch of links in the read-me-first thread in this forum however the majority of the wedding album vendors are not going to work with you unless you\'re a working professional with a website and tax id, etc.
So you turned out to be the most helpful and informative person in this thread. Jerk.
Being asked to shoot a wedding when you aren't a wedding photographer
TTLKurtis wrote:
You need to make sure in whatever contract you have that you make zero guarantees about client satisfaction and that they understand you are not a wedding photographer or even a professional photographer and that you can not be held liable for any damages should the pictures be terrible, should you lose the photographs, whatever... This needs to be very clearly understood, because you could be sued personally. Not to mention the fact that it could potentially affect your wife\'s employment or at least her work environment. In that case, the liability insurance thing is less of a concern and so far as I\'m aware nobody is going to want to insure you \'for the day\' - that\'s not how insurance works (to my understanding). You will want equipment insurance however if you plan to do photography for money.
I do plan on making all of this clear.
Turn-around shouldn\'t really be anything more than a couple of days tops.
Have you had to deal with the types of lighting you\'ll be dealing with at a wedding before? Or the quantity of images you\'ll be producing?
I don\'t know the venue, so I can\'t comment on the lighting, but I have dealt with massive amounts of images before in a short period of time.
Depending on how picky you are and how much you want to put into it, it could certainly take you a lot more than a couple of days. I would give yourself a pretty big safety net just in case you end up needing it. 30 or 60 days isn\'t too bad in terms of a \'standard turn-around\' and leaves a lot more time for \'oh shit\' moments.[/quoted]
30 days is definitely more than I need, but I\'ll be sure to keep that time frame in mind. Sounds fair.
So taking it a step further, when you shoot a wedding, how do you go about picking the images you want to edit? Do you pick your best and show her and let her pick, or do you just pick the ones you think are the best and edit them. Also how many good pictures should you have for a 3 hour reception? Any links for wedding albums?
This varies for every photographer and ultimately if you were going to continue doing this you have to figure out what makes most sense for you and how you prefer to do things and what aligns with your values etc... Personally, I cull the images (select them) before I edit them and with two photographers I can end up with anywhere from 400-800 photographs on average. I do not show them anything I\'ve culled, as far as they are concerned those images don\'t exist.
So if I\'m going to edit 600 pictures, I\'m definitely going to need that 30 days. I was thinking along the lines of 100-150 edited pictures at the most.
I think if you\'re going to do this, I would make it a condition that they need to pay you sufficiently for you to cover the majority of the day\'s activities from getting-ready to the exit so that this is a worthwhile learning experience for you. If this is just talking about doing the reception only, that\'s the biggest pain in the ass to shoot and in my opinion the least interesting.
Seems like I\'m not going to be much of a bargain after all lol.
In terms of wedding albums... well, there\'s a bunch of links in the read-me-first thread in this forum however the majority of the wedding album vendors are not going to work with you unless you\'re a working professional with a website and tax id, etc.
So you turned out to be the most helpful and informative person in this thread. Jerk.
I appreciate this. Truly.
Feb 24, 2013 at 02:11 AM
Previous versions of Ballistics's message #11370756 « Being asked to shoot a wedding when you aren't a wedding photographer »
