What to Look for in a Wedding Photographer

As many of you may know, I’m engaged too! It’s been so fun this season to talk with my brides and relate to the process of wedding planning, budgets, details, learning their tricks and more. There’s so much that goes into wedding planning, and I thought I’d share some tidbits of helpful insight I find along our way! For us, we’ve decided to elope here in Grand Junction during the week of our festivities next fall, and then have a reception on the Grand Mesa to celebrate with all our friends and family that weekend. We are so excited!

One of the hardest things was finding a photographer for the event. Such a nontraditional celebration like ours was hard to accommodate for some. But I want to share some insight we found, and that I have from the inside as a photographer, about what to look for when hiring your wedding photographer!

Four Things to Look for in Your Wedding Photographer:

1. Real Portfolios. Don’t just make sure you like their work (though that’s the first thing you should do in my opinion!) — make sure that they have experience in actual real weddings. A lot of wedding vendors add to their portfolio with photos from styled shoots– photoshoots with model brides, perfectly posed tablescapes, ideal lighting and weather. Which is awesome! I love to see the creativity and personal artistic preferences of the photographers I know! But it can lead to problems if they don’t work the same on the real wedding day. Make sure you see a full, real wedding they’ve shot before booking.
2. Contracts. Professionals work with contracts. These contracts help you to know what to expect from the professional, and they should help to protect you, the client, feel secure in your payment, what you can expect in return, and what their policies are if things go wrong. Never work with a photographer without a contract!
3. Experience. Have they shot a wedding as a primary photographer? There’s a lot of learning that goes into
   being the boss, keeping the day on schedule, rounding up family members and wedding parties, tying ties and pinning boutonnieres, controlling lighting during the reception, and on and on. Make sure this isn’t their first rodeo. (Or, if it is their first time and you’re cool with that, then at least you’ll know!)
4. Personality. Do you get along with this photographer? Do they feel the love between you two, do they make you laugh even when you’re uncomfortable in front of the camera? Do you feel like you can be yourself around them? Do you trust them to capture your big day in the way you want? These are all crucial to the wedding process. You’re not going to want someone who annoys the crap out of you following you around at all moments of your wedding day. Make sure you hire someone you love!

There are obviously many more factors that can go into choosing a wedding photographer for your big day, but these are the top four that I found in my own hunt to be useful, and that I have witnessed as a photographer from the inside perspective! I hope this helps some of you brides- and grooms-to-be out there.

If you’re interested in learning more about my own wedding planning, keep posted for insights! I’ll be sharing planning tidbits as we continue the process and I’ll link the whole series here when we add more. 🙂