Wedding photography is one of the most rewarding yet challenging photography niches. Capturing a couple’s most important day requires preparation, skill, and attention to detail. It requires a level of competency because unlike most other fields of photography- a wedding can’t be redone. The investment of a wedding is usually significant, therefore it’s crucial to choose the right photographer to capture such an important event. Here are 5 red flags to look out for when choosing your wedding photographer and how to avoid them.
No Backup Equipment
I would arguably say that this is the most important thing to ask a wedding photographer but also one that is often neglected by couples.
It can be easy to get carried away with their style and aesthetics of their instagram portfolio, but all that means nothing if you don’t receive anything at all. Professional wedding photographers should have two cameras and each with dual memory card slots. This is a standard with any professional camera, because things can happen to memory cards and files can be lost. This has happened to me a number of times over the years during landscape photoshoots, but if I am shooting for someone else and particularly a wedding- more diligence must be taken. I have also known couples over the years who have lost all of their photos due to memory card fails and it’s one of the most devastating things to happen.
More amateur photographers may arrive at a wedding with just one camera and a single memory card and this is considered very risky and there’s a possibility you won’t receive any photos of your wedding.
Ask the photographer about their equipment, exactly what camera they use and how many- that way you can be assured you’ll receive the photos.
Lacking in Technical Skills
Weddings require an uncanny breath of technical skills- from capturing fast paced moments, to creating artistic portraits of the bride and groom, from macro photography to capture details and capturing the wide angle scenes of the venue. A lot of weddings run from day to night and from indoors to outdoors and you want to be sure that your wedding photographer has the ability to be able to respond to different lighting and compositional conditions.
An experienced photographer will know exactly where to place their subjects and also have the ability to use natural and flash light in the correct way as required.
Some examples of bad technical skills are:
- Poorly exposed images: dark images or images that have areas that are over exposed. Sometimes photographers may compress the shadows or overexpose highlights for the artistic element, but I more often than not see this as a technical error in wedding photographers.
- Poor focal length: I tend to find that a lot of photographers always shoot at the lowest aperture, creating a very narrow depth of field. This is quite common in portraits to separate the subject (you) from the background by creating a blurring effect. If a photographer is always shooting with a narrow depth of field, this may also cause some of the people to be out of focus, especially in group photos.
- Incorrect lighting: Understanding lighting is one of the greatest challenges of a photographer. Too often, I see unflattering photography from photographer’s not understanding lighting and not directing and placing the couple to create the best of the light. Being able to respond to different natural lighting conditions, whether it’s overcast, direct sunlight, nighttime or indoors requires technique and the right equipment (reflectors, off camera flash, on-camera flash etc) is essential for creating the most flattering photos.
Below are two examples of photos where carefully placing the subject and using composition and lighting to draw your eye to the subject.
Nectlecting Post Processing Workflow
As a wedding can produce a large amount of final images, placing simple filters or editing images using AI has become increasingly common. Personally, I do incorporate these workflow tactics for my bulk images, but I do think it’s necessary to manually edit a refined amount of the final photos.
Filters and AI edits are great at creating a consistent final image, especially if you want a nice looking instagram feed, but it does neglect a lot of imperfections that you may want edited. Personally, I manually edit a select number of photos to remove acne and blemishes, as well as removing background images or other distractions. Fine art printing is another skillset, as printed images often appear a lot more dull than on screen. A lot of trendy ‘instagram filters’ won’t print well, as instagram tends to favour a desaturated and low contrast look, which will appear dull and muddy when printed.
Ask your photographer what their editing process is like- if they include higher end retouching. This may not be something you need, but it can be great for those nasty, stress induced breakouts or if you have a scar you’d like removed.
Unprofessional Behaviour
Unlike most professional jobs, as a photographer you don’t have a boss and so you have no-one to keep you accountable. This means that photographers have to create their own work ethic and quite often, are incredibly unprofessional in the way they run their business.
Too often I’ve heard stories of couples never receiving their photos (or receiving them months after they were supposed to), the photographer ghost them after receiving the payment, running late and missing part of the ceremony. There are stories all over reddit and Facebook and even if a couple ‘thinks’ they’ve done their research, it can happen to anyone.
To avoid any of this happening, try to find previous couples that the photographer has worked with and ask them for a reference.
No Shot List
There’s nothing more heartbreaking than receiving your photos back and realising there are no photos of someone special like your mother or your daughter. There can be hundreds of people at a wedding and it can be nearly impossible to capture everybody and the photographer doesn’t know who the critical people are to capture on the day.
The photographer should communicate before the wedding and also during a list of family photos. Some couples like to prepare this list beforehand and some like to ‘wing it’ on the day. Either way, it’s important for the photographer to be communicating with you and ensuring that the people who means the most to you are captured. This red flag can be a little hard to filter before hiring the photographer, but you may take matters into your own hand by directing the photographer to the right people or creating a family combination list yourself.
About Me
Vanessa Claire
Vanessa Claire is an engineer turned photographer. With 10 years of photography experience and a professionally trained background in landscape and travel, she has a unique skill for using natural light and composition to create remarkable images. Her vision is to create timeless imagery by utilising unique and creative compositions.
Outside of photography, Vanessa loves travelling, surfing the coast and sipping on a good Nebbiolo.
