Question 1

Are they a full-time Wedding Photographer?

Accepted Answer

Keylight Photography is a dedicated, full-time Wedding Photographer.
This matters because it is often found that part-time Wedding Photographers do it for “extra cash on the weekend” or “it’s a hobby-turned-money-maker”. Similarly, a part-time Wedding Photographer is not fully committed to one career, putting all their eggs in that one basket, to secure the success of their own business. Would you really be happy if our Wedding Photographer was not 100% committed?

Question 2

How many years’ experience?

Accepted Answer

Jon has over 20 years of experience in the trade with over 1500 weddings completed.
This is very important. In Britain, we have four seasons. Each season offers totally different lighting and weather constraints. For a low-quantity-per-year photographer, that doesn’t give many chances at shooting Weddings in each season and gaining the experience needed. Also, since the banking crash of 2009, there were a lot of redundancies and many people with little to no experience simply bought DSLR cameras and considered themselves as Professional Wedding Photographers. How do you tell the difference?

Question 3

Can the Photographer show hundreds of full Weddings?

Accepted Answer

Yes, we can. Go to our Wedding Photography Portfolio and take a look at our work and testimonials.
This is paramount. Any true Wedding Photographer worth their weight should have hundreds of Weddings under their belt and should easily be able to show at least 50-100 images from each Wedding, as the day flowed, at each location of the day, and including the Evening Reception. Things to look out for are ‘Spray-n-Pray’ photographers who vastly over-shoot the same scenes, in a bid to “pray that some are ok”. They are likely to throw away a lot of photos. And you never know what was taken, so you never know what’s missing. Another thing to look out for are the ‘heavy Photoshoppers’. If a professional Wedding Photographer can show you full-sets of photos from hundreds of Weddings, in their unedited RAW format, and are proud to, then you are on the right track. If a photographer can only show handfuls of key photos from a dozen or so weddings, are they showing the full picture of their worth?

Question 4

What Cameras do you use?

Accepted Answer

The industry is laden with different types, brands and styles of camera. Typically, Canon and Nikon are the most popular. But where it really matters is whether or not the actual cameras being used, are amateur, semi-pro or professional full-frame types. Cheap D-SLR cameras cannot handle getting rained on, so they may fail. They don’t hold up as well to being dropped. But more than that, they struggle to get sharp, grain-free images in dark churches, and during the Ceremony, when flash guns are banned. I use Canon EOS 5D mkIII cameras for the main shooting. They are full-frame, shoot massive RAW image files, and save to two memory cars within the camera, at the same time. So if one card fails, the other one carries on. The 5DmkII and III cameras dominate the industry, as they have full-size 35mm sensors. Big sensors means better in low light for less grain in the photo and better build quality and overall performance. I also use the latest DJI camera equipment, the Zenmuse X5S and OSMO systems, for 4K video shooting.

Question 5

Do you shoot RAW?

Accepted Answer

This is so important. Any professional photographer worth their weight will NEVER shoot in JPEG mode on the camera. Many do this because they either (a) don’t want the extra responsibility of having to correct RAW image files, or (b) don’t want to have to handle 30-50 gigabytes of stored data, per Wedding. The photographer who shoots JPEG images is at a huge disadvantage. Shadows and highlights of an image cannot be recovered. So if a Bride is in a white dress in bright sunlight, and the photo is too bright when taken, there’s no “hidden image meat” in the JPEG to recover. The RAW image file does contain it, so RAW-to-JPEG tweaking can perfect the photo, before the image is rendered to a JPEG file, for easy use by the customer.

Question 6

Do you have backup?

Accepted Answer

We have multiple redundancy cameras and setups, this allows for breakages, accidents, unforseen circumstances and the most important, people blocking the view.
The Wedding Photographer, who does not have a second camera, is an instant no-no. What happens if that one camera fails, gets dropped, rained on, or stolen? What about if the photographer does not have more than one physical kit of camera gear (including multiple cameras, lenses and flashes, in separate kit bags)? What if someone steals their bag on Saturday and your Wedding is on Sunday? At Keylight, I have three master sets of gear, all stored separately. All in all, I have 15 or so cameras, all with different uses. If something goes wrong, I have backup. If someone were to steal my bag, I have another.

Question 7

Are you insured?

Accepted Answer

This seems obvious to ask, but there is more to it than a simple “Yes I am insured”. There are two main types of Professional Photographer Insurance. The first one is the more common – ‘Public Liability Insurance’. This covers if the photographer breaks someone’s property by accident or if someone trips over their camera bag and gets injured, etc. But that’s pretty much it. What you should look for is a “Certificate of Professional Indemnity Wedding Photographer Insurance”. I have this, the top package, supplied by Photo Shield via the Master Photographer Association. The difference is, it covers the usual public liability things, but it also covers me, the cameras, the memory chips, and if I were to be critically ill, injured or kidnapped, for example, or if someone snatches the camera or memory, or if the camera or chip fail and there are issues with the photos, the insurance covers re-staging the Wedding forsake of the photos, up to £100,000 per indemnity (or per Wedding). Fortunately, in 1235 Weddings since May 1997, I have never missed a beat. Sure I’ve dropped and smashed a camera or two onto concrete floors, but the chips are fine and I have six cameras with me, so there are no problems.

Question 8

What are your people-skills like?

Accepted Answer

Personality of the Wedding Photographer is everything. On the big day, they are the one person who is there from start to finish. Makeup and hair people, they come and go, so do the cars, caterers, DJs and so on. The Wedding Photographer needs to have a high level of personal skills, rapport and charisma. We’ve all been to Weddings as guests over the years, many as a kid, and I am sure we all remember photographers who take too long with the group photos, shout and moan at people and kids when they don’t do what is asked of them, get impatient and otherwise don’t come over as friendly and relaxing. I always find that the best way to get the nicest photos is to put people at ease and make them laugh.

Question 9

Can I see photos on the day?

Accepted Answer

A lot of photographers don’t want to show anything to the customer until they have edited everything through Photoshop. But what I like to do, is make a ‘rush-job’ gallery of RAW images, raced through during the Wedding Breakfast, and presented on my trusty old iPad 1 (the basic screen quality model) during the Evening Reception. All the galleries of individual Weddings that are uploaded to my Keylight Facebook page are the dumps from the iPad after the Wedding. Couples can then relax, having seen their photos in their basic unedited (except for some in black and white) form, and can share these with the guests. Any true Wedding Photographer should not worry about showing unedited work, in bulk, on the day.

Question 10

How cheap or expensive are you?

Accepted Answer

We are not the cheapest out there, but our packages offer a lot more and security for you on your Wedding day with industry competitiveness with a package to suit your budget and your needs.
Beware of super-cheap or low cost Wedding Photographers. There are many who are offering £200-400 packages. But this is not enough to make for a sustainable business. Something to remember is, you are booking them far in advance of your big day. Are they going to still be in business? How can they afford to offer services so low price? Are they full or part time? Is this just a hobby? Remember, you are paying for someone who will turn up to your Wedding in 12-24 months’ time and capture the biggest day of your life. Scrimping on costs is not going to secure you the quality that you expect, regardless of portfolios shown.
Likewise, there are a lot of ultra-expensive Wedding Photographers. Many start at £1000 and go up to £2000-4000. That, to me, is extortion. Many customers are new to planning a Wedding. It’s their first time. It is easy to be indoctrinated into believing that you should have a set budget for A B C components for your day; if your Wedding is £20,000, then £2000 of that should be for photographs. I’ve always seen this as poppycock. A lot of money is made in huge profit margins for Albums and Storybooks. One key Storybook that I sell is priced at £490 with me when customers want to add them as individual purchases, on top of their chosen package (an A3 metallic 20-page Storybook). At the NEC and Ricoh National Wedding Shows, there are always 5 or so photography companies who charge £750 to a whopping £2500, for the exact same book. Shopping around gets you a great middle-ground between too cheap (unsustainable business model) and too expensive (rip off).

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