Top Tips on Choosing the Best Wedding Photographer
By CAROLINE LANGHAM
How to Choose a great wedding photographer…
Our No.1 question, without a doubt, is always “Can you recommend a photographer?”
My Top Tips on How to Choose a Photographer
Choosing the best wedding photographer for you is a huge and important part of your wedding planning, and is often the next thing that couples turn their attention to after booking their wedding venue.
Where do you start?
Here are our THREE key steps to choosing a photographer….
1 STYLE
Research their style of work; Traditional, formal, posed, documentary, reportage or stylised.
Check out their website, social media and ask your venue for samples of their work; albums or links to weddings shot there.
There are a variety of photographers on our website – Click here to check out a selection of real weddings here at Cote How.
2 REVIEWS
It is imperative that you like them! You need to feel confident that you will get on with them and feel you can trust them to get the job done too. Check their reviews and in addition to looking at their star ratings look for more personality driven keywords, friendly, relaxed, quick, flexible.
3 PRICING
There is a vast array of packages & pricing out there, so research a few to get a feel for what to expect. If you are worried about budget, then rather than choosing a cheaper photographer, ask whether your preferred photographer could cut the coverage by maybe offering a half day rather than a full one. Fewer greater shots would be more desirable than thousands of poorer ones!
4 DATE
Of course once you have decided on your preferred photographer you may now need to:
Check your date is available. Unlike other wedding suppliers, such as florists, cake makers and stationers, your wedding photographer can only be in one place at any one time. So make sure that your chosen wedding date is one that your best wedding photographer can attend too.
This may mean trying to juggle a few agreed dates with your venue in order to find the perfect wedidng date, when all of your favourite edding supliers can confirm.
5 RAPPORT BUILDING
Personality is so important, so sometimes a phone call or skype call ahead of booking is wise.
Once booked trying to meet up is always a good idea. This is not always easy, especially if not local, but can sometimes be arranged as a pre-wedding shoot or an engagement shoot. This allows time to get to know each other and helps put you at ease behind the camera. A successful pre-shoot will also allay those nerves and build trust that your photographer knows exactly what you are looking for and how best to work with you on the day.
6 Cote how Photographers
So who could we recommend??? A question we get asked all the time.
Here is the short answer…
there are many photogrpahers out there and it is so important that you do steps 1-5 above first.
then head over to our page – Cote How Wedding Photographers page.
ALL of these photogrpahers have worked here (more than once) and we would “hands on heart” have them at our wedding.
That is not to say that if they are not on here – We wouldn’t!
We may not have met them before or may not have had time to add them yet.
But we are pretty particular about those that we do recommend, as we do feel that your wedding photography is really important – But we do value your wedding day experience more than that!
We are responsible for the smooth flow of your wedding, and whilst you can check out their work, pricepoint and avialability, we will be checking out their personality and how easy they are to work with, to make this day the best day of your life!
So we value their trust, willingness to work with us, and respect your space all at the same time. This is not an Instagram photoshoot, and the main thrust of the day must be about your experience, not the “light” or the angle of a glass on a table!
A good photographer should be almost invisible and manage to record the day with the least amount of disruption to the flow and overall feel of the ambience that we all try so hard to create. I hope that makes sense 🙂
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