Tips for choosing wedding vendors: Photographer

“Picking a photographer” seemed like the perfect place to start this series since I’m trying to be yours. That being said I’m going to be as straight forward and transparent as possible – one of the reasons is that I want you to have the perfect photographer for your wedding, and that might not be me – you see everyone has their perfect fit and it might not always be me.

Enough dancing around the topic – onto the tips!

1. Style: So much of your wedding day ends up being about style. You should choose a photographer who’s style matches your own. If you are young, hip and edgy you should choose someone who can capture your day your way. If you are conservative and consider yourself traditional you should choose someone who will give you that kind of coverage.
2. Interview the actual photographer that will be covering your event – not the company’s salesman. And make sure you review their portfolio.
3. Get the DVD. Not every photographer saves every photo forever. You should take control of the archival of your precious memories.
4. When dealing with budget constrains products should be the first to go. By this I mean prints and albums. You can always get those later – but you can never recapture missed or mess-up moments.
5. Photography is more important than flowers. This is another dealing with budget tips. Your flowers will be dead the day after your wedding – but you’ll be sharing your photos with your great-grand children.
6. Engagement photo shoots are great! These sessions let you practice being in front of a camera, they are really fun and you get some great photos. But the most important reason (and photographers will never tell you this) is that you get to test the photographer. If your engagement shoot turns out really bad run (don’t walk) away from that photographer. If they can’t rock a simple engagement session then don’t trust them with the main event.