Searching for a Wedding Photographer: The Step by Step Guide to Finding a Wedding Photographer That's Right for You

For the first time in a while, I'm on the other side of the inquiry form.

I’m a wedding photographer searching for a wedding photographer. It's a strange experience to look at portfolios other than my own, and it's made me reevaluate the perspective of the prospective clients looking at my own website.

Why am I currently shopping for a wedding photographer as a married woman, you may ask?

Because my little sister asked me two very important questions this year:

1. Will you be my matron of honor?

2. Can you help me find the perfect wedding photographer?

And obviously the answers were “yes!” and “hell yes!”

For the first time in years, I was doing a deep dive on the work of other photography vendors, and it is a daunting experience. Even though I knew what to look for, I realized my little sister didn't. Since not everyone's matron of honor knows the ins and outs of the wedding photography industry, I've come up with this guide to show you exactly how I made her a short list of photogs that would match her preferences and priorities.

Here is my step by step process on how I’m finding the right wedding photographer for her (and how you can find the perfect wedding photographer for you!).

Step 1: Find Your Style.

Open Pinterest or Instagram, search “wedding photography [insert adjectives that describe your venue/wedding aesthetic: barn, coastal, ballroom, woodsy, etc].” Then, sift through the absolute deluge of photograph results. The more specific you can be, the more you'll be able to see results that match the conditions you need your wedding photographer to work with. It doesn't help much to see a natural light photographer's work in an open field when your entire wedding day will take place indoors in a speakeasy bar.

While scrolling, save everything you like. No need to be judicious or particular. Anything that catches your eye, add it to that folder. At this stage, you're casting a wide net.

Once you’ve gone through enough photos that your eyes start burning, go to that folder.

Now that you’re in the folder, start to look for what makes the photos you chose similar.

1. Posing: Do the photos look more documentary-style, cinematic, or posed & editorial?

2. Styling: Do the photos look light and airy, true to color, or dark and moody?

3. Color grading: Are the images more warm or cool toned?

4. Editing: Do the photos look vintage or timeless?

If you have a difficult time defining the style you like, go to the websites of the pins you saved and see how those photographers describe their style. That should help you understand the adjectives that describe the type of wedding photographer you gravitate towards.

Step 2: Define Your Budget.

Find a range that you’re comfortable spending. It doesn’t matter if you’re obsessed with a specific photographer but their starting package is the price tag you want to spend on your whole wedding day. It’s important to understand that the budget you set will impact the expectations you can reasonably expect from the professional you hire.

It’s not fair to post your inspiration photos from Hailey Bieber’s wedding while your budget is $500 for a full day of coverage.

But how do you figure out your wedding photographer budget?

Scroll through any local wedding group, and you'll see people asking "what should I expect to spend on a wedding photographer?"

If you scroll down to the comments, you'll see that this is one of the least helpful questions you can ask.

There is a wedding photographer for any budget. And I mean any budget. Search hard enough, and you'll even be able to find someone willing to work your wedding for practically free just to get experience in their portfolio.

If you are willing to roll the dice on having practically no useable photos from your wedding day, that option is certainly available to you.

However, photography is one of those industries where you pretty consistently get what you pay for. Someone charging next to nothing will not have the budget for the gear they need or the years of experience required to produce those inspiration photos you saved.

That's why typing "average cost of a wedding photographer" isn't the most helpful either. There's certainly more lower end photographers than experienced ones, and there's also select photographers who are extremely high budget. In this case, the mean or median numbers don't really tell you much. Plus, you have to factor in your location and what each package includes. A wedding photographer in NYC is obviously going to cost more than a wedding photographer in Alabama.

These are extremely loose numbers, because of all the factors listed above. But an extremely rough estimate on photography budgets for 8 hours will look like this:

1. Under $2,000 - Extreme beginner. Very much a gamble on what you're going to receive.

2. $3,000 - $4,000 - A bit of experience, likely does decent work.

3. $5,000 - $7,000 - Experienced, produces consistent, quality work.

4. $8,000 - $10,000+ - Very experienced, high end work.

Those are very rough estimates. Of course, you can find really talented photographers who are undercharging (maybe photography isn't their sole source of income), and maybe you'll find really expensive photographers who may not have the highest quality work. And again, your location and wedding market will sway those numbers in either direction. This is a very rough set of touch points I've gathered from spending a lot of time in a variety of photography forums.

Finding a photographer for my sister in the Hudson Valley had higher price points than my main market in Delaware.

Step 3: Start the Search.

Now, let’s talk about where to search and what you should be looking for.

The best place to start (in my opinion) is Google. Google My Business is a helpful way to search through local results for the professionals who are ranking highly for your search terms. Now that you have some adjectives to describing the wedding photographer you're searching for, it's easy to search "wedding photographer [location] [style of wedding photography you like]."

It's also easy to get a quick sense of their portfolio and style without having to click on every website individually, since you can see the photos they have posted. Additionally, reviews are right there for you to swipe through to get a quick sense of other peoples' experiences with that vendor.

Once you get a lay of the land there, you can search through directories like Zola or Loverly, but if you can, reach out to the professionals through their own website or only reach out to professionals you’re really interested in. On most of those sites, professionals need to pay to speak to every client who messages them, so reaching out to 10 photographers when you really only like 2 of them costs the other 8 money.

If you’re prepared to get 800 comments, you can post in a local wedding group. But when you do, make sure to be specific about your needs so you can hopefully weed out some spam. Your date, location, budget, and style are great things to include.

Step 4: What to Look for When Searching for a Wedding Photographer

Trying to wade through the deluge of options online can feel extremely overwhelming. Here are things to look for when evaluating wedding portfolios:

1. “Do they show complete galleries on their site?”

While a portfolio showing the best of the best photos from each wedding is nice, you absolutely must see 2-3 full galleries before committing to a wedding photographer. Anyone can get lucky and take a nice photo or two (or pay to go to a styled shoot with professional models). You need to ensure that they can handle the mechanics and complications of a real wedding day.

On your wedding day, there are no re-dos. Someone can be an incredible family or newborn photographer, but once you introduce the time constraints, difficult lighting, or managing 120 people at once that comes with wedding photography, they might crack under the pressure.

Not all photographers show full galleries on the website, but some are happy to share them when you inquire. Regardless of when you see the galleries, you need to make sure that editing and shooting style consistently performs across the entire gallery.

2. “Am I represented in their portfolio?”

The photographer you hire should have experience documenting bodies that look like yours.

You should be able to see examples of your skin tone, your body type, your mobility needs, and your relationship on their website. There are some photography editing styles that look lovely on fair skin, but they could make darker skin tones look inaccurate.

The website might have beautiful photos of thin, white, able-bodied straight couples, but you deserve to know that your photographer can create images just as beautiful if you don’t fit that mold.

3. “Do they have examples on their website showcasing how they handle different lighting scenarios?”

There are some natural light photographers who do beautiful work outdoors during ideal lighting, but if your wedding day is taking place in a dimly lit bar, you need to hire a photographer with the experience and gear to handle those tricking lighting situations. You need a photographer who can handle whatever curveballs the shifting lighting throws at them, because most wedding days will include indoor lighting with a window, bright direct sunlight, backlit lighting, golden hour, blue hour, night, and windowless indoor lighting, and you typically only have a few moments to transition between those complicated scenarios.

4. “Is the photographer I’m hiring going to be the actual person who shows up on my wedding day?”

   
   

For larger wedding companies, it’s common practice to book a wedding and then shop around for an associate to shoot that wedding. This enables them to take on more and more clients, since they outsource the shooting and then outsource the editing to someone else to edit them in bulk.

Some collectives have a primary photographer and then have associates they have specifically trained in their style - this is vastly different than outsourcing to a random professional.

If you’re booking someone for their specific work and you want to ensure that they are the ones actually showing up to your wedding, make sure you have that conversation early on.

Note: Most photographers have in their contract that they can hire an associate in the event of an emergency - if they become extremely ill the day before the wedding, they will do the legwork to find you an associate so you are not without a photographer on your wedding day. This is a very common practice, as we’re all human and emergencies happen, and very different from someone taking your money and then getting a different professional to pay $100 an hour to shoot the day.

There's No One Right Answer When Searching for a Wedding Photographer

Shopping for a wedding photographer can feel extremely overwhelming, and quite frankly, exhausting.

For better or worse, there's no one right answer when it comes to searching for a wedding photographer.

Because the “best wedding photographer” doesn’t exist.

All that matters is that you find the best wedding photographer for you and the love of your life. Everyone has a different preference, style, and budget when choosing the right artist to document their day. Photographers aren't one size fits all, and you should find one whose work speaks to your style and taste.

Did you like the wedding photos seen throughout this blog? Still Poetry Photography would love to be considered for documenting your wedding day! We're a true to life, documentary style wife and husband wedding photography team that brings just a bit of editorial to your portraits. To see more of our work, check out our wedding portfolio, and best of luck in your search!