At this early stage, it can be an overwhelming task to plan your wedding day. So many vendors, so many guests and so many small details. How does a photographer work in amongst all of this? Let's break it down step by step for you so that instead of feeling like you're sinking, we make it more fun and help you with getting started. Sound good? Let's roll.
When you think about it, there's no other wedding vendor that is with a couple for the whole day. As photographers, we're there from getting ready through to, at the very least, when your formalities are done and you get onto the dance floor. So, let's dive in and look at what your wedding photography experience will be.
The first thing to help de-stress you is that you don't need to know everything right now. Plans naturally fall into place as time goes by. First, fill out a contact form or send me an email to make sure I have your date available and then schedule an appointment to meet. We can either do these in person over coffee, on the phone or a video call. During that meeting, I'll take you through how I operate, how I get people comfortable in front of the camera and what the timing of a standard wedding day looks like. We'll also cover any questions you have. From there you both go home, discuss things and make a decision whether to book with me or not.
If you do decide to book with me, we get to work. I'll give you every piece of knowledge I have to help with anything I can along the way.
Contract & Payments
Bookings are made on my website. Once we have had our meeting, there will be a follow-up email sent with the link to a booking form. If you decide to go ahead, you just need to fill out that form and it will then be converted into a contract. An email will be sent which requires an electronic signature using Adobe's Echo Sign PDF contracts. Your deposit amount will be $800 and the final payment is due two weeks prior to the wedding or once we have finalised your schedule and whether you're going for a half or full day.
Payments can be made by VISA, MasterCard and EFT.
Before your wedding
In the lead up to your day, we schedule a planning session to go over the finer details so that you can get all of your wedding vendors onto the same timeline. This is usually scheduled once you know your getting ready locations and ceremony details so that we can fine tune some timing for you.
During this meeting, we work on a schedule to factor in everything from the start of the day through to whatever time you have me there for. We cover where you're getting ready, whatever travel time is involved and when your ceremony starts. We'll discuss plans for family photos and setting aside some time for sunset photos. We'll also work out whether you want (or need) a second photographer and we'll check out all the different locations for your bridal party and formal photos.
I then type up this schedule and send it through to you as a PDF to have a look over and check that we have it right. We then fine-tune it until we're sorted and finalised. Once we're good to go, I'll then email you an invoice for final payment.
After your wedding
Once your wedding day has passed, I get to work on your image gallery and a teaser film. Your final Images are available within two weeks of your wedding and teaser films will be 3 weeks. Final wedding films are available within 12 weeks.
Back up
I begin this process as soon as I arrive home after a wedding. I load up memory cards onto the computer, the computer does its own back up to a hard drive and all the RAW files are exported to a dedicated hard drive. By the next morning, there will be five copies of every photo taken.
Colour grading & editing
The next step is to select a colour scheme that suits your wedding. Each one is different because of locations, weather, clothing and flowers so once I get one that works, I then apply those same settings to all of the images. This gives me a starting point as well as applying consistency throughout the whole collection.
Image Gallery & Teaser Video
You can view, share and download your images straight to your desktop or phone and also purchase fine art prints and have them delivered straight to you from a professional photographic lab in Australia. Your films will be embedded into your gallery page and you will also receive a link to download the film directly from Vimeo.
Final Image Editing
In the two weeks after your wedding, I chip away at the editing process. It involves selecting and editing a set of colour images and then duplicating this set to create black and whites that are then edited from scratch as well.
Final Video Editing
The process of editing your film starts with a choice of music. I use a music service called Musicbed and you will have the opportunity to choose a song before the editing starts. Arranging your film is done to coincide with the song and any audio clips from the ceremony or speeches. Once your film is complete, it will be uploaded to my Vimeo account where you can download the file or stream to your TV.
RAW Footage
After you have received the finished film, all of your RAW footage will be compiled and uploaded to a dropbox account. Once synchronised, an email will be sent to you with details on how to download your footage.
You will be provided with one long camera file from each camera and not individual clips. Everything that we captured through the day will be supplied so expect some shaky and out of focus footage with some colouring problems that are fixed during the full editing process. As the name suggests, this will be RAW footage so expect a mix of good and bad stuff. The benefit of having this footage is that you will have the ceremony and speeches in full.
