Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen! As the title of this blog post indicates, I'm going to do my best to explain, to the best of my abilities, what you ARE, and ARE NOT, paying for when hiring a professional photographer.
What are you NOT paying for?
Someone to "just push a button". Photographers do SO much more than "just push a button" to capture and produce the amazing images that we give you and there is so much more involved, behind the scenes, than you could ever imagine unless you're a photographer yourself.
What ARE you paying for, relatively speaking?
Well, first and foremost, you're paying for a professional photographer, with very high-end gear and the knowledge to use it properly to capture photos that you will treasure for many, many years.
You're paying for the constant, non-stop, ENDLESS formal and self education (both paid and unpaid) that comes along with photography and the industry. The extremely long days and nights, sitting in front of our computers and watching/reading/training, to be the best photographers that we can be. You compensate us for the hours upon hours upon hours away from our family and friends, that you don't see, that allow us to provide you with the quality work that you expect from us.
You're helping us pay for the required, monthly subscriptions and software purchases we have to pay for that goes towards keeping our editing software updated with the latest and greatest features and equipment that will eventually wear out and/or break and will have to be replaced.
You're paying for the many, MANY hours that we spend sorting, culling, rating, editing and re-editing the photos we captured AFTER your photo shoot has finished.
You're allowing us to make a livable wage using a VERY complicated, ever-changing skill-set learned through many years of practice and studying, trials and errors and an unbelievable amount of time we've invested into "free" photo shoots to help us hone our skill into something that made you want to hire us in the first place.
You're paying us for enormously expensive photography gear. (High-quality lenses can run in the multiple-thousands of dollars alone and a current-generation, professional, full-frame camera body usually costs between $3000-15,000, for JUST the body alone.) Strobe lighting, speedlights (a.k.a. flashes), remote triggers, back-drops, lighting stands, tripods, batteries, protective containers to carry everything in, new camera bodies that have a limited shelf-life due to normal use and accidental damage, back-up equipment so that we always have a fall-back should something happen to our primary gear that would other-wise cause us to cancel or re-schedule your shoot and so much more. Computers powerful enough to be able to edit the hundred, or even THOUSANDS, of photos that we take for you and the multi-tiered back-up solutions that we have to keep on-hand so that we reduce the risk of losing everything we worked hard to capture for you.
You're helping us pay for insurance to keep it all protected, attorney's fees for the documents we have to have created for all of you to sign to protect ourselves, and you, and outline what you will and will not be receiving from us.
These really are just a few examples of what you're actually paying for when you hire a professional, full-time photographer. Sure, you can find hobbyist photographers who may, or may not, be able to capture everything you're looking for. Someone who may, or may not, have all of the right equipment needed to provide you with the types of photos that you want and you may be able save yourself a few dollars, but is that a risk you want to take, or would you rather increase your chances of ensuring that your photography needs are met by spending your hard-earned money on someone entirely focused on you and your photography desires because we do this full-time and understand that if we do a bad job we can't just fall back on the ol' day-job to pay our bills?
We are small businesses, and most photographers are passionate about what they do. We are artists but we also have to be very tech-savvy and use our equipment, knowledge and hearts in everything that we do. Consider some of these points when questioning why photographers charge so much and ask yourself this..."How valuable are the memories of my life? How do you put a price tag on items that will easily out-live you, your children and the rest of your family for many, many generations to come and how important is it that you hire someone to capture them in such a way that you will know that your money was well spent?"
I could go on for days, but I'll end it here. Let me know what you think in the comments section below. I know there is so much that I left out, but this really should have most of you thinking about why you question how much a photographer charges you to "just click a button". Nothing in photography is free, including this website or the time I invested in creating it. It's all worthy of fair payment, don't you think?
Until next time...
Adam