Now the task begins of planning the details of your wedding day and getting all the necessary suppliers booked up. The first thing you’ll need to do is sort out the venue. Without the venue there is no wedding. As soon as you have booked your venue, which will also give you your firm wedding date, it’s time to start looking at photographers. Wedding photographers often get booked a year in advance, sometimes even longer. That’s not to say you won’t find a photographer at shorter notice – you will – but if you want to be absolutely certain that you get the photographer you REALLY want, you need to book them as early as you can.

But where to start?
There are literally thousands of photographers around at every price level and every style you can imagine and the choice can be overwhelming. Have a look through some wedding magazines to see what sort of style of photography you like. Search the internet and look at as many websites as you can muster the energy for. Start book-marking the sort of thing you like, but don’t get too bogged down in the labelling. Photojournalism, documentary, traditional, reportage photography… these are all terms that people use to label themselves but one photographer’s “Reportage” is another photographer’s “Traditional”. So ignore the labels and just look at the photographs on the websites.

Definitely ask your friends for referrals. It is always good to work with someone who has been recommended to you. But keep in mind that just because your best friend thought this was the greatest photographer on earth, doesn’t necessarily mean they are going to be right for you.

Then what?
Once you’ve short-listed a few names, get in touch with them by phone and have a conversation with them about your wedding day. If you’re not comfortable talking to them on the phone, if they’re not friendly and open and interested in you and your day, then they’re probably not the person you want to have around you for 8 hours on one of the most important days of your life.

And yes, do ask them about their pricing but don’t get too hung-up about the opening numbers. Each photographer has a different way of structuring their packages and until you have detailed information about what is really included in the pricing, the headline numbers can be very misleading. The photographer whose packages start from £1800 could end up working out cheaper than the person who quoted you £800 a day.

Also, beware of super cheap prices. I’m not saying that because I want you to spend a lot of money, it’s just that there is ALWAYS a reason why it’s cheap. You get what you pay for. Ask yourself how a photographer who is offering to cover your wedding for £500, including 200 prints plus the DVD plus album (just an example) can possibly be making enough money to make a living, to cover the costs of running a business, to have insurance in place in case things go wrong, to cover the cost of backup equipment so that they have an extra camera on the day if they happen to drop theirs on the church floor. Smell a rat? Chances are they are a keen hobbyist and fancy making some extra money on the weekend. If they mess up on the day they have nothing to lose. It’s just a bit of fun – to them!

Of course you MAY have found a talented beginner keen to get the experience and working towards becoming a wedding professional. They can be a real find – but again, keep in mind that they might not have the experience to deal with difficult lighting conditions such as dark churches and super bright mid-day summer sunshine. Check what sort of photography they were doing before they started in wedding photography and how long they’ve been taking photographs for.

My Uncle Bob dabbles in photography, and he won’t cost a penny.
Well, he may well be a very keen photographer indeed. But is he an experienced WEDDING photographer? Will he be able to provide you with photographs that you will cherish for the rest of your life or will you look back on the day and say “I wish we’d gotten someone to do it properly?”. And what happens if Uncle Bob messes up? Will you ever really forgive him? Will it strain family relations for the future? Is it worth the risk? And what about Uncle Bob himself. Wouldn’t he much rather ENJOY your wedding day than go through the stress and pressure of making sure he doesn’t mess up? If all goes well, Uncle Bob could be great. But if it doesn’t, the repercussions could reverberate around the family for years.

So how much should I budget for?
On average, a London based photographer will charge somewhere between £1800 and £2500 for a package that includes full-day coverage and a high quality album. Obviously there will be prices outside this range, and album quality can vary considerably and affect the pricing, but it’s a good ballpark figure to start from. At the end of the day, how much of your wedding budget you allocate to photography is down to you.

In the cold light of the post honeymoon days, your cake will have been eaten, the table decorations are gone, the flowers have long since wilted and the venue is hosting someone else’s wedding. What remains is a ring, a carefully stored dress, the wonderful memories of the day you made a lifetime commitment to the love of your life and the photographs that captured those moments. What’s that worth? Only you can decide.

Make an appointment.
Now that you have a shortlist of photographers, arrange a meeting. If at all possible try to meet with your photographer before booking. It’s not always feasible, and plenty of people book on the strength of the website, but if you can, then do. If you can’t, then be sure to have a detailed telephone conversation with them to make sure that you know what you’re getting.

Expect to travel to them for the meeting. Keep in mind that they will have lots of albums and prints to show you and often it is not practical, or for that matter professional, to travel all over town with them. Can you imagine having your wedding dress consultation at Starbucks? Well, bringing high quality prints and albums to Starbucks is no more appropriate than that. Also, remember that they will (more often than not) have made evening time available to see you, and they may well have another couple booked in to see after you.

At the meeting, be sure to look at as much material as you can. Ask to see complete weddings. Most anyone can pull 50 decent images out of a full day’s shooting to put an album together with… but you need to see what the complete body of work is like. Look at the style of the images and be sure that that is what you want from your wedding photography. There is no point in really admiring someone’s work and then asking them to shoot it in a style that’s different from what they have shown you. Listen to what they are saying to you about how they work. If they say they are truly unobtrusive throughout the whole day, and you already know you want 25 family groupings, then you are unlikely to be a good match.

A good photographer will be interviewing you as much as you are interviewing them to look out for any signs that you might not be a good fit. If there is any doubt that the two parties have a good understanding of what will be delivered in terms of style, product, quality and service, then you should walk away. Did you have a good rapport during the meeting? Again, if the photographer made you feel uncomfortable in a 1 hour meeting just imagine how you will feel when they are in the kitchen on the morning of your wedding!

Also consider that the relationship with your photographer will often extend long beyond your wedding day, sometimes developing into a lifelong relationship whereby the photographer goes on to photograph your special family occasions and new arrivals as your family grows over the years.

So in summary, do lots of research and decide what you like, set a ballpark budget, meet a shortlist of photographers and be sure you know what you’re getting for your money. And remember that personality counts for a great deal on the day.

Choosing your photographer is one of the most important decisions you will make for your wedding – I hope I have helped you a little bit in how to make that choice.

Written by Yvonne Blume at YBPHOTOGRAPHIC.COM