Perfection

Business of Photography

Interesting tread on the various business models in the photographic trade.
http://forum.clubsnap.org/showthread.php?t=239573

Interestingly i moved from the lower end market right up to about the loweer end of the high market price bracket almost instaneously, thanks to the education of valuing my work from Kuang.

About a year ago i was like charging 800-1000 bucks for a wedding. INCLUDING ALBUM! I remember cussing about the amount of time i had to spend on doing the album and not being able to charge for it like videographers are able to charge for editing videos.

Without a business to feed and having a goal of making my clients happy. That price range seemed sensible. However such a model would not suffice for a business in the long run. Looking at the math(yes engineering trained me must use numbers to prove myself)

Assuming 800 bucks for a wedding with album.
Album Cost: $150 (past yourself type, with print cost included)
Transportation: $50 (To wedding venue, meet clients, collect prints, send clients album)
Equipment Depreciation Costs: $ 80 (My $5000 setup would prob last me 2 years. Say 30 events a year)
Film Cost: $80 ($40 a roll for film, developing and scanning)
Total Costs: $360
Left with: $440

Time spent with client:
10 hours on wedding day
5 hours to edit images
2 hours for initial meet up
2 hour to send film, collect prints
5 hours to do the album
2 hours to meet clients to deliver goods
Total: 26 hours

So i am paid like 16bucks an hour. This model is off course NOT including business costs like rental of office space(this is definately a killer), website fees, web designer fees, sample album costs, taxes etc etc. Think McD offers a better pay if u include the business costs.

Yes i satisfied my clients in the past but i did not satisfy my own pocket. It is bad for the long run as one will be trying to go out and look for more clients so as to fulfill the basic minimun to sustain such a business model instead of trying to come up with more creative ways of shooting the next assignment.

Thought of the day:
Weddings happen just once. So does your dinner, hotel reservation even makeup artist. However images lasts forever. Those beautiful memories captured by the photographer will still be looked at by your children and grandchildren years on from your wedding. So why should we spend 40-50K on a wedding dinner, then be not willing to spend a bit more on a better photographer.

A good read on budgeting for wedding photography.

Diversity

Many photographers often find a niche and they specialize in it. This guy's different.

A Friend's Wedding

I attended my JC classmate, Eng Ngee's wedding on Sunday at Orchid Country Club. Yes.....just before two exam papers on Monday and Tuesday. Well, we have exams all the time but weddings? They come just one in a lifetime(at least for most ppl ;p). Its kinda break for me too. Haven't shot a wedding for a while already. So here are some of the images....

All the best, Eng Ngee and John.

:)

First post

Its been 2 years since i registered this blog and prob the 2nd time i attempted to start writing my blog. The past few times failed because i was too busy. So why now?

I have been reading many other photographer's blog, Kuang's and Eadwine's in particular. I realised blogging is a good way of charting one's progress in this business. I look at Kuang's blog and remember how i shot my 1st wedding with him and how much my shooting style has changed over the past 10+ shoots with him. I have also been inspired by the many entries these great photographers entered in their diaries and hope that by writing my own blog, i can inspire myself at times too.

So here goes......

:)