I’ve been photographing weddings now for six years and have shot close to 100 weddings. I juggle 10-15 weddings a year, a full-time job as a Digital Director, and a family with three kids, 6 and under. Because of this, I’ve had to learn a lot of tips about balance and productivity. Here are some of my favorites:
OUTSOURCE
This has been the biggest game-changer for me. For the first 5 years of my business I edited every one of my galleries on my own. In my head I told myself that no one is going to put as much care and attention into the edits. I then proceeded to suffer through 15+hours of editing per gallery. With my life, that means from about 8pm when the kids went to bed, to about 11pm I would edit as many photos as I could. Ultimately, I gave up the majority of my free time to edit.
It wasn’t until this year that I finally hired an editor. I still cull the wedding and edit sneak peeks the day after the wedding, but then I send off my catalog to be edited by a professional. What did I find out? Professional editors are actually better at editing than me. The fee I pay for is laughable for the amount of time I get back of my life. Typically a wedding costs me about $150-200 or so. A small price to pay to get all my free time back.
Maybe you love editing. That’s fine. What part of your business do you dread or suck at.? Outsource it and hire someone who is a professional. You need to focus your attention on your strengths and passion. Can’t afford to outsource? Keep reading.
NAIL THE SHOT IN CAMERA
With hiring an editor, it forced me to try and nail the photo better in camera, so I don’t have my editor trying to fix a bad photo. To me that means focusing more on the light and how it’s affecting the photo, removing distractions in the background and really nailing exposure in camera. It’s not hard, but sometimes it just means slowing down and paying more attention. If you’re spending more than 20 seconds editing a photo it’s typically cause you’re fixing a mistake.
FIND INSPIRATION OUTSIDE OF WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY
If your feed is all wedding photogs and you’re just chasing the latest trends, you will end up just producing work that looks like everyone else’s. I encourage you to find areas of inspiration outside wedding photography itself. It’s okay to unfollow some accounts so you can focus your attention elsewhere. Some places I find inspiration: Fashion magazines, photo books, paintings, and music.
GET A HOBBY THAT KEEPS YOU ACTIVE
By year three or four my back and body was killing me by the end of the day. The biggest reason was because I was out of shape. I spent the majority of the day sitting behind a computer. This year I took on a new hobby, climbing. It’s made me a lot stronger, got me back in to shape and makes an 8 hour wedding day no stress. Your health is so important and no one is going to pay attention to it besides you. You need to put yourself first and take care of that thing!
BE PREPARED
This is the number one, ultimate key to all my success as a wedding photographer. I have a questionnaire that gets the couple and me on the same page before the wedding day and makes it so I can meet and exceed all expectations. Check it out here.
WORK WITH AMAZING PEOPLE
Hire amazing second shooters, work with the best planners and venues, and surround yourself with the best. If you work with the best, it will force you to up your game, and challenge you to be the best. My business is almost completely run off referrals now. Here’s an article I wrote on being a great vendor to work with.
CHARGE MORE
Seriously. The more you charge, the higher-end clients you’ll work with, and the more trust they’ll have in your work. You’ll have more money to better run your business. You won’t stress when you need to upgrade your gear. And you’ll be able to make business decisions you want to make, not financially have to make.
INVEST IN EDUCATION OVER NEW GEAR
Spend money on education over buying new gear. Learning how to better use light, better run your business, better work with clients will all be a lot more valuable over the small tiny percentage gain you get by getting new gear. Make sure you know what you’re signing up for though. There are a lot of styled shoots out there disguised as education. My recommendations: do a one on one mentor session or check out something like Steel & Flint Workshop.
SHOOT MORE
Last, but not least. Shoot more. Photograph things outside of weddings. Travel, products, portraits, food, whatever. Take photos of other stuff and push your skillset beyond what you’re comfortable with.
WHAT DID I MISS?
Got any great secrets I missed? Leave them in the comments below.
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A visual breakdown of lighting & composition to help you take better photos.