I have a super wedding couple who are getting married in August and guess where the reception will be? Yep! Is that gorgeous or what? Check out the website here; http://www.prestigeyachtcharters.com/yacht_lexington.asp
This is going to be one awesome summer! :)
~Valeen
Once again our poor little blog has been somewhat neglected and I know I keep promising to write more often, but it's been crazy busy, especially since I thought this is was the 'off season'!
So here's a quick sneak peek of the wedding Kasey and I shot on Sunday. Of course we always have fun getting together and this was no exception. We have the best times and the best job ever!
I experimented a little with texture overlays on the first one and the second is right out of the camera, the first dance, one of my favorite shots of the day. :)
Valeen
by Shawn Ritcher
Shawn is a photographer in CA and has written this article, with his permission I'm posting it here. If you have any comments or questions, let us know, ok? :) ~ Valeen
In this digital age where everyone has digital cameras, scanners and home "photo printers", when people upload their photos to a local drug store website and pick them up a few hours later, we hear this all the time - How in the world do Professional Photographers charge $55 for an 8x10 when they cost just $1.50 at the drug store?
Here's why.
Simply put, you're not just paying for the actual photograph, you're paying for time and expertise. First, let's look at the actual time involved. If you don't read this entire page, at least read this first part.
For a two hour portrait session:
- one hour of travel to and from the session
- two hours of shooting
- 30 minutes of setup, preparation, talking to the client etc.
- 30 minutes to load the photos onto a computer (2 - 4 Gb of data)
- 30 minutes to back up the files on an external drive
- 3 - 4 hours of Photoshop time including cropping, contrast, color, sharpening, saving a copy for print and a copy for the internet and backing up the edited photographs
- 2 - 3 hours to talk to the client, answer questions, receive their order and payment, order their prints, receive and verify prints, package prints, schedule shipment and drop package off at Fed Ex.
- For local customers, we also print a set of all of their photos, and meet them at our studio to review the photos and place their order. Meeting and travel time averages 2 hours.
You can see how one two hour session easily turns into more than ten hours of work from start to finish. So when you see a Photographer charging a $200 session fee for a two hour photo shoot, you are not paying them $100 / hour.
For an eight hour wedding:
- I won't bore you with the details, but an eight hour wedding typically amounts to at least two to three full 40 hour work weeks worth of time. Again, if they are charging you $4,000 for an eight hour wedding, you are not paying them $500 / hour.
Now for the expertise.
Shooting professional photography is a skill, acquired through years of experience. Even though a quality camera now costs under $2,000 taking professional portraits involves much more than a nice camera.
Most Professional Photographers take years to go from buying their first decent camera to making money with their photography. In addition to learning how to use the camera itself, there is a mountain of other equipment involved, as well as numerous software programs used to edit and print photographs, run a website etc.
And let's not forget that you actually have to have people skills, be able to communicate, make people comfortable in front of the camera - and posing people to make them look their best in a photograph is a skill all by itself.
Think of it this way - the next time you pay $X to get your hair done, a pair of scissors only costs $1.50. But you gladly pay a lot more to hire a Professional.
What about the cheap studios at the mall?
Please don't compare us to the chain store studios. But if you must, consider all of the time and work that we put into our photographs, compared to what they do. Good luck getting a two hour photo shoot at a chain store. Not to mention they won't come to the beach! And of course, look at our work compared to theirs. You get what you pay for.
The truth is, most of the mall and chain store studios lose money. In fact, in 2007 Wal-Mart closed 500 of their portrait studios because of the financial drain they were putting on the company. What the chain stores bet on is that you'll come in for some quick and cheap photos, and while you're there, you'll also spend $200 on other things. They don't have to make money, they are just there to get you in the door.
Conclusion
We hope that those who have taken the time to read this page will have a better understanding of why professional photographs cost so much more than the ones that you get from your local drug store.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Shawn, Pamela & Gavin Richter
Caught on Film Photography
A beautiful wedding and a wonderful couple! I just posted a new slide show for Tracie and Scott who got married last month at The Water's Edge Resort in Westbrook. Even though it was freezing, everyone was so good about going outside for some shots and you can't even see the goosebumps in the pictures! :) It was a great time, we have THE BEST couples!! Brian J. shot this wedding with me, but it was a "one shot" gig for him (yes, pun intended!) as he is now in Washington DC working for the State Department. How cool is that?? :) This is his shot, working the flare!
Sweet!
The Mohegan Sun for a wedding? Yes!! A very intimate affair with just the Bride and Groom, me and the JP. I can't put their names here yet because they haven't told their families they got married! Oh, I should say we weren't alone, there were about a million other people there who decided to head out to the casino Saturday night!! It was absolutely the craziest I've ever seen that place!
I gave myself an hour to get there and check it out and to meet them, we hadn't even talked on the phone! And even though it only takes me about 15 minutes for the drive to the Casino, I was lucky to get there at all. As soon as I took the exit and the cars were lined up, I started to wonder what was going on.
Then I started seeing the signs... Valet Closed. Parking Garage Closed. Uh oh. I headed out to the Winter entrance where I usually park...Closed. I mean CLOSED, torn up and fenced off closed. Uh oh. After circling around, I decided the best and only way to get there was the shuttle bus, along with those million other people, of course. When I got on the bus, the driver tells me that no way are they going to let me in with the gear bag I had. Really? Huh? Didn't figure on that!! So he said to go to the hotel, and then cross over, etc, etc, etc. ....yeah, right... like I have time for that...did I mention it's almost 7 and the wedding is supposed to be taking place like...NOW??
Hmmmmm... now what? I went back to my car, dumped everything out of my purse and loaded George (yeah, I name my camera!) and a flash and my license and barely zipped it up and headed back to the Shuttle bus station... and waited while 2 buses full of people go by!! Agh!! My turn!! Yay! And where does this bus go? Some 'who knows where' place somewhere in the casino...sheesh!! I get there, get out, and try to find where the heck the bar is from where I am and, I'll tell ya, it wasn't around the corner! lol
Finally found the bar, the staff there was great...met my couple and a few of their newfound friends that stayed for the wedding. The JP still wasn't there (same problem) but everything was cool. Whew!!
I have to say it was so much fun regardless of the craziness and it made me think that there certainly wasn't a recession that night!
So here's a little preview shot... I love secret weddings!! :)
I haven't blogged in a while, I know. So I'm going to get started again now, but so much going on I'm not sure where to start!!! First a big thank you to all those who sent me get well wishes, now 'all better' and getting caught up. Well, if there is such a thing!!
We shot a really wonderful wedding on Valentine's Day this year, is that romantic or what?? I'll blog more about the wedding shortly, but right now I'm putting together a small 'mom' album so that my bride's mother can take some photographs back home to Europe from her daughter's wedding. I found out that European weddings are somewhat different from American weddings, so I want to learn more about those difference and other cultures too. (It's on my to do list)
More posts to come... more news... a great season ahead... very cool stuff. :)
Just loving Monday!!
~Valeen
I went through some of the weddings that we have already booked so far this year and it's going to be a blast! Lots of places we've already worked, and a couple of new ones too. I'm totally psyched and can't wait! So anyone looking for awesome places to have their wedding and/or reception, check out these gorgeous venues. Gotta love it!! :)
Mystic Seaport and the Seamen's Inne, Mystic, CT
The Water's Edge, Westbrook, CT
St. Clements Castle, Portland, CT
Fisher's Island, NY
Lake of Isles, North Stonington, CT
Saybrook Point Inn, Old Saybrook, CT
Ski Sundown, New Hartford, CT
Harkness Mansion, Waterford, CT
Branford House, Avery Point, Groton, CT
Quidnessett Country Club, N. Kingstown, RI
Lord Thompson Manor, Thompson, CT
Tunxis Plantation, Farmington, CT
These are some of my favorite places for so many reasons besides the fact that they are all absolutely gorgeous! Like maybe the food is fabulous too?? Right Jeremy?
There are more places and vendors that I love to work with so I decided that I'll be adding a page on the website to help you with your plans. If anyone has suggestions and a good referral, let me know, ok?
Happy Planning!
~ Valeen Thivierge
I just posted Tracy and Bryan's wedding slide show on the home page of the website www.thesweetestdays.com so check it out when you can. They were an awesome couple to work with and although it was freezing cold that day, it was a blast!! Thanks for letting us be part of your day!!
~Valeen
Love does not make the world go round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.
~ Franklin P Jones
This was such an awesome wedding and we had a blast shooting it! How can you go wrong with a beautiful couple, St. Patrick's Cathedral for the ceremony and Harkness Mansion for the Reception? Oh, and then there were the horses! The amazing, fabulous, wonderful horses that Beth gets to work with all the time. They are Shires, which are actually bigger than the Clydesdales! They also thought Beth's bouquet would taste pretty good too! :)
The slide show will be up soon, but I just had to post a few sneak peeks!
~ Valeen
Kasey and I shot Alicia and Lee's wedding back in October, we had such a great time shooting together (go figure!) and I just wanted to post a few shots here on the blog.
This wedding was in Putnam, with the reception in Webster, Mass., and boy did we catch everything right in peak foliage season! Plus the crystal clear blue day didn't hurt either!
Alicia and Lee thanks so much for having us! Your slide show will be done soon so keep an eye out for it. And Happy Thanksgiving!!
-Bruce
Tracy and Bryan got married on Saturday and it was cold!! OMG!! It was a beautiful wedding and I had such fun shooting it, too! I've known Tracy for years and had the pleasure of meeting Bryan a few months ago and they are just wonderful together! They wanted some shots down by the Sea Wall in New Haven and if they were out there in the cold, so was I! :) It lasted all of about one minute, I think the wind chill was zero!
And one from the church... the girls all wore this fabulous shade of red, and the flowers were all red... my favorite!!!
Because it was so cold, we had to improvise on the portraits... in a booth at the restaurant where they had a little pre-reception party, I love this shot.
Thanks for letting us be part of your day!
~ Valeen
Kate and I shot Kendra and Clint's wedding back on September 6th at the Eolia Mansion at Harkness Park. Despite the total monsoon that was blowing through the area, it was a wonderful evening. The Mansion is such a great place to shoot, one of my favorites! Kendra and Clint were so nice and the terrible weather seemed to have everyone in that typical "hunker down and roll with it" New Englander attitude ;) The party, after all, must go on!
Kendra was stunning...
Here is the link to your slideshow. And for friends and family here is the link to order pics from your online gallery on Pictage. If the link doesn't work when you click on it, please copy and paste this address into your browser:
http://www.pictage.com/423101
Thanks for a wonderful evening! All the best to you guys!
-Bruce
Yep we're here, alive and kickin' but as you can imagine with wedding season in full swing we are really busy concentrating on client images and haven't had much time to blog. Bad, bad, bad!!
Anyway just sitting here cranking through images like crazy and thought I'd share one I really like. It's from Crystal and Scott's wedding back in June. Isn't it cool?? A little secret sauce has been applied of course ;)
Hope everyone's enjoying their summer! Talk to ya soon!
-Bruce
