How Much Should a First Time Wedding Photographer Cost?
By: Chris Romans
Tags: Freelancing, Business, Photography, Startup, Entrepreneurship

Last Updated: August 9th, 2019

The average price range we would expect a first time wedding photographer to charge for their services is between $0 — $1,000.

Some photographers looking for their absolute first wedding experience may be willing to shoot for free in exchange for “exposure” and the ability to build their wedding photography portfolio. On the other hand, some photographers will deem their time worth something monetary, but will still want to offer highly discounted services to be competitive with other established photographers in the marketplace.

There is no hard and fast rule on any of this. Our opinion is based on our own personal experience pricing our wedding photography services and seeing the starting rates that were charged by other photographers around the web and in our circle of friends.

If you’re here just for the hard numbers, you have them already!

If you want some more detail about why we feel a first time wedding photographer will fall in the $0 — $1,000 price range — we’re going to cover that in more detail now.

The Photography Intern vs. the Photography Professional

No matter what job a person is choosing to work, there will be some level of a learning curve. The best wedding photographers will normally have the opportunity to assist, shadow, and second shoot with other already established wedding photographers to get a taste of the work without having to fully invest themselves into the responsibilities of the job.

We often think of starting photographers as the “interns” of the wedding industry in much the same way a person would intern to be a teacher, counselor, etc. While the idea of an “unpaid intern” seems to be getting less common (at least in the United States), it still remains one potential route. The idea here is that this intern is receiving compensation in the form of experience — and that may be sufficient compensation for some.

This is just the simple fact — and while many photographers (and frankly — creatives working in virtually any industry) will object to the idea of “working for exposure”, we can at least understand the logic behind it.

What working for “exposure” actually results in

Okay — just because we can make sense of working for exposure, we don’t really agree with it in principal. This is especially true in the field of wedding photography — which is very high pressure and high stress at times.

As an outsider looking in, it may seem easy enough — a person taking pictures of people getting married. In practice, though, there’s a lot more to it. The need for communication and designing effective logistics of the wedding day are all just a few things outside of “photography” we do.

Some of the earliest shoots we did were for free and with exposure being an incentive. While growing our portfolio was beneficial, the exposure never really translated into anything tangible. We rarely would receive referrals of new business from these shoots. While we benefited from the hands on experience (and maybe for some this is enough!), that was about the extent of our benefit.

Every wedding photographer, new or experienced, has to make the decision of what their time is worth. For those just starting out, working for free to get that little bit of experience may be okay, and that’s a fine decision if you go that route.

For us — our time is valuable, and free is never an option anymore (save maybe for shooting photos through a charity like Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep). A wedding photographers’ job is not just 8 hours on a single wedding day. In practice, every booking we have results in at least 40–80 hours of work — an engagement shoot, wedding day shooting, photo editing, email communications, in person meetings, assembling a timeline, etc.

Whether you are a photographer trying to figure out your pricing, or a prospective client looking to figure out how much you should be expecting to pay — we challenge you to keep this in mind.

The wedding photographers you are looking at (or maybe comparing yourself too in some ways) are people too, and they probably put a ton more into their job then you realize.

They should be paid accordingly — and they get to dictate their value.

If that value is free for the first client — then fine, let them do it.

If it’s $500 — then rad, let them do it.

If they decide to take a giant leap and maybe already have a lot of photography experience in other niches, then by all means they can jump in at a higher price point.

But make no mistake about it: exposure doesn’t = compensation. Rarely does the promise of exposure pay off.

Money = Real Compensation

The defining feature of a professional wedding photographer is they will charge money (any amount) for their services.

As we started to charge to shoot weddings and other sessions, we began to approach things as a business instead of someone just dabbling in what is virtually a new hobby. The money we made we invested again and again into new camera gear, professional services to make our workflows better and give our clients better experiences, and over time — allow us to do things with money on a personal level like travel more.

We think it’s entirely reasonable if a person is just starting in in this industry to get their feet wet with little or no financial incentive, but that is not a sustainable way of living. Our efforts have value — even if they are ultimately artistic pursuits.

If you’re a newbie wedding photographer, consider charging even $50 for your first wedding. If you don’t have the photography portfolio established, at least make people value your time and efforts.

If you’re a potential client looking for a wedding photographer on the cheap, be willing to spend at least a little bit of money on someone who will be present and documenting one of the most important days of your life. If the photographer is against charging you, considering dropping them a tip at the end of the night as a way of saying thanks for their time.

3 Benefits of Hiring a First Time Wedding Photographer

1). Lower costs for clients on a budget.

For people looking to hire a wedding photographer without a lot of extra spending money, those photographers just starting out are going to be a good match.

While they won’t have the level of experience of portfolio to support them, they can still be great to work with and capture the day.

When we got married back in 2016, we were on a tight budget for our wedding. While wedding photography was important for us — at the time, affording a $5,000 photographer wasn’t in the cards as we struggled to even keep our rented house heated — even if we love and respect the work of the people we saw. We ended up finding a great photographer who was starting out, had a rocking time, love our photos, and still stay connected as we’ve had the opportunity to see her grow her wedding photo business.

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2). Creating opportunities for the photographer.

The photography industry is filled with a lot of people available to take on work. Often, the hardest part is getting the first gig or two. As a client, giving someone a chance to make their dreams come true is a huge deal. Obviously, you will want to be sure you click with the person and they seem like they can come through (within reason) on what you are wanting — but this is a great side effect.

3). They will bring an unrestricted point of view to your wedding.

It’s easy for wedding photographers who have done dozens (or hundreds) of weddings to get into a simple mindset of doing the same things over and over. Don’t get us wrong — there is definitely value to that sort of approach in some situations, but it can just as easy turn into cynicism and a bad case of “honing it in” just to get some shots done.

Beginner photographers will often be a lot more unhinged. They’re more excited to take great photos, and have a really great time doing it since it won’t feel like work just yet. Photographing one wedding is a lot different than photographing your 60th — we can tell you that!

3 Downsides of Hiring a First Time Wedding Photographer

1). They lack experience.

After the wedding day is over, it’s really easy to tell the good wedding photographers from the bad ones.

As we’ve pointed out, not all beginner photographers will be bad — but we can say they will lack the experience that is sometimes necessary to navigate wedding days successfully.

You might be thinking — weddings aren’t that hard!!

Sure — some of them are not. But others throw curveballs with schedules being thrown off, family & friends of the B&G stirring up drama, and so on.

A photographer with a lot of wedding experience will be able to better adapt and get the shots that are needed. More than this — they will be able to predict these types of things as well.

2). They lack organization.

We look back at our earliest weddings and realize — “wow, we were pretty disorganized!”

We struggled with figuring out the flow of the day, communicating effectively with clients, and even just finding our way around wedding venues. Since then, our approach has become much more refined and, well, professional.

Now we start to get organized before many of our clients even book with us. We get all the info we need upfront. We send out a wedding questionnaire about a month in advance and put together a timeline to help our clients get on the same page as us for the flow of their day. Little things like these go a long way to creating organization pro-actively.

3). They won’t have the best gear to back them up.

The honest truth is, budget photographers will be photographing on budget gear. We mentioned in this post that we shot our first weddings on a Canon Rebel camera — a good beginner camera, but not really one that is up to the task of making professional images in any consistent fashion.

The (obvious) reason for this is because professional camera gear costs money.

If a wedding photographer isn’t being paid enough to afford this type of equipment, how can they take really great photos?

Because the actual costs can often feel intangible, we can tell you we’ve spent over $30,000 on camera gear to help us support the creation of high quality and beautiful images in any environment. Budget gear can work when conditions are right, but once you enter a low light or imperfect lighting environment, it becomes harder and harder to get good images.

If anything is true about wedding photography, it’s that consistency should be one of the goals.

If you’re an aspiring wedding photographer and need help getting the right camera, lenses, etc. — check out our Recommended Gear pages right now!

Your Thoughts?

So — what do you think? Is the price range of $0 — $1,000 reasonable in your mind for a first time wedding photographer? Why or why not?

We’d like to hear your thoughts and let this run into a good discussion on the topic. We know that many people have opinions including established photographers, prospective clients trying to figure out what is a normal rate to be paying, and the first time photographers themselves! Let us know which camp you fall into, too!