Calling all full-time photographer- Care to comment abt this?


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delong72

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Dec 16, 2004
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Hi to all full time photographer,

Found this website recently http://www.budgetshots.com offering extremely low rate cheap photography which currently doing their mass advertising.

This thread is not meant to comdemn any freelancer, but just hope to hear the comments and feedback to such low budget photography from those who committed their full-time and make a living out of wedding photography who have daily operational cost to meet.


Thank you in advance, would love to hear your views.
 

I respect their effort as they are banking on the budget market segment. As long as their clients are happy with the style of shooting, that's fine.
 

website so sloppy. they do not even make an effort to check for spelling errors.

yes its cheap.

pay peanuts get monkeys.
 

seem like 1 man show than a team... but nevertheless he know where his overhead lies... good for him, i'm waiting to see the product photography... esp the HP pics...
 

kinda funny, they charge customers on the rental of backup equipment, thought those are primary stuff photographers should take note? perhaps its like buying shooting insurance...
 

Wow, cheap :D

Its market force at work. May have good amatuers or so so amatuers. Hard to guarantee results, since u dunno which photographer u going to get.
 

but i like the concept of printing station... hehe

Some of my friends are doing that too :D photoedit and printing on the spot. hard work thou, if everyone is queuing up for photos.
 

Got to start somewhere ma.. start low price.. when can make money, introduce more quality..

Looking at the gallery pics, some overexposed, some composition flaws... cheap but ok la... shoot alot and choose the best..can do.
 

when the skill improve to a certain level, sure the price will likely be go up in the future.
 

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8. In your package rate, why is there an options to bring along backup equipments?

Ans: As we can only promise you to have a photographer at your wedding, we cannot promise you of the equipment failure, therefore, we provide this kind of service for which is like buying a peace of mind. Whereas most of the other freelance photographers don't provide.
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Amazing ..... they represent the "other" freelance photographers too :p ..... LOL ......

Picture this .....

On your big day ....... 6am in the morning ....

"Ding Dong"

Couple (C) : "Who is that"
Photographer (P) : "I am the photographer to take your wedding photographs"
(C) : "Please come in"
(P) : "Thanks ......"
Photographer happily sit at the sofa and make himself comfortable, switch on the Television, drink some water .... etc etc .....
(C) : "Ain't you going to take some picture"
(P) : "Oh ..... that ..... you see, my camera broke down, so since you did not pay for the back up system rental, I am here to show myself ...... ah .... where is the toilet? I need to go to pee ..... and call me when lunch is ready" .......

LOL ......
 

why are people always dissing photographers who offer relatively market rates?

there seem to an association here where low rates = low skills.

do they feel their ricebowl is threatened?

or who are they to say these photographers are not professional by their standards?
 

why are people always dissing photographers who offer relatively market rates?

there seem to an association here where low rates = low skills.

do they feel their ricebowl is threatened?

or who are they to say these photographers are not professional by their standards?

agree.

Hmm..there's a 'dionysus' package, but no relation to me hor! hehehe
 

This is nothing,

nobody can beat this guy...

We are coming to year-end where things are hotting up, so I am offering a promotion for Weddings. :)

My wedding package is $500. What you get are :
- Photojournalistic style shooting with the usual formals from 7AM to 11.30pm or so. Of course give me a short rest in the afternoon when there is no so much happening.
- ard 500 shots with post-processing, effects for about 10% of them, images on DVD-R return.
- 10 DVD-Rs for photo distribution (eg relatives/friends/colleagues) in slideshow w/music format, viewable on TV/DVD player.
- 360x 4R (4x6"), 2 nice slot-in albums
- 28x S8R (8x12"), 1 freestyle type album
- slideshow to show during banquet, notebook provided. Pls provide me with the photos 2 weeks in advance.

Prints are using Fujifilm FDi lab on Fuji Crystal Archive Supreme paper. Good stuff.

For events, i charge $40/hr, 20% discount if more than 4hrs total.

Equipment : Digital SLR.

You can contact me via PM or wedding_photog@yahoo.com.sg
to find out more.. check this out,

where is he now?
still among us?
or became history?



.
 

Having looked at their website, I am sure they're not the first, nor the last to be offering low priced wedding photography services.

Personally, i don't have a problem with it, I think there's a market for everyone budget and personality. I would never venture into that market myself being a bit lazy myself and not wanting to have to do hundreds of weddings a year to have to make a living.

Of course some of their stuff on the site alarms me. Ie, they may not have a enough photographers on your wedding day, of which they'll return the money. My feeling is that most couples want photos of some sort, so it's not really about returning the money but having the event covered.

Also not having backup gear or having to pay extra for backup gear. Yikes!:bigeyes:

Be interesting to see if this business model works out.

As for starting at a low price and working up, I hate to say it but it's really a myth that many photographers never achieve. It's not simply a matter of skill. There's much larger forces at play. There are other issues to deal with such as capital investment, established production, marketing, etc, that play a factor to the efectiveness of a company's rebranding. And finally, the biggest factor of all history.

Ie, Golden Horse Awards bridal boutique would find it really difficult to take away market share from Vera Wang not only because of changes required to production, marketing etc, but also to be able to break away from their history and their established consumer base. Photographers are no different. The cost of rebranding a photographer can be prohibitively expensive especially for one man operations in my opinion.
 

i have to echo wat kuang said about rebranding.

i had the toughest time converting from the "cheap freelancer" to the "expensive pro" (but still not that ex lar!). almost all of my old customer base was gone, because their referrals all wanted the same low price (but of course at the same, or higher quality).

it was almost like starting all over again. :)
 

agreed with ckuang & jOhO, many junior photographers go budgets maketing ways can't last till the stage of re-branding.

as for the paying xtra for back up gears, maybe is the way to raise fund to buy a proper equipment?
 

I know of a friend who is not so well to do. They are looking for wedding photographer that is below $400 and said that they dont mind lousy standard as long as its better than a compact camera quality. Heard they got 1 that did it for <$300. So i think there is always market for budget photographers.
 

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