Read below 1st!
You have your camera charged, and memory cards ready. You are getting ready to shoot your first wedding. You are sweating buckets because you are nervous, but you are excited for the opportunity. A new photographer who has had their camera for not even 5 months, you think you ready and prepared.
You listed an ad for cheap wedding photography--$500 for all day coverage.
You go to the wedding and you shoot. The day goes off without a hitch and you are loving this new "job"! The pictures on the back of the camera look awesome, and you can't wait to get home to edit the pictures!
BUT
The ball drops.
You get home and download the images to find that there are NONE. The memory card that you shot the entire wedding on is corrupt. No images at all. This happened to me. I was a brand new photographer. I had my Nikon D70 for about 5 months, and wanted to start doing weddings. I listed an ad for cheap wedding photography, and found a couple that was willing to let me shoot their wedding. I was new and didn't know what I was doing, so we met up and talked about their wedding, and agreed I would shoot it for $500. No contract signed. No LLC to protect myself, nothing. There is no way that I would get sued, right? The bride and groom were super nice, and hey, he was a lawyer, so if we needed a contract he would have mentioned it, I figured.
I took my camera, in P mode, with an 8gb card, and shot their entire wedding on one card. I couldn't wait to get home and see the images I saw on the back of my camera materialize in Photoshop. But instead, I got home and found that the card was toast. I had not 1 image from their wedding. I had to tell them that I had nothing. Talk about gut-wrenching. I knew I was going to give them their $500 back. That was all I planned on happening. Little did I know that my world was about to get rocked. I got sued. I had no LLC, I had no contract. Even worse, I had no insurance. Either I pay him what he was asking, or else we would end up in court, and I would have to pay an attorney, and that would cost even more. They sued me for the cost to rent new tux's, new makeup, and hair, new flowers, a new photographer, and other things. They sued me for enough to recreate parts of their wedding so the new photographer could take their pictures. It would have cost me more to fight it. They would be able to eventually put a lien against my house and more. I paid up. I paid almost $3,000 on top of refunding them their $500.
I quit photography. It was my first wedding, and I was devastated. My heart was broken that this had happened.
Over the next year, I practiced on my kids, and shot my friends kids, friends who were engaged...and just had fun. I learned my camera and abused it. I still had a passion for photography, but was gun shy and scared. I knew that there had to be a way to protect myself, but I had no idea. During that year, I did tons of research and I filed for an LLC. Even if I was going to be shooting my friends kids, I wanted to keep my personal assets like my house protected in a lawsuit. Then I met Rachel. I had decided to try one more time, but start with a free wedding. This time I had a contract. This time I shot the wedding on 4gb cards, in case something happened to one of them. This time I was an LLC. This time I had practiced for a year, and knew my camera. I was no longer in P mode, but in Manual mode. This time I had more then my kit lens to shoot with. Even with all those things in place, if someone sued me, I would still have to pay out. What if my gear broke? How would I replace it? I didn't have the money to just replace a camera if it broke. What if I tripped and fell and my camera broke? What if my cards went corrupt again? What if someone at the shoot got hurt by tripping over my gear or lightstands?
I looked and looked and finally decided that if I was going to do this, I had to do it right and protect not only myself but MY FAMILY. That is when I got insurance. I decided to go with Package Choice through Hill & Usher. It was worth the small amount each month to have that peace of mind. I knew that if I got sued or something broke I would be protected. My family would be protected. In NO WAY am I saying that insurance is all you need. You need to have backups. You need to be prepared for the what ifs. You need a contract that lays things out, and protects not only you, but your bride and groom, or your portrait clients. Our contracts under promise and we over deliver. Our contracts lay out what they can expect from us. They lay out the time line on how long till they receive their images (which is always longer then we know it will take, but then you look like a rockstar when you get them out sooner then they expected), to what will happen if for some reason something happens to their images, or even if something happened to US on the way to a shoot!
Going into the photography business can be risky and scary. It is not easy or cheap. And there are certain things that you just can not get away with not having. You need to protect yourself and your family. You need to know your camera and you need to know how to handle the what ifs. I was absolutely not prepared.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE do NOT fall into the line of thinking that I fell into, thinking that it won't happen to you. I mean, you're most likely right that it will not happen to you.
BUT
What if you are that small percentage that it does happen to? What if you are not prepared?
I wish I could go back and change so much of what I did. (It is a huge part of why we are as open as we are with Pure.) The bride and groom forever do not have pictures of their actual wedding day because I was unprepared and untrained. I should have second shot with people before I went out and shot this wedding. I had no idea what to expect during a wedding day. I barely knew my camera. It was NOT fair to use their wedding to practice. I should have been a second or third shooter for someone else and practiced there. I am not saying that this would not have still happened, but at least I would have known to not shoot an entire wedding on one memory card. I would have known to have a backup camera and lens, even if I had to rent them. I ONLY use 4GB cards now and shoot RAW, so if something like this was to happen again... I would only loose 100 images due to the large file size on my 5d mark ii. Plus Rachel and I shoot together, so we are backed-up both in images and in gear. We have back ups of back ups now.
My point here is do NOT ever think that it won't happen to you. Because, as sad as I am to say it, at some point in your career, whether if you are new or seasoned, something will happen at some point. Something you did not anticipate. The difference can be in what you did to prevent it, and what you do to learn from it, and how you protected yourself and your family.
