Category archive: Weddings
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Melbourne bridal shows 2012
I’m not sure which of these shows Best Day Photo will be at but for your convenience here is a quick list of the places we know shows will be happening so you can plan your Melbourne wedding. Which shows do you plan to attend?
(Remember – you already know who you want for your photographer: US!)
Inglewood Estate Bridal Show – April 18th
Windmill Gardens Bridal Show – April 29th
I Do I Do (Bendigo) – May 20th
Morabbin Bridal Expo – May 26th
Pakenham Bridal Expo – June 3rd
Bride.com Wedding Expo – June 16 & 17th
Mornington Extravaganza – June 17th
Ballarat Bridal Expo – June 24th
Doncaster Bridal Expo – July 1st
East Gippsland Wedding Expo – July 2012
Expo at L’Unica Parkville – July 2012
Ivanhoe Bridal Expo – August 5th
Bendigo Bridal Expo – August 26th
Bridal Service Exhibit – August 2012
Cranbourne Bridal Expo – August 2012
Hoppers Crossing Wedding Expo – September 9th
Mornington Bridal Expo – September 16th
Wedding Expo Evening – October 2012
Bridal Extravaganza – November 2012
Melbourne Expo – January 20th 2013
Remember: your wedding photography in Melbourne is set. All you need to do now is contact us!
For more wedding planning tips please check the blog archives or bookmark us to return to later.
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5 Reasons to Hire a Professional Wedding Photographer For Your Wedding
If this post is useful, please remember to share with others! ————————–>
As you are planning your wedding, you will discuss things like wedding budget, DIY invitations and save-the-date cards, what style dress you want to wear … and of course, photographers.
You’ll find many, many options for your photography services so how do you know whether to hire a professional or let your “friend with a camera” take all the photos at your wedding? Your friend just bought a “fancy new camera” right? Can’t they cover it all? (Note: by “friend” in this article we also mean $200 amateur photographers, Craigslist photographers with no insurance and those with no website other than Facebook.)
Here are some reasons we suggest a professional wedding photographer for your Melbourne wedding:
1) A professional photographer is more consistent.
Your friend may take a few of the best photos at your wedding. The odds of them taking the 10 best or 50 best or 100 best are increasingly difficult. At a wedding, many things change such as lighting, angles, and the speed and stress of the day. Having a pro ensures that whether the lighting is beautiful or it’s a harsh sunny day or even a dark, cavernous church, a pro will have the skill (and tools) available to make your wedding photos beautiful. Nearly every camera takes great photos outdoors on a slightly cloudy day. A professional knows how to get great results when your wedding day isn’t so forgiving.
The easiest ways to tell a professional photographer from an amateur is the consistency of one full wedding. Does their lighting get much, much darker at the reception? Do people’s skin tones become yellowy? For instance, study this photo of a bride and groom dancing (please note this is a stock photo, Best Day Photo did NOT take this image. Nor would we ever put it on our website if we had.) Note that you can’t see the edge of his tux, his hair, anything in the background. His face is darker than you’d expect, they cut off his hand at the wrong place, left some blob of light in the background and didn’t seem to edit the photo. In good news, he’s smiling.
2) A professional photographer has more (and better) gear.
If you hire a “real” professional (not someone who bought their camera last year and got 2 lenses for Christmas) a real professional will carry much, much more photography gear than your friends and relatives. For example, when we go to a wedding, each photographer carries at least 2-3 camera bodies and 5+ lenses as well as over 30 gigabytes of memory cards and enough batteries to leave our cameras on for days, not hours. As I’ve explained to couples in the past, I could shoot over 50,000 photos over 4 days before I was out of space and battery life. Your average “friend with a camera” will carry 1 camera body, 2 batteries, 2 sets of flash batteries and probably under 16 gig of memory. Could that be enough? Yes. And if it’s not? At your wedding?
A professional wedding photographer is also likely to have tripods, light stands, umbrellas, etc. They can possibly shoot remotely for those hard-to-reach balcony shots. And if their gear breaks the week before your wedding, a pro also likely has insurance on all their gear. If you’re going to use your friend, ask what happens if their camera drops into that “cool waterfall” they’re going to photograph the day before your wedding.
3) A professional photographer is more focused on what you want than what they want.
Very few articles discuss the reality of having a friend or “someone just starting out” take your wedding photos but here’s a reality: they’re shooting for themselves. They want “portfolio material” and don’t really care how they get it. They will go where they aren’t supposed to in the church, do things you think are absolutely crazy, focus on shots that “look good” to future clients, not the ones you necessarily care about. VERY few amateur or “just starting” photographers will get table shots, “grip and grin” posed shots at the reception or photographers of your grandmother at table 9 who doesn’t get up to dance. They are focused on having fun, dancing with your wedding party and getting some “really cool photos” to show off on Facebook.
A pro, on the other hand, knows that a really great wedding portfolio comes with doing a great job for the couple. We know you want dancing photos but you also want pictures of your grandmother and Great Aunt Sally. A professional photographer knows your family hasn’t gotten together in 3 years since your sister’s wedding and knows how important those photographs are. A professional wedding photographer is going to care more about making sure you’re on time for your reception than “one more jumping photo by the lake” when you have already done five, which leads to …
4) Experienced wedding photographers use time wisely.
One of the most precious things on your wedding day is time. You never have enough. At a 4 hour reception when you need to try to talk to 160 people, you’re going to be talking to almost 1 person per minute for the entire time. If your photographer takes you away for half hour, you’re now fitting those 160 people you care about into 3.5 hours and spending 12% of your wedding reception with someone you’ve met 2 or 3 times. A pro realizes this is not what you really want. When you give us an hour for portraits, we’re going to use that time to create the best portraits we can.
My favourite example of this is a photo we took while the groom went for a “potty break.” We captured this image and a few like it in under 5 minutes during downtime. When you hire a pro photographer, you’re getting the experience and understanding that only comes with time and testing.
5) Adrenaline & stress: Pros use it, amateurs get overwhelmed by it.
I’ll admit it: my first few weddings were *by far* not my best. The adrenaline rush of having such great couples, venues and so much to shoot at every turn was overwhelming. We missed so many great moments, possible photos and so many people. We had guests telling us “shoot this, shoot that” as they always do but instead of quickly taking a photo and moving to what else was happening, we allowed ourselves to be engrossed by every detail of the wedding.
A professional photographer can multitask with a camera in their hands. They take the photo in front of them while planning 2 or 3 more great photo opportunities across the dance floor. An amateur wedding photographer has never experienced the stress of a bride who can’t find her veil 5 minutes before leaving or having 2 bridesmaids walk out after the ceremony and take a smoke break during formal photos. An amateur has not likely faced a deadline of getting a couple out of the church so the next wedding can get in and having 15 minutes to get 10 group photos. A professional has, does and knows what needs to be done. A professional knows when to step up and take charge and when to step back and let moments happen.
This is the third post in a series of wedding planning tips
1) Affordable wedding photography in Melbourne
3) 5 Reasons to Hire a Professional Wedding Photographer For Your Wedding
Best Day Photo is a professional wedding photography studio in Melbourne, VIC. We have photographed over 150 weddings in 7 years and have photographed weddings in 2 countries and 8 US states. We are new to making great photos in Melbourne and always up for new location suggestions. We photograph weddings, family portraits (mostly newborns and babies) as well as working on commercial photography for restaurants and other small businesses when we’re not otherwise too busy. We are also professional photographer consultants and have helped other pro photographers improve their business for over 5 years.
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Wedding photography styles – what it means
Last time we talked about what affordable wedding photography in Melbourne really is. This time, I want to talk about photographic styles.
What styles of wedding photography are there?
Traditional photographers – also called classic wedding photography.
Traditional or classic wedding photographers are those that pour a lot of time, energy and effort into documenting your wedding through traditional posed wedding photos, group formals and the “expected” photos. These photographers often get a bad name because classic and traditional is “old” but some pose-based wedding photographers take exceptional wedding photos. Getting great posed formal photos on the day of the wedding is something couples care more about as time after the wedding increases. Paying attention to groups is an important part of wedding photography but may not be the whole story. Avoid wedding photographers who are “classic” in the way their photos look dated, old or just plain boring.
Wedding photojournalism – also called documentary wedding photography or reportage photography.
True wedding photojournalism means that a photographer is mainly and most importantly focused on the moments that happen at your wedding. These type of photographers can sometimes be called reportage or documentary wedding photographers as well. A photojournalist may have little to no experience posing wedding clients except as clients ask them to photograph these groups. Photojournalists take their approach from news photographers who only observe and do not interact with events. Documentary wedding photographers believe they are at the event to capture things as they happen, not make them happen, and thus try to use as much of a hands-off approach as possible. Some of the truly great wedding photographers in the world are photojournalists but many who claim this label are simply photographers with little to no skill in posing and are trying to avoid feeling uncomfortable on your wedding day. Formal photos are an important part of your wedding where family and friends are involved so please ensure your wedding photographer has some skill with posed photos.
Fashion wedding photography.
A new style has emerged in the last three to five years that only existed in magazines previously – fashion wedding photography. Fashion wedding photographers want to make beautiful photos that look as if you and your groom stepped from the pages of a magazine. They are concerned with posed photos, like the traditional photographer, but are also focused on the specific aspects of photography that appear in those magazine photos. Posing is much different for a fashion photographer and a classic wedding photographer. Fashion photographers take their lead from industry leading photographers who provide incredible art to fill the pages of your wedding planning magazines. And what bride doesn’t want to look like she stepped from a magazine, right? To be a fashion wedding photographer successfully, you must normally have a high level of skill or your images will look cheap, unattractive and not interesting. A great fashion photographer will have galleries of stunning, high quality work and plenty of poses outside the realm of bridal parties jumping in the air.
What style of wedding photography does Best Day Photo produce?
As a small business owner, we have to play to our skills. My greatest skill is flexibility. We call the Best Day Photo style of photography “freestyle wedding photography.” Freestyle wedding photography means I have learned to pose people – both in a fashion sense and a classic way. I also have and had great second shooters to work with and have also been able to focus on capturing the moments as they happen. In “real life” I tend to practice what the great martial arts master Bruce Lee called “jeet kun do” – which was a way of learning that allowed you to absorb what is useful and discard everything else.
If you are being honest with your wedding photography desires, don’t you want magazine style photos? When your family has dispersed and gone home, and you don’t see everyone until Christmas, don’t you want a great family group photo where everyone looks their best? And realistically, you probably also want your dad watching you say your vows, dancing moments, events as they occur – everything a photojournalist would cover.
The images linked above are not photos we bury on our site to show clients “once in awhile” when a client needs to see more. These are the images we show in our galleries and want you to see. They are who we are. They are colorful and classic, artistic and posed, thoughtful and spur-of-the-moment. We are flexible in giving you what I’ve always called “the best possible photo taken in that moment.” We want to provide great wedding photography and we believe brides want a combination of styles, NOT just one style that will limit what they see in their album after the wedding.
Some words describe Best Day Photo more than others. If they fit what you’re looking for that’s excellent. We know we won’t fit everyone’s style. We are fun, colorful, humorous, romantic and professional. We are serious about the job but we love to have a good time with our clients. We hope to be your wedding photographers. If you like what you see in our wedding galleries and engagement images, please contact us today and we’ll be happy to help you!
This is the second post in a series of wedding planning tips
1) Affordable wedding photography in Melbourne
3) 5 Reasons to Hire a Professional Wedding Photographer For Your Wedding
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Affordable wedding photography in Melbourne – what is it?
Melbourne Wedding Packages
As you plan your wedding, you’ll have to sort out many factors in choosing your wedding photographer. You’ll be looking at many different styles, trying to figure out who are the professionals and who are the pretenders, and of course deciding on a budget and choosing how much to spend on wedding photos.
Every couple’s budget is unique so “low budget” to one couple is “affordable” to another. Couples search for “affordable wedding photographers” but get results that don’t help them. So, let’s try to sort out what affordable wedding photography is in the Melbourne area.
After an exhaustive survey of over 30 Melbourne wedding photographers, here are some statistics:
- 18 of 30 photographers would be considered “professional.”
- 17 of 18 professional photographers give their clients a high resolution disk of images with their packages.
- 11 of 18 pro photographers post at least some package pricing on their website.
- Their prices range from $1200 to $3600 as a base cost.
- The average base cost of the 18 photographers is $2450.
So, what is affordable wedding photography?
If your budget is under $1000, there are very few professional photographers in your price range. The only photographers we could find under $1000 were offering a 3 or 4 hour package. For photographers who customize, this is not uncommon. In fact, even though it’s an unlisted package, Best Day Photo will offer a 3 hour, disk only package for $995. We understand that many couples need just a few hours of coverage and we’re happy to help them at a reasonable rate. If you require a full day of services under this price range, please check GumTree or check with your local college for students who are willing to take some photos for you.
If your budget is $1200-$2500, you will have choices to make to find an affordable photographer. Maybe you need to have your photographer for fewer hours than you intended. Maybe you need to purchase an album after the wedding, not before. Whatever the choices you have to make, you can find an affordable wedding photographer in Melbourne in this range. Best Day Photo‘s base rate starts in this range with both an album and high resolution disk. You will likely be able to choose a style and photographer you feel comfortable with for your wedding.
If your budget is over $2500, you will have very little trouble finding an affordable photographer. You will be able to find full day packages, album and disk included, for $3300 with many photographers. You are not looking for an “affordable” photographer in this range – you are looking for the one who suits you best. Many professional photographers have packages in this range, including us.
How does Best Day Photo compare to local photographers?
Best Day Photo has photographed over 150 weddings in the past 8 years. We have been full time in this industry for over 5 years and when we’re not photographing weddings, we do search engine optimization for other photographers. We carry industry standard insurance, have the gear to shoot in almost any situation and have handled events from 4 people to 400 people.
That being said, we aim to please the mid-range client. Our clients spend an average of $3200 with us. This includes an album, full resolution disk and 8+ hours coverage. Typically, our clients allot time for us to shoot formals and what we call “romantic” formals – you and your new husband together, alone, for a little while. The vast majority of our clients purchase an album up front and that album is typically a 30-40 page magazine style wedding album. Our packages range from $995 for a 3 hour disk only package to a $4950 full day, flushmount and parent album package with everything you would expect in such a package.
The word we haven’t discussed above is “value.” When choosing a photographer, the real question is how much value you are receiving for your money. Whether you spend $900 or $4900, we want to provide the highest value possible – this means the best service and best photography we can possibly manage at the lowest sustainable rates possible. Our albums are professionally printed and bound and we use only the best vendors in the industry. Although we want to shoot your wedding, we cannot compromise long term success to shoot *every* wedding. We are looking for clients who are looking for high value for their money – those are our clients.
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This is the first post in a series of wedding planning tips
1) Affordable wedding photography in Melbourne
3) 5 Reasons to Hire a Professional Wedding Photographer For Your Wedding
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Nick and Amanda’s wedding at the Palmyra Golf Course
Since this wedding, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044. If you still need Maine wedding photography I suggest Rene Minnis Photo.
Once upon a time …
Gosh, it really makes me feel … old to think about how long I’ve known Nick. Our families have been friends for about 25 years. I met this kid when he was … maybe 5. He HAS a kid now. Time FLIES.
When Nick asked me if I’d shoot his wedding, I was honored and thrilled. I couldn’t imagine anyone else doing it! Nick and his family are like family.
Amanda and Nick were married at the Palmyra Golf Club. It was a beautiful place and the weather *barely* held out for some outdoor photos. What a great day! So good to see everyone I know there, too!
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Acadia National Park wedding | Marta and Rich
Since this wedding, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044. If you still need Maine wedding photography I suggest Rene Minnis Photo.
Once every few years I have a very small, tiny, intimate wedding that is just the highlight of my year. We had one with Matt and Leslie in 2005, Jacquie and John in 2008 and now Marta & Rich in 2011.
How many people were at this small Acadia National Park wedding? Me, the officiant, Marta and Rich, her parents and their two children. Done. So yes, me, an officiant, the couple and two adult witnesses… sound familiar, Jacquie?
Marta and Rich chose a fantastic place at Acadia for their wedding: Bubble Pond. Now, you can’t have 100 guests at a Bubble Pond wedding but if you are looking for an intimate, beautiful outdoor spot in Maine you could do a *lot* worse than Bubble Pond. It was picturesque. I was thrilled to shoot the wedding and formals for Marta & Rich.
I hope you enjoy the photos of their beautiful Acadia wedding!
Tools for planning your 2012 wedding
Since this post, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044. If you still need Maine wedding photography I suggest Rene Minnis Photo.
Many wedding planning tools exist in 2012 to plan a great wedding. Since it’s my job to be familiar with the wedding industry I thought I’d post up some of the tools I’m aware of.
So where do you start? Start by being excited! Make a countdown timer to put everywhere!
For fun
You can get free countdown timers at
For a little more fun you can design your bridal avatar.
Wedding costs, lists and planning
Once you’ve done that you may want to figure out how much this wedding is going to cost.
To find some average wedding costs in your area try the Cost of Wedding calculator.
(On average, couples that live in or travel to Portland, ME spend between $18,756 and $31,260 total for Average Cost. You should expect to pay, on average, 50% to 100%+ more when choosing well-experienced professionals, designer labels, popular event locations, unique or custom products and services.)
Ok, let’s get down to planning this wedding. First, you can figure out to do lists and such on any major planning site like TheKnot. If you’d rather doing everything in one place you can also use a site like MyWeddingWorkbook which has some really great features to help plan. TheKnot and similar sites have great timelines, lists, etc. to use in your planning.
Other wedding planning tools
Three really cool tools are the Sunset Calculator, Wedding Mapper and Kuler’s Color chooser.
The sunset calculator can let you plan for photos, outdoor ceremony times, etc. months in advance of the date. The wedding mapper creates great local maps of your venues, reception locations, local hotels, places to eat for guests, etc. Kuler is used by design professionals to create color schemes. Why not use a professional tool to design your wedding color scheme?
Wedding website design
So you want to design a site? If you are going to use a simple page on WeddingChannel or something, I can’t help you much there. The tools they have are all they have. But if you want somewhere to put that countdown timer, embed your weddingmapper maps and let guests and wedding party know info about the event, you may get creative and setup a WordPress blog.
If you do, here are a few themes, plugins and tools you can use:
Want something simpler? Try creating a free wedding website at EWedding.
DetailsKevin & Amber: a destination wedding in Tampa
Since this wedding, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044. If you still need Maine wedding photography I suggest Rene Minnis Photo.
Clients always ask me how far I travel for weddings. Well, the answer has changed. I’m based in (Melbourne, Australia) and my recent trip to shoot a wedding for Kevin & Amber in Tampa, Florida is about 10,000 miles one-way. I’m pretty sure that’s the furthest I’ve traveled to do wedding photography. Well, not including my first wedding shoot in Seoul, South Korea, but that was before I was a pro! And I was actually living in Seoul then so I don’t think it counts.
How did I book a wedding in Tampa? Well, Kevin & I have been friends since he started college, about 1996? Kevin is one of the reasons I’ve shot so many weddings in Pennsylvania, as well. Word travels when you have great friends AND great clients and Kevin & Amber are both!
I spent a week in Tampa and we had a fantastic time!! Lots of tennis and family parties, a great wedding and a relaxing day at the beach (when it was 40 degrees back home in Maine!) I missed being away from southern Maine and my family but if I was going to go for that long this was the perfect trip for it.
I couldn’t choose fewer photos to blog so there are a lot. Sorry about that! When you spend so long and get to know so many great people it’s VERY hard to limit it. I’ll keep the blah blah blah short and focus on Kevin & Amber’s many wedding photos! You may notice a theme (Amber laughing!) Enjoy!
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Wedding photos of Keli and Isaac
Since this wedding, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044. If you still need Maine wedding photography I suggest Rene Minnis Photo.
We met Keli and Isaac at a bridal show and if you had told me in the first five minutes that Keli would be one of my favorite brides I’ve ever photographed and her mom would be in the top 3 favorite mother-in-laws ever, I may have laughed. Keli didn’t seem all that interested in us to begin with. Her mom was VERY interested and asked a lot of questions! They kept coming back to our booth, though, and I knew we were going to book the wedding. We also were fortunate to meet Isaac that day. Isaac is one of the nicest, funniest grooms. Keli is not only gorgeous but one of the sweetest brides!
Well, it turns out we’d develop a special bond with all three of them. We all share so many inside-jokes and we had so many great laughs between their beautiful engagement session and the wedding. Every-single-time Keli’s mom would call us she would tell me “Hi Matt, this is Brenda-Cohen-Kelis-Mom.” So just an FYI, THAT is her official name here at Best Day Photo. BrendacohenKelismom.
Another perk of this wedding was working at the fantastic Gilfillan’s! One of the things I’m going to miss most about Syracuse is Dan & Marilyn and their food! They have the *best* wedding food in all of CNY.
Keli and Isaac: I MISS YOU GUYS! Onto photos!
That’s it! Don’t forget to check out the video from the wedding by going to the Best Day Photo homepage and clicking “Watch” on the main photo from the wedding!
Enjoy the photos? Don’t forget to join us on Facebook!
DetailsWedding photos of Mel & Stewart
Since this wedding, I’ve moved and become a Melbourne wedding photographer. If you’re in Melbourne or the surrounding suburbs please contact me today about shooting your wedding by email or phone at 0403-515-044.
This wedding was awesome! Melissa and Stewart are some of the nicest people we have ever met. You can tell how much they love each other just by seeing them together. It’s a real special pleasure photographing weddings when the emotion is genuine and all the guests share in it so completely.
All in all it was a beautiful day full of happiness and joy for two wonderful people.
More wedding pictures after the jump!
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