It’s a question I’m continually being asked: if you can buy a copy of one of your own shots for 15p on the high street, why does a professional portrait session cost so much? Well, let me see if I can offer an explanation.
If you want to have your hair cut for a special occasion, or need to have the wires in your house replaced, how confident would you be in taking on the task and doing it yourself? Wouldn’t you? Well, professional portrait photography is not that different. Taking a good portrait involves more than pointing the camera at someone and clicking the shutter. So why should the skill of a professional photographer be valued less than that of a qualified stylist or electrician?
Part of the problem is that in this digital age everyone has a digital camera and a home computer or “photo printer.” And that’s why everyone thinks it’s easy to be a photographer. After all, isn’t that what the ads tell us? Well, yes they do. But in reality it is not that simple. Perhaps it would be useful to analyze what the production of a professional portrait entails. Wrapped up in cost are three main ingredients: time, equipment, and experience.
Weather
Let’s look at the number of hours involved for a typical two-hour location portrait session:
- an hour or two of travel to and from the session
- more than two hours of shooting
- 30 minutes of preparation with my client, getting to know him, discovering what they want and do not want from their session.
- An additional 3-4 hours of post-production time on the base to prepare your photos for your viewing experience. This includes downloading the images, editing and cropping them, and any additional manipulations and adjustments to the image.
- 2-3 hours to view photographs with a customer, answer questions, finalize their order, place their order with one of my specialized suppliers, pack the order ready for pickup, and finally arrange pickup by the customer.
So what starts out as a two-hour session usually turns into more than eight hours of work for the photographer.
Team
Equipment cost is a major ongoing expense for most professional photographers as they constantly update their cameras and lenses as technology improves. And a quality camera body – one that will give you those portraits big enough to hang on the wall – is now over £ 2,500. But the camera with its lenses and accessories is not enough. The photographer also relies on a sophisticated computer system and a mountain of software used to edit and view photographs.
Expertise
Taking professional photos is a skill. And just like being a stylist or an electrician, it is a skill that is acquired through years of experience. It is much more than a good camera and a good lens: it demands the ability to deal with the ability to make people feel comfortable in front of the camera. And I must add, the ability to pose people and capture the results as they unravel while making them look their best in the finished photograph. All professional photographers spend years practicing these skills. Many of us invest in regular training seminars to stay up-to-date in this rapidly changing environment, not only in our camera and people skills, but also to master that mountain of other equipment and software that I already mentioned.
So is professional photography good value for money?
Think of it this way: next time you book your £ 50 haircut, would you consider the free ‘do it yourself’ version? Why not? Styling your hair can’t be that difficult, right? And do it with that special portrait: the newborn; grandparents’ wedding anniversary; college graduation. These are all events that must be recorded – children grow up very fast and it is a time that can never be visited again. Families are important and spending money and time on professional photography is an investment, a way to preserve your memories and family history so they can be shared over and over again. Can you really put a price on that?