“We come by love not by finding the perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person, perfectly” – Sam Keen
If you are getting married and have a face, this article could be for you! Our aim is to give you stellar photography – real event coverage without breaking the bank. We’ve been capturing weddings since 2005 and we have come up with an all inclusive basic plan that will save you a bundle, but still give you everything you could need. Below, we’ll walk you through the flow of the average wedding. We’ll show you how we capture your day, our services and at the very bottom we’ll tell you how much we charge for a wedding.
We have found that a major expense with wedding is printing. No kidding! That’s how we get you! We’d love to sell you a 16 sq. inch, hand made, Italian leather bound, coffee table book with 4 corner bleed edges and lay-flat binding photo album. Beautiful with unsurpassed quality, they can run north of $2000 easily. Our basic plan doesn’t come with one.
Instead we would like to make it more convenient for our clients so we’ve got a slightly different approach to our business model: You will receive everything we produce in a digital album. Inside your album you’ll find two sister folders – one with full resolution files (for printing) and because we want you to share with everyone, the same files optimized for web in the other folder. (yes, there’s a huge difference) We also include a limited release that will allow you to print commercially where ever you live, whenever you want with who ever you wish. This is BIG! With online printing services available now anything from your faces on balloons to canvas to wall murals is possible. This puts all the power in your hands where it should be – you in total control of your memories.
We’re not heartless though! We understand you want to see your images bigger than a phone screen. For this reason we combine all your images into chapters named after the shoots described below on a multi media slide show. It comes complete with pan shots and close ups. Watch your favourite chapters or the entire wedding over again anytime you want on your big screen tv or computer. Upload it to Youtube and share with remote friends and family. This will put your wedding album right in your hands where ever you may go. It’s also a terrific safety catch in case you misplace your master copy.
From our point of view weddings are front loaded. This means lots of photo opportunities during the beginning of the day and less towards the end. For example; Your ring exchange during your ceremony is certainly more ‘picture worthy’ than ‘Uncle Fred’ eating dinner at the reception. Also the beginning of the day is when everyone still looks fresh. This is where the action happens. This is the area we concentrate on.
We separate weddings into shoots. There are up to 6 shoots in a full blown, basic package plan. They are the engagement portrait, the pre-wedding, the ceremony, friends and family, the wedding party and finally, the duet. To capture all this takes about four hours or so not including the engagement shoot. So we base our basic plan on about 4 hours.
So let’s talk about the ‘engagement shoot’. If you are lucky enough to be local or can possibly schedule some time with us prior to your wedding, we would love to capture you both in a engagement portrait. Ideally we would like to do this early enough to release your image back to you in time to use it for your wedding. The digital world is full fun wedding applications for a full resolution file! It also gives us a chance to get to know each other a bit before the ‘big show’.
If you google “hate having” it’ll autofill with “having my picture taken”. We get it! We could say something flippant such as our lenses are trained not to be scary, but more likely you, like everybody else has been the victim of poor portraiture. We promise you’ll have fun. We always have fun! It’s the rule! (We have puppets, but please don’t make us use them) Most importantly, we feel confident that your engagement shoot results should alleviate your fears.
Vancouver Island is a vacation destination! We can make use of the postcard scenery outdoors in an environmental portrait if weather permitting or we can head for the comfort of our dedicated photography studio.You may feel more comfortable leaving everything up to us or maybe you have a creative streak? Maybe you want something more artistic and less cliche? Maybe you may have seen an image you’d like to replicate with you and your fiance…Quite often we can accommodate our client’s wishes. Either way, we’re confident you’re going to love the results. About a week later you will be offered a selection of images to look over. We ask you to pick your favourite and we’ll bring an 8 X 10 framed print with us on the day of your wedding. It will sit on your receiving table at your reception which adds a nice layer of familiarity between you and your guests. (Yes, they have the right hall/room) and the feedback will give even the shyest ‘cameraphobe’ a whole lot of confidence.
The big day is here! There’s still lots to do and lots to keep your mind on! You can relax a bit as you’ve hired professionals. We show up at the venue early enough to put you at ease. We need to because it’s time for our pre-wedding shoot. The pre-wedding shoot is much more than one might realize. In fact Angel Studio’s basic plan supplies two experienced photographers because we believe four eyes are better than two and to cover this shoot we need two photographers. While our second photographer will be capturing your guests arriving, your lead photographer will capture the bride and her wedding party performing last minute touches. Since you and your bridal party all have perfect hair and make up, it’s ~the~ time for close up head shots. We suggest these be shared as thank you’s to your bridal party after you receive your digital album back. We will also try to cover the groom and groomsmen as well, but this is not always geographically possible. If this aspect of the shoot isn’t possible or declined as it sometimes is, don’t worry – we will give equal coverage to the groom and groomsmen later on.
Meanwhile, your guests are arriving at the venue. Shooter #2 is in shooter heaven because capturing people at their best is so much fun. There’s hugs, kisses and greetings from friends and family. Everyone is smiling! All are happy to be here! Somehow dressing to the nines puts everyone on equal footing – and we are smiling because we know we are getting it all for you. At weddings, people love to play with photographers. We encourage this! We’ll do informal family groupings or whatever your guests want. We definitely interact with your guests here. This produces a terrific record of who was there and in years to come, it becomes a time capsule of sorts for your friends and family.
You probably paid a lot of money for your reception. You know a lot of people worked hard. The tables are all set. The candles are ready. The chairs are all perfectly arranged. When possible we like to capture that before the guests get there. Quite often, by the time the new couple get to the banquet, the guests have already moved in. We don’t think it’s right that bride and groom never get to see their reception hall in its pristine readiness. When geographically possible, we capture it all for you.
You may have noticed B&W or monochromes scattered in our examples. When an image in the pre-wedding series lends itself to a monochrome treatment, you will receive both full colour and monochrome files of the same image.
It’s your cue! You’ve never looked so beautiful! We are out there waiting for you to arrive by foot/horse/golf cart so you can walk the aisle/beach/forest path …however you make your first entry, we’re there to catch you.
The benefit of not having the groom see you before the ceremony becomes evident now when we capture his face as he sees you for the first time. We love emotion! Tears and smiles…Every one of your guests is watching you two and we are watching them watch you. Equipped with long lenses the balance is to stay out of your way and be unobtrusive, but yet be close enough to capture a ring exchange and first kiss.
Right after ceremony, everybody wants a picture with the bride and groom. We call this shoot “Friends & Family”. At this point we will ask your wedding party to assist in rounding up those who want a picture with you. No limit set to how many people you’d like to be captured with. We will coach you with posing for your more formal shots to make sure every one is presented at their best. Grandparents go first as they need to get out of the heat, kids next as they lose interest quickly…and then the rest of the gang in groupings. Once posed and captured our photographers have no problem sharing the photo op with your shoulder-surfing guests who, right before your eyes, will turn into paparazzi with their cell phones cameras.
With friends & family all our posed portraits are supplied in both full colour and a monochrome. We like the elegance this adds to the presentation. Yes, still all part of our basic plan service. We know you’ll be happy with the results!
We have seen that not every wedding has 200+ people attending. Some weddings have a more intimate gathering. If this is the case, we will still capture who’s here with our usual flair, but spend a bit more time on your upcoming duet shoot.
Your best friends are all wearing suits/tuxes and dresses they’ll rarely get to use again. They are your wedding party! These are the people who watched you from aside going crazy with organization pressures for a year. We have to pay attention to them as well! Here we can play a bit and act goofy if we want to. Your wedding party will reflect fun, laughter and several very stylishly dressed people. Quite often this shoot presents on the chic or vogue side of the spectrum. When the wedding party has such similar clothing on, it’s fun to play with symmetry – we can’t help ourselves!
These shoots are always fun! Everyone gets to strut. Quite often, this is the first time anybody will ever see themselves captured using the rules of portraiture. It really makes a difference! We also know that weddings are infectious. The romance of it all seems to cause more weddings. We need to impress your bridesmaids as they might be looking for a photographer soon. So, if you’re thinking about putting them in orange pumpkin shaped dresses…don’t…please, for our sake.
We expect going through your wedding pictures several weeks later will be a whole bunch of fun! We promise it’ll be nothing short of “trippy” for your kids to see down the line. This is a record of the people you love, today, all dressed up for you. Yes, we have fun at work, but we take it seriously too. All wedding party participants get their own time in the lights separately as well as all of you together. We believe a tastefully done head shot is such a nice way to say thank you and looks great on their facebook page!
Finally we can dismiss the wedding party and they most gladly run off to have a well earned cold drink. It’s been a whirlwind of activity! We’re almost done! Now is the time for your duet shoot which is a photographic celebration of the pair of you! This is our favourite part! Up until now we’ve been following rules for photojournalism and portraiture. We get to switch gears now. Our ultimate goal is a presentation of fun, romance, vitality, humour and fashion set with gorgeous natural scenery.
Quite often we’ll retire to another venue for this. (We know where all the good places are.) The separation from the quick pace of a wedding lets you relax a bit, but yet another beautiful scenic backdrop gives diversity to your album. We will coach you, pose you and let you do your own thing.
If there’s one thing you shouldn’t have to worry about, it’s your memories. At Angel Studio, we are ‘legacy’ minded. We record people’s history. This might seem just a bit corny, but in 30 years we know our timeless albums will make you smile. Although we love our tourists, we find they clash with your dress. We’ve always got always an empty beach for you two to play on.
We’re not locked into beaches though. Some people don’t do sand. No problem as we work out your preference for a duet venue long in advance. We have mountain tops and everything in between.
Of all your images, it’ll probably be one from your duet shoot that you’ll want to hang on a wall. We think that printing a new image on your anniversary as a gift to each other is a terrific way to keep the romance of the day alive throughout the years. To that end we use our talents to artfully render all your duet in duplicate monochromes.
Yes, we’ll capture the standard wedding images too. Icons of your day, the colours you chose, your dress, shoes, and all the parts that you fretted about come together now for one presentation.
If you consider a late-in-the-day wedding sunset photography could co-inside with your duet. If you’re from out of town, you should know that July through October in the Oceanside area is quite dry. You’re almost guaranteed perfect weather to take advantage of that golden light.
About 4 hours has passed since we started capturing your day. We’ve gathered reams of images that will accompany your memories of this beautiful day. Our time with you draws to a close. Your duet shoot has given you the perfect chance to decompress a bit after the excitement. We wish you all the best, but now your guests are waiting for you…
Angel Studio does not cover receptions to the delight of your guests who really resent flashes in dim halls. We will cover cake cutting and first dance though with no hesitation. So, unless we have made previous arrangements, at this point, our shoots come to a close.
Our job has only begun at this point…
Back in the digital darkroom, we cull several thousand images. Each image we select for production is then gently enhanced, we tag the image file with your name for google search and place into chapters in chronological order. The finished product is a tale of how the day unfolded.
It’s impossible to say how many images we promise. Small weddings offer less photo opportunities and of course, larger affairs offer more. At present we are running about 250-600 images/files returned to various clients. This includes derivatives such as monochrome renderings of the same image. Viewing your day should run about 25-40 minutes on your multimedia presentation.
Turn around on your album depends on how early your wedding is in the season. We endeavour to be as quick as possible. The closest answer we can give is 2 weeks to 3 months.
All this, our basic wedding package price: $1400. Additional hours are $200 each.
Just need your duet or ceremony covered? Single shoots are $400 each. Sorry, these won’t produce enough images for a multimedia presentation, but we will offer you a $40 in house print credit.
