Weddingbee Blog

Is there a better way to introduce you to our photographer than to show you some of her photos that first inspired us to book with her?:

The thought of finding a photographer for our wedding scared me silly. Good photography is something very very important to Mr E and me (he is a student photographer, so yeah… he especially cares). As far as spending priorities go for the wedding, photography would be probably number two, right after food. Choosing someone who will take the photos that you will hopefully look back on for years to come is a big thing for us. I’m the kind of person who is a tad nervous if something is completely out of my control, and on our wedding day how our photos will turn out will rely entirely on the photographer. I wont be able to do anything about it.

See why photography gets me nervous now?

But we knew that we had to take the plunge so bravely we delved forward into the internet, searching for a photographer who would:

1. Take amazing photos, ones that capture the emotions and almost-missed moments of the day, ones that have a classic and intimate “feel” to them (if that makes sense at all… it does in my head).
2. Be someone we feel completely at ease with… someone down to earth, relaxed (because Mr E and I aren’t very comfortable in front of cameras), and preferably with a sense of humour.
3. Fit into our budget (which, even though we have dedicated over 20 percent of the overall budget to photography, is not exactly large).

We emailed around about eight photographers in our area/island and were not that impressed. Though many of them had great photos, and a few were within our budget, none of them made us feel, well… inspired. Or relaxed.

And then I found Jane Sanders one day while trolling through wedding photographers on the web. Unfortunately she happens to be based on the North Island, but we decided to take a look anyway. Jane has a background in press photography, and now does weddings and portraits. We saw her photos online, loved them to bits, and with some trepidation looked at her package prices (by the way, don’t you LOVE it when vendors list their prices on their website? So helpful). Lo and behold, her packages looked like they could work for us. We flicked her an email, and soon got a reply—pretty much the most down to earth and friendly reply we had got from any of our vendors so far. Big points there! After that email, we knew we wanted to book Jane for our day, and even with travel costs added she was able to give us a package that works perfectly for us.

At our consultation with her in sunny Tauranga (well, it was trying to be sunny) back in April, we were even more reassured that booking Jane was one of our best decisions yet. When she talks (or emails), she isn’t intimidating or preoccupied with the whole commercial aspect of weddings (which, compared to other wedding photographers we communicated with, was very refreshing). With Jane, we feel like our wedding photos are in more than capable hands. And I can not emphathise enough the importance of “clicking” with your wedding photographer and feeling comfortable with them. It means that you can let your photographer do their thing on the day and just relax and concentrate on the getting married part.

What “big” wedding decisions have been scary for you to make? What is important for you in a photographer?

*All photos in this post taken by Jane Sanders