How Much Does Wedding Photography Cost?

If you’ve read my “Top 6 Wedding Planning Tips” blog, you’ll know that creating your budget is one of the first things I recommend doing. If you want to prioritize wedding photography costs in that budget, it’s essential to know how much it costs! In this blog, I’ll not only be giving you exact numbers, but I’ll also be breaking down why wedding photography costs what it does. 

Average photography price for the Seattle/Tacoma area

The wedding photography cost can vary depending on where you’re located, but for those looking for wedding day coverage in the Seattle-Tacoma area, one should expect to spend anywhere from $3000-$10000. 

Hours of Coverage

My starting rates for wedding day photographic coverage start at $3000, which breaks down to $500 per hour. 6 hours of coverage is pretty standard for weddings, but some couples need more, and some couples need less! For example, if you want ‘getting ready’ photos as well as photos during your reception exit, 6 hours most likely will not be enough for you. Be sure to chat with your photographer so that you both know exactly how many hours of coverage you need.

Equipment for Photography Cost

Photographers spend a lot of money on high-quality equipment to make sure their photos come out as beautifully as possible. Camera lenses alone can cost thousands of dollars, not to mention the actual camera bodies as well! In addition to that, we invest in external hard drives to keep your photos safe, SD cards, camera bags, lens caps, and more. Being a photographer is definitely not an inexpensive job!

Culling & editing

Adding to the hours of coverage we’re physically present for on your wedding day, there are also hours and hours that go into culling and editing your photos. First, once we get home, we have to back up all your photos onto a hard drive. Then, we look through every single photo and remove the duplicates and blurry ones. Once that process is over, it’s time to edit the final ones!

Admin work

All the time that it takes to answer emails, create timelines, contact vendors, and market ourselves on social media is a LOT! Photographers don’t technically bill for all the hours of admin work that we put in every single day. If we did, we’d be millionaires! So when setting our prices for photography, we have to take into consideration at least some of those hours. Most of us pour our hearts and souls into the behind-the-scenes work for our clients, and we wouldn’t have it any other way. 

Outsourcing

As much as we wish we could do everything ourselves, that’s just not realistic. We have to invest in other service providers for things like web design, branding, and marketing. And because we want high-quality work, we pay a high-quality price tag! We would lose our minds if we didn’t have the option to outsource parts of our business that we’re just not educated on, not to mention don’t even have the extra time to do ourselves. 

At the end of the day, most of us photographers aren’t in it for the money. We simply want to do what we love while being able to pay our bills and feed our families. Our passion is documenting love stories for years to come, and we’re blessed to be able to do that for a living! 

On the hunt for a Seattle Wedding Photographer?

I would love to get to know you a little more and learn about what you want your wedding day to look like. To inquire about your date, you can fill out my contact form and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can!