Why Are Professional Photographers So Expensive?

This article has been very well received by the photography community, and is published in the December 2009 edition of Professional Photographer Magazine.

In this digital age, where everyone has digital cameras, scanners, and home “photo printers,” they often wonder, “how do professional (or personal) photographers charge $X for an 8×10 when they cost just $1.50 at the drug store?”

Simply put, the customer is not just paying for the actual photograph; they are paying for the time and expertise of the personal photographer.

The Average Two-hour Portrait Session

First, let’s look at the actual work involved:
* Travel to and from the session
* Setup, preparation, talking to the client etc
* Two hours of shooting
* Load the photos onto a computer
* Back up the files on an external drive
* 6 – 8 hours of Adobe Photoshop® time (including cropping, contrast, color, sharpening, saving a copy for print and a copy for the internet and backing up the edited photographs)
* 2 – 3 hours to talk to the client, answer questions, receive their order and payment, order their prints, receive and verify prints, package prints, schedule shipment, and drop package off at the mailing center

You can see how a two-hour portrait session easily turns into more than twelve hours of work from start to finish. So when you see a personal photographer charging a $200 session fee for a two-hour photo shoot, you are not paying them $100 per hour.

The Expertise and Cost of Doing Business

Shooting professional photography is a skill, acquired through years of experience and education. Even though a DSLR camera now costs under $1,000, taking professional portraits involves much more than a nice camera.

Most personal photographers take years to go from buying their first camera to making money with their photography. In addition to learning how to use the camera, there is a mountain of other equipment, backdrops, props, and software programs used to edit and print photographs, run a website, etc.

In addition to the financial investment, photographers actually have to have people skills to make subjects comfortable in front of the camera. Posing people to look their best is a skill by itself. You could argue that posing is a more important skill than actually knowing how to use the camera. A poorly exposed photo can be saved, but a badly posed photo cannot.

The Chain Store Photo Studio

Chain stores do have their place. For a very cheap price you can run in, shoot some quick photos, and be done with it. But, you get what you pay for.

Consider the time and effort that a personal photographer puts into photographs, compared to a chain store. Store sessions last just a few minutes, while a personal photographer takes the time to get to know the people, make them comfortable, and make them laugh. If a baby is crying at a chain store, they often don’t have the time (or the patience) to wait because everyone is in a hurry. Not to mention, they won’t come to the beach!

The Real Deal

Professional, personal photographers are just that—professionals. No different than a mechanic, dentist, doctor, or electrician. But a personal photographer often becomes a friend, someone who documents a family for generations with professional, personal photographs of cherished memories.
Maybe we need to help clients look at it this way: A pair of scissors costs $1.50 at the drugstore. Still, most people will gladly pay a lot more to hire a professional hairdresser to cut their hair.

The added attention and quality that a personal photographer gives is worth every penny.

Conclusion

We hope that those who have taken the time to read this page will have a better understanding of why professional photographs, created by a personal photographer, are so expensive.

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Article adapted from Shawn Richter of Caught on Film Photography.