Quality Criterion: would you hire you ?

Just curious for the wedding photographers doing this part or full-time: how many weddings did you shoot as the main photographer, before you could honestly say to yourself: I'd hire me. Let's put considerations of pricing aside--just in terms of your photos reaching the quality threshold that you personally have as a potential customer.

Pricing considerations aside, no. I just don't have the experience yet to fully capture the full day.

When I shot my first wedding, it was after years I'd experience and I would have hired me in my price range. (first wedding was for over $2k)

Now the same holds true, I would hire myself in my price range but with unlimited finances, I would probably go with Ben and Erin Chrisman.

I think that if you sell your services at any price before you can or put a consistently professional product, you are doing a disservice to your clients and committing carer suicide.

I think the first time I thought 'i'd hire me' was about 25 weddings in. Understand that I'm not talking about reliability or cost or any other factor--I mean purely in terms of the photographs that I returned to the bride and groom. The funny thing is that as my professional bar gets set higher and higher (we all strive to improve, right ?) I think my expectations in a personal sense for the level of photos I'd like to commission also get raised. So it's a question that gets revisited every few weddings.

@Thomas--that's cool that you shot your first wedding at that kind of pricing. I guess we all have our own individual backgrounds, our own stories, and that we all have our own ways of traversing the landscape that is building a business. Hopefully we can remain humble and open to the possibility that there isn't only one way.

Given that I'm not price sensitive, around 100. If money was an issue and price was taken into account then a lot sooner, probably 20.

Our first wedding.

brokensocial wrote in post #14745867
Our first wedding.

This^

With 2 qualifications.

When I shot my first wedding in the 80s all the local wedding photography I'd seen was fairly bad. I figured I could at least equal that.

When I remarried and we hired a local pro in 2000 we were on a budget and he was producing stuff on a par with what I was at the time.

I'll add that I'm much better than most of the local competition now so as my bar has raised so has my output.

I was my first wedding. So... I guess, from the first one on. But we also had a "this or next to nothing" option in our hands. And I was happy with those photos even though I barely looked at them again after the wedding...

I don't think "I'd hire me" yet... but then again I'm my own biggest critic

Christopher Steven b wrote in post #14745188
@Thomas--that's cool that you shot your first wedding at that kind of pricing. I guess we all have our own individual backgrounds, our own stories, and that we all have our own ways of traversing the landscape that is building a business. Hopefully we can remain humble and open to the possibility that there isn't only one way.

I wish I could say that it was some brilliant foresight on my part to start out there. But the truth is that I didn't want to do weddings.

There are a lot of photographers that don't start out charging more. But it is a generally poor business plan and lack of foresight that leads to this. The higher you start out the better off and more profitable your business will be. But most people don't have the patience to wait until they actually have all the skills in place to go pro in this industry.

So I get this straight. There are photographers on here who at one point were charging people to shoot their weddings but at the same time would not have hired themselves? Confusing.

rob0225 wrote in post #14752031
So I get this straight. There are photographers on here who at one point were charging people to shoot their weddings but at the same time would not have hired themselves? Confusing.

Photographers know great and value photography, and they know their own limitations and how they could improve.

There are a couple of ways of clarifying this apparent contradiction. Here's one:

I charged $200 to shoot my first wedding. So my prices were low, the expectations of my client (who was getting a deal and who understood what my experience level was) was commensurate with that.

The expectations I have in terms of the photos I want of my wedding (should that happen !) are higher than that of the person looking to pay $200 for a wedding. So it isn't surprising that I wouldn't hire the me who shot that first wedding.

More plainly though, photography is an art--it's subjective. I can present a perfectly good product that satisfies a large number of people without necessarily being fully satisfied about the product for myself. As has been pointed out, photographers are often incredibly picky; and in fact, it is in part because of self-doubt that we strive to do better and better work--even if where we started was pretty good.

Finally, it's also possible for a photographer to do quality work in a style A and then eventually, after shooting dozens of weddings, arrive at style B--both being perfectly acceptable interpretations. This photographer might say to themselves at this point--Ah--I've finally arrived at the style that I personally would like the photos of my wedding to take.

rob0225 wrote in post #14752031
So I get this straight. There are photographers on here who at one point were charging people to shoot their weddings but at the same time would not have hired themselves? Confusing.

rob0225 wrote in post #14752031
So I get this straight. There are photographers on here who at one point were charging people to shoot their weddings but at the same time would not have hired themselves? Confusing.

I always strive for to improve and know that I can and will over time. Hence I know whatever I do for my own standards will never be good enough for myself. After every wedding I shoot I look back and see areas I can improve on.

Not really confusing at all. The day you let other people's standards for you be higher than those that you set for yourself is the day to quit.