How many images on a Wedding / Event Photog. site ?

Having shot events and weddings for a little more than a year and a half I think I am now past the stage at which I need to showcase all or even most of my work (I look back on what I had to show at the beginning and am astonished that I got hired on the basis of that ! But then I also think: that was all I had.). I am, however, having difficulties deciding just how much work should be visible on my site.

Here is how it is currently organized. I have about 12 events and 5 weddings in galleries that are accessed via a link on the front page. I show about 50% of what I think are the best of the photos I returned to clients (the galleries are for the most part about 40-120 images). On my front page I have a slideshow that loops 60 of what I consider to be the best and most representative in terms of variety of content.

Here are the questions. Should I be showing this much of my work ? does anyone have suggestions for numbers of photos, numbers of galleries ? My only motive here is appealing to clients and getting hired, though being hired with appropriate expectations is another consideration--should it be?--(this informs the impulse to include more images, more galleries).

thanks a lot.

FWIW, I don't do portraits, weddings or events. I do nature, landscape etc, so I post ALL of my work because that's how I get paid. I limit each gallery to 25 images.

I think 60 on a slideshow is WAY too much. I only use 6, but I think 12-15 should be the max. If you're not trying to sell a particular image (like I do), so I would limit your VERY best work. Maybe 25 per gallery (wedding, events etc).

Hope this helps.

To show off what you can do(basically an online portfolio), each gallery should have 10ish pictures and not much more than that IMO...e.g. 10 for weddings, 10 for portrait sessions, 10 for sports, etc. Anymore than that and your going to make the viewer lose interest. Show your versatility but specialty at the same time.

Those pictures should be your cream of the crop, creme de la creme pictures to showcase your talents and what your capable of.

If you need help deciding on which ones should be displayed and which ones shouldnt, put your site up for evaluation and see what the masses think.

*EDIT* Just thumbing through your site quickly, I see PLENTY of pictures that can come off...and a good handful of ones that could stay.

@Hikin Mike: I'm not sure I see a downside to having lots of images in a slideshow--people look for as long as they need or want to. How does having it loop after 12 or 15 help, especially if I'm trying to show a variety of kinds of events that I cover ?

@Jeffro: there are definitely plenty of images on my site that aren't portfolio worthy; but if I really did narrow it as much as you're suggesting, wouldn't that set up unrealistic expectations ? Also, wouldn't narrowing down this much leave clients with the question: 'what does a FULL wedding from this photographer look like ?' I know that if I were looking to book a wedding photographer I'd want to see a hell of a lot more images than 10 or 15. Do you shoot Weddings ?

Ah--I think part of the difficulty is that my site serves not just as a portfolio, but also as means of showing clients fuller sets of images. I don't have a studio or book full of prints, so this site has to kind of do it all.

Christopher Steven b wrote in post #11049716
Ah--I think part of the difficulty is that my site serves not just as a portfolio, but also as means of showing clients fuller sets of images. I don't have a studio or book full of prints, so this site has to kind of do it all.

You really should separate the two... put your portfolio in one area and password lock all the others or put it on another site\account....not overly familiar with Zenfolio, so not sure how thats works with them.

Ill respond to your other post later when I have more time...

Christopher Steven b wrote in post #11049680
@Hikin Mike: I'm not sure I see a downside to having lots of images in a slideshow--people look for as long as they need or want to. How does having it loop after 12 or 15 help, especially if I'm trying to show a variety of kinds of events that I cover ?

@Jeffro: there are definitely plenty of images on my site that aren't portfolio worthy; but if I really did narrow it as much as you're suggesting, wouldn't that set up unrealistic expectations ? Also, wouldn't narrowing down this much leave clients with the question: 'what does a FULL wedding from this photographer look like ?' I know that if I were looking to book a wedding photographer I'd want to see a hell of a lot more images than 10 or 15. Do you shoot Weddings ?

I guess I just prefer a shorter slideshow presentation. I don't want to guess on when the presentation will end. After 10-15 images, I'm off to find something else.

@Jeffro250: much appreciated--I've definitely been persuaded that I have too much public--not sure yet how I'm going to address it though.

@Hikin Mike: I guess I don't mind if prospective clients click away from the slideshow--the more images they see, the more likelihood they are to see an image that perhaps matches the kind of event or the venue that they're seeking out. I'm hoping, obviously, that they click on the 'contact' link. I think I'm going to try to reduce it to about 35, though. 60 does seem a little ridiculous ! Thanks a lot for your input.


Any other wedding / event photographers out there have any suggestions ? Again, it doesn't need pointing out, but primary consideration in designing the site is booking clients.

Chris I did a quick check of your site and here's my observation.

1st: I wouldn't care too much about how many images you have in the slide show because you can set it so that the slide show starts with random images, and as mentioned, the viewer will either review them or move to the galleries.

2nd: If your portfolio is important to you, then I believe it should have it's own tab at your home page that takes the viewer straight to it; don't make them search for it (i.e. Galleries). This is a way to separate your portfolio from your other images. Maybe name the tab "Wedding Portfolio" which will catch the attention of a prospective client.

3rd: No where on your home page do you mention about you being a wedding photographer. If you did not state so here in this thread, I'd not know it from your home page. So maybe you want to use the "About" box to introduce yourself to the viewers, or you can consider my comment in No. 2 as sufficient. However, I'd do an "About" statement to just put it right there for them to see - no guessing at all. Do a search in Zen for wedding photographers and see how they have their sites organized.

Lastly: I will mention this again, if your portfolio is important, then establish a tab on the home page so the viewer can go straight to it to see that line of work. I'd do the same for any other work, too.

I do LL sports as way to earn a few bucks - not lucrative, but I really just enjoy watching the kids play, so I tend to put up most of the shots from the game because I don't know what the parents will or will not like at this point so I have to show them everything. However, I do plan to put together a Sports Portfolio and place the tab on my home page.

Just One Man's Opinion

I use my Zenfolio more for a digital archive, we focus more on Sports photography, so we uploaded every sports event that we have been to since 2004. It equals out to almost 25,000 images. The funny thing is, we never really did it for the intention to sell images from back then, but amazingly parents have been finding images of their kids that they didn't know we had and started buying them. Thus far, this year, I have made more money on old prints then I did during the years I took them.

I am actually not a fan of slideshows, so I just did sample galleries, then I let the potential customer decide if they want to look at images individually via thumbnails or they can start a slideshow.

As for wedding and private events, I upload them and inform the family I intend to upload them and ask them if they want the gallery to be password protected or not.

As someone about to publish a website, this thread was most useful.