Same day edits?

I have been thinking about this the past few days and wondered what you guys thought about it. I know there are videographers that do same day video edit, and wanted to know if it would be possible to do it for photography. Obviously you would have to bring a laptop and an editor, but I dont think that would be that great of a cost.

My thought was to do it in sections. Shoot the pre ceremony stuff, have your editor edit during the ceremony.
You shoot the ceremony, give the card off and have them edit during the formals.
You shoot formals, have them edit during intimates.
All the way to the reception. The last few pictures you have them edit while you are packing up your stuff, and you can give the B&G the pictures the same day.

I think the pros of this could be you would have much less editing time during the week (none) leaving more time for other activities.

One con I can think of is they do not get enough time to forget their wedding. I think one of the things that makes the wedding photo session so great is that you have the anticipation, and with this you kill that.

What do you guys think? I think it could be definitely feasible, but would it be a good idea?>

What kind of editing can be done that quickly? I know I'm slow and my experience cant compare with that of a top notch editor, but if you are doing anything more complex than tweaking your .jpg conversion it seems unlikely that you could do anything significant in that time frame.

I edit about 150 photos from the day to put up a slideshow at the reception... but you are talking about DELIVERING the final images on the same day. Wow that is crazy. I honestly don't think it would add any value to your service to do that, but it sure would increase the stress and pressure on you.

The BEST way to do this is to become a master jpeg shooter, so all your images straight off the CF card are final grade. This is something I'm striving for every day. I would LOVE to ditch the stupid raw garbage.

picturecrazy wrote in post #11052113
I edit about 150 photos from the day to put up a slideshow at the reception... but you are talking about DELIVERING the final images on the same day. Wow that is crazy. I honestly don't think it would add any value to your service to do that, but it sure would increase the stress and pressure on you.

That is a good point. I obviously wouldnt be editing them myself, but it would be quite a bit of pressure. Id have to figure out if it added value, and I was afraid it wouldnt.

I don't do this - I like to concentrate on shooting, not stressing about editing, or slideshows, or anything else. It's definitely good advertising, though, and I can imagine how excited the couple would be.

P.S. - Hi Lloyd!!

Wipe this idea from your brain as fast as possible.....how many weddings have you shot if you don't mind me asking?

As of now I shoot primarily as a second shooter for a few studios. I have shot a handful of weddings solo, and will be doing more through these studios now.
I am trying to figure out different things to do, and wanted to see how plausible everyone thought it could be.

Wedding schedules change constantly, you need to be ready and available to adapt to anything at a moments notice, not worrying about this extracurricular activity you are thinking about.

The wedding photographers attention needs to be 100 percent on what is going on and how he is going to capture it....anticipating what is going to be coming up next to be ready for it....and of course dealing with the emotion and drama of the day as it presents itself.

The only way this could work is to shoot jpeg and hand a card to your assistant who is all set up to process them....this assistant would have to be independent of everything else and this would be her only job on the day. You say give them to them...what format...are you going to print them out on a printer....just hand them a disc....????
Would it add any value....no...people at receptions are there to eat drink dance and party.

Shoot on the day....process later.

I mentioned explicitly that this would be someone elses job, exclusively. The only thing the main photographer would have to worry about is handing the cards off to someone else to edit.

And why would it be impossible for 1 person, or 2 people, to edit a full wedding shot in raw, in 8-10 hours? This requires what ever editing you do. I prefer to do basic color corrections, fixes here and there, and nothing extravagant unless it is being printed.
Burn this to a CD and hand it to bride and groom the night of.
People at receptions are there to dance and party, agree. My target audinece is not the attendees, but the bride and groom.

Videographers do it, so I would assume it is possible. A lot of work, of course. Value added, debatable. Maybe the value added is actually to the photographer, not having to worry about being backed up on editing.

You asked for opinions I gave you mine.
Sounds like you are trying hard to justify it to yourself to give it a go, have at it.
Nothing wrong with learning the hard way I guess....

Hey if it does work out after a few weddings you can come back on here and say I told you so!

I think you are correct in saying that the customer will 'lose' some of the antisipation and excitement from receiving all their images on the day of the wedding, so if you wanted to give them something on the day of their wedding..........

When I got married, 8 years ago, the photographer was a friend of my parents, and somehow managed to get a lovely shot of me and my husband outside the church, edited, printed and framed in time to be presented to us when we arrived at the reception, it was then on display for our guests to see.

This was one of the most memorable things i remember from my day, because it was not expected at all, and how exciting it was to see on the day, however, the whole lot, I dont think it would have had the same effect some how.

Perhaps try that.

Claire

i shoot in jpgs and i can shoot and edit a wedding in a few hours using lightroom easily. Its doable but why the rush? id rather have the clients waiting for the pictures, dreaming of the pictures, cant wait to see the pictures! Then, when they finally get them, they can relive the wedding all over again thru your pictures.

Even if you hand off the "editing" duty to a third party and it magically takes zero time from your shooting duties. You are completely surrendering the control of your product to a 3rd party. Given that you would be shooting until near the end of the reception, you would have to depend on the editor to shape the final product with no input from you. You wouldnt even have enough time to do a decent cursory review before the product went out the door. All this risk for no upside as I cant imagine this is a feature with a profitable upside but certain additional costs.

I agree. The idea of having all the pictures done by the end of the night sounds great, but as a bride I would wonder how carefully the pictures were edited receiving them so soon. I'd rather look forward to getting the pictures a couple weeks later edited beautifully and completely. Am not opposed to the suggestion of receiving one edited image as a surprise for the reception though...that would be lovely.

Shockey wrote in post #11053411
You asked for opinions I gave you mine.
Sounds like you are trying hard to justify it to yourself to give it a go, have at it.
Nothing wrong with learning the hard way I guess....

Hey if it does work out after a few weddings you can come back on here and say I told you so!

I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page. While I agree with you that a photographer should not spend his/her time editing during the wedding, that is not what I was referring to.

gonzogolf wrote in post #11053580
Even if you hand off the "editing" duty to a third party and it magically takes zero time from your shooting duties. You are completely surrendering the control of your product to a 3rd party. Given that you would be shooting until near the end of the reception, you would have to depend on the editor to shape the final product with no input from you. You wouldnt even have enough time to do a decent cursory review before the product went out the door. All this risk for no upside as I cant imagine this is a feature with a profitable upside but certain additional costs.

True. But hopefully you have people working for you that you can trust. I know photographers that only shoot, and they have people that only edit. I dont believe picking someone up off the street to make edit your pictures would be a good idea too.

cynergie23 wrote in post #11054089
I agree. The idea of having all the pictures done by the end of the night sounds great, but as a bride I would wonder how carefully the pictures were edited receiving them so soon. I'd rather look forward to getting the pictures a couple weeks later edited beautifully and completely. Am not opposed to the suggestion of receiving one edited image as a surprise for the reception though...that would be lovely.

This is a good point. Perceived value. I have another idea I am working on that involves getting a few pictures by the end of the night still.