worth a thousand words

Finding a photographer we could afford was possibly the most challenging thing we encountered when planning the wedding. Since we were having the ceremony in Atlantic City on a Thursday night, and then the reception in Philadelphia the following Saturday, it was extremely difficult to find someone to do both and not bust our budget. And while our wedding was casual and non traditional, we still agreed that it was very important to us to have a professional photographer at both events, and that while we didn't have a ton of money to spend on it, it was still something we were willing to put a little extra into. After all, the pictures are the only thing you have that doesn't last just the one (or two) day(s). Oh, and the marriage. That hopefully lasts a while too.

I contacted a photographer whose work I liked that I followed on facebook, and he was out of our price range. He did however give me some amazing advice - he suggested I contact the Press of Atlantic City and ask to be connected to their photo department. Then he said I should ask if anyone did freelance work for weddings, and ask if they would spend two hours shooting my ceremony. While he wasn't sure what to tell me about my reception in Philly, he said that a freelance photographer from the paper might be more affordable for the ceremony in AC.

I feel SO lucky that my inquiry was responded to by Sean Fitzgerld. After a few email exchanges, he agreed to photograph the ceremony in AC for two hours, and also travel to Philadelphia to photograph the reception for five hours. Afterwards he would edit the photos, give us access to them all on his website, and send them to us in both color and black and white on a disc, giving us rights to the photos so we could share and make prints all we wanted.

I'm not even going to tell you how much we paid for this, because I think he should charge much more. I think we were super fortunate to catch him at a time where he is just starting out in the wedding photography world, and I hope that soon he will raise his prices to better reflect the quality of his work and the effort he puts into it. I've had friends whose photographers missed key moments of the wedding, or some who ended up with only a handful of pictures when it was all said and done. Sean was there for everything, constantly clicking, and the end result was over 800 photos for us to chose from. He caught everything and the pictures are perfect. Here's a few of my favorites...

So while Sean might one day not be an "on the cheap" photographer, I have a feeling his rates are still going to be insanely reasonable for quite a while, so if you're looking for a photographer you should totally contact him. He is amazing. And it's also good advice to contact local newspapers and find freelance photographers that way. You might luck out like we did and get someone who is experienced and right on the brink of becoming a wedding photographer and not yet charging what they can in the future for their work. Their pictures will also probably possess the same editorial qualities that ours do, which is a style that we love.

On top of this, I got an email from living social soon after we got our photos that was a deal for a custom photo album, hardcover and free shipping, for only $7. I snatched it right up, and we put together a lovely book of over 40 of our images with an interesting layout and fun backgrounds. It would have normally been $35, so it was a tremendous deal. The site was York Photo, and after I ordered the book, they also gave me 20 free prints! We now have prints to put in some frames we got, and some to give to our families.

Between the photo booth, Sean, the album, and the prints, we couldn't be happier with the photography aspect of our wedding.