Why are Professional Photographers so expensive?

Why are Professional Photographers so expensive?

A short break down summary of the price of a portrait session

A pair of scissors costs $1.50 at the drugstore. Still, most people will pay $50 or more to hire a professional hairdresser to cut their hair. The same goes for photographers.

In this digital age where everyone has cameras with a portrait or auto setting, anyone can claim to be a professional photographer. As a customer, you are not just paying for the actual photograph, your paying for time and expertise.

The average one-hour portrait session involves:

Travel to the session: 30 minuets
Setup, preparation, talking to the client, etc: 1-2 hours
Shoot the photos: 1-3 hours
Travel from the session: 30 minuets
Load images onto a computer: 30 minuets
Back up the files on an external drive: 30 minuets
Photoshop editing time, including cropping, contrast, color, sharpening, resizing 2-4 different sized image files, and backing up edited photographs: 2-5 hours
Setting up online gallery: 1-2 hours
Talking to the client, answer questions: 1 hour
Possibly meet clients to review photos and place order. Meeting and travel time: 2 hours
Burning disk of selected images: 1-2 hours

You can see how a one-hour session easily turns into an eight-hour day or more from start to finish. So when you see a photographer charging a $150 session fee for a one-hour photo shoot, you are NOT paying them $150 per hour, it’s more like $5 per hour.

Professional, personal photographers are just that—professionals. No different than a mechanic, dentist, doctor, or electrician. We spend hours perfecting our work for the client. We have devoted years of our lives to practicing, learning and improving our photographic skills. Many photographers spend well over $10,000 on equipment and other expenses such as classes, seminars and training on the newest equipment and styles. Professional photographers do more than just show up and take great photos. We are CEOs, accountants, marketers, child tamers, receptionists, graphic design artists, production workers, and sales people. The added attention, quality, and time that a professional photographer gives are worth every penny, and much, much more.