Small Rant

[calamityjane]

we all have to start somewhere. When you first start, you aren't that good. Your rates you charge will probably expound upon that aspect.

When you first start, you learn, you assist someone who can actually do the job, try stuff out in a safe (for the client and your reputation) environment. You do not learn to run before you can walk, at the client's expense. Mind you, we still haven't seen the actual results, even if we can have a good guess from the 'best' shots on her fb page.

 

[dennybeall]

Money or no money - years in the job or not ?? An old friend who was a management speaker used to say "There is a big difference between someone with 20 years experience and someone with 1 years experience - 20 times." Joe Powell, Sr.
All goes to say that photography skill is individual.

 

[wezza13]

Just looked at that "Photographers" facebook page that was linked. Looked through, literally, the first 10(?) images and saw this :

https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.ne...40190_527822344047566_77957241771817995_o.jpg

Wow and this is on her business page.

I personally would've focused on the B&G and not the background.....

And the face of the bride in this one, wow just wow!

https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.ne...266_516351671861300_5225869818242697202_o.jpg

 

[JacaRanda]

Just looked at that "Photographers" facebook page that was linked. Looked through, literally, the first 10(?) images and saw this :

https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.ne...40190_527822344047566_77957241771817995_o.jpg

Wow and this is on her business page.

I personally would've focused on the B&G and not the background.....

But was the client happy? Kinda joking, kinda not.

 

[Stradawhovious]

I personally would've focused on the B&G and not the background.....

I don't know... the cabinetry is pretty stellar.

 

[Derrel]

After seeing this thread come up, I revisited the Facebook page. Occasional flashes of creativity, and some semi-good work, but also a lot of shots that show unstudied, untutored, self-educated learning leading to serious problems WRT really basic posing rules and concepts. There are books that deal specifically with HOW to pose people, and it seems that this photographer has not read any of them.

Studio 34 Photography by Chrissie Batt

One thing I notice though is her tendency toward awkward framing, awkward composing on, mostly, her horizontals. The single biggest way I can spot a self-taught, un-mentored shooter: frequently allowing way too much top space above the head in a wide-framed or horizontal shot, meaning allowing the person to ride low in the frame, which looks unstudied, and also even worse, often cuts a person off at an awkward part of the body. In effect, shooting a head and shoulders shot...with the head and shoulders comprising 15% of the entire frame, the background 85% of the frame.
Winner of MISS EDGERTON photogenic... - Studio 34 Photography by Chrissie Batt | Facebook
Winner of Miss Edgerton, described as "absolutely stunning". Yes, a gorgeous girl.

She does better in-studio than she does on-location. The severely back-focused wedding shot of the B&G...ugggh. Cannot believe that image is allowed to see the light of day on her FB page.

Here's a "tall" that has the same problem, too much top space, and a bad, awkward lop-off at the bottom.
Studio 34 Photography by Chrissie Batt... - Studio 34 Photography by Chrissie Batt | Facebook (called an incomplete pose...not knowing how to FRAME the pose!)

This basically comes down to not understanding how to properly POSE a person and his or her body. This is the kind of stuff that is covered in dozens of books on how to pose people for portraiture. When the eyes are placed wayyyyy below the mid-height of the frame, on a landscape-framed portrait, and Dutch tilt is used to give "dynamism"...I can tell that a photographer who does those types of things really would benefit from some professional training and some assistance in improving her weakest areas.

 

[otherprof]

I thought to post this in here so I could get it out of my system. Yesterday, I was going over my call reports with my sales assistant who recently got married. She showed me her wedding pictures that cost her $1500.00. Oh my Lord! These were so bad.... it took me a great deal of restraint not to say a word. FINALLY, the words came out of her mouth at her displeasure with them. The professional photographer blamed the poor church lighting, now correct me if I am wrong but if your a pro, is it not your job to overcome this? 14 in the wedding party and she brought in two speedlight w/umbrella's? Really? You could clearly see in the photo's the people on the ends were dark, and the shadows... oh my. All the faces in the photo sittings were blown out and WB was way off. I felt bad for her and I did not say to much. She signed a contract and I told her she should go and take her to small claims court and should win easily. I wish I could show you some of the pics, just awful. People like this need to be stopped.

I think her first priority is probably to salvage some good shots of her wedding, and getting some money back would be secondary but desirable. Perhaps she can parlay the threat of suing into the release of the photos to her ownership, with some money back, if possible. Then I'm sure some Photoshop magicians could come up with some shots she could treasure as memories of her wedding rather than memories of being taken by an incompetent photographer.

 

[gsgary]

I thought to post this in here so I could get it out of my system. Yesterday, I was going over my call reports with my sales assistant who recently got married. She showed me her wedding pictures that cost her $1500.00. Oh my Lord! These were so bad.... it took me a great deal of restraint not to say a word. FINALLY, the words came out of her mouth at her displeasure with them. The professional photographer blamed the poor church lighting, now correct me if I am wrong but if your a pro, is it not your job to overcome this? 14 in the wedding party and she brought in two speedlight w/umbrella's? Really? You could clearly see in the photo's the people on the ends were dark, and the shadows... oh my. All the faces in the photo sittings were blown out and WB was way off. I felt bad for her and I did not say to much. She signed a contract and I told her she should go and take her to small claims court and should win easily. I wish I could show you some of the pics, just awful. People like this need to be stopped.

They are probably members on here

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[jcdeboever]

I thought to post this in here so I could get it out of my system. Yesterday, I was going over my call reports with my sales assistant who recently got married. She showed me her wedding pictures that cost her $1500.00. Oh my Lord! These were so bad.... it took me a great deal of restraint not to say a word. FINALLY, the words came out of her mouth at her displeasure with them. The professional photographer blamed the poor church lighting, now correct me if I am wrong but if your a pro, is it not your job to overcome this? 14 in the wedding party and she brought in two speedlight w/umbrella's? Really? You could clearly see in the photo's the people on the ends were dark, and the shadows... oh my. All the faces in the photo sittings were blown out and WB was way off. I felt bad for her and I did not say to much. She signed a contract and I told her she should go and take her to small claims court and should win easily. I wish I could show you some of the pics, just awful. People like this need to be stopped.

They are probably members on here

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Right, surprised they haven't went off without on me




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[imagemaker46]

It's not like I haven't said this before. The world has become a deep pool of fast buck amateurs calling themselves professionals. Business card, free web site, and learn the basics on the fly instead of working it the other way around. It's not going to to get better and more people are going to end up burned and heart broken because they bought into a "professional" without the skills to do the job. I'm sorry your friend got taken on a day when it should have resulted in good memories. I have to believe that there are more wedding photographers now than ever. People are willing to pay big dollars and the "pro scammers" are just sitting back waiting.

 

[ruggedshutter]

I did a little searching on Ohio's SOS website and found her business.

http://www5.sos.state.oh.us/ords/f?p=100:7:0::NO:7:P7_CHARTER_NUM:2379560

it seems that she's at least registered and an LLC. Not that helps the OP or her friend. Not sure that we can really say much more since she isn't really looking to remedy the situation. I can't access the FB page from work so I have to view it on my cell phone. I can see the framing issues and lighting problems that Darrel mentioned. She definitely needs to second shoot for a while before taking on another wedding as a lead photographer and have her own work critiqued.

 

[Overread]

How's about instead of focusing all our efforts and critique upon the photos of people who won't ever been on-site to see them we instead focus on those of our community who are here and who are posting photos and who are eager to learn and improve