The best photog ever (No PICS)

bogleric · Aug 6, 2006

I attended a wedding in early July as a guest. Some old friends that I had not seen for many years had flown back in from Oregon to get married in their hometown. This really was a great wedding, small, but special like a wedding should be.

Anyways... here is where the story begins. My friends had carefully chosen a photographer who only talked about he was god's greatest gift to wedding photography.....

My wife wanted to make a scrapbook of some events in their lives as a gift and something they could add to. So of course I took my camera to the wedding to get a couple of pictures for the scrapbook (no "paid" type shots) and just a few shots for myself.

Just a few days after the wedding the scrapbook was done and I shipped it to their home, they were delighted. Then I get an email and phone call. This great photographer had missed / didn't take pictures of the first dance, the unity candle lighting, their rings, father and bride dance.... and about two or three other key items that our friends had been expecting.

Not only did he miss the shots but wanted to know if I had any other shots that I had taken for myself that they could use in their album to fill the gaps that he had badly created. After looking I had suitable pictures for all but one gap.

I can understand missed shots, but to actually request if your quests had pictures to use the in the professional album....

To help my friends out I sent them some high res images, but just had to share this one...

Some god's greated gift to photography, eh...

elsaspet · Aug 6, 2006

My first teacher was this sort of dude. I feel bad even saying it, because at least he tried to teach me, but at the same time, I think he took me on as a student because he wanted to hear himself talk about how wonderful he was. Blah, blahdy, blah, blah. Needless to say, everything I learned in those first few months was wrong. Just everything. I couldn't figure out why my photos were getting worse instead of better. I got in a serious funk about it, and decided to part ways with the "wisest of the wise all wedding photography had ever seen". And to my delight, my photography improved greatly by leaps and bounds.
I'm a middle aged woman, so I can tell you by a long hard experience that those that are really great at what they do, don't go around telling everyone how great they are. They don't have to. It's the one's who have a bad self confidence that do that. I'm not talking about the guy who is confident in his ability, but the guy who runs his head 24/7 screaming at the top of his lungs that he's the best the planet has ever seen.
It's fantastic that you were there to take up the slack. I know things can go wrong, cards can fail, all sorts of things can happen, but thats a whole lot of "missing". Sounds like the photog was missing. Maybe he was talking the guests and DJ up, telling them how great he is..............

elsaspet · Aug 6, 2006

And just an aside............do not give your files to this dude. I feel bad for the bride and groom, but at the same time, if you give his guy your files, I can promise you, he's going to submit it as his work in "pitches".
Don't do it.
It's a hard lesson for a bride to learn after the wedding, to be sure. But this is yet another example of why you don't chose the guy who charges the least, and you check references whenever possible.

bogleric · Aug 6, 2006

You have some very good points... This always seems to happen with people who have the god complex. I always figure if you are good people already know it and if you are trying to convince them you are just being an ass.... Well, over the top convince like the god complex.

I did send images to the bride and groom but not the photog.

ksmattfish · Aug 7, 2006

bogleric said:
My friends had carefully chosen a photographer who only talked about he was god's greatest gift to wedding photography.....

Apparently they weren't so careful after all. Did they just take his word, or actually look at a portfolio? Did they check references? I'm amazed at how many people hire me without checking my references.

duncanp · Aug 7, 2006

ksmattfish said:
Apparently they weren't so careful after all. Did they just take his word, or actually look at a portfolio? Did they check references? I'm amazed at how many people hire me without checking my references.

Your not that bad