photo prose: gary rabenko

Questions I can’t ask

Posted

Information is useful to the photographer photographing your event. Often the individuals actually doing the imagery are not given much information. Studios use a “job card” that does not convey to crew members actually doing the work the “feel” or “insight” into the event assembled during the booking phase. I learned this having been a freelancer for years; then I was not paid to care until the moment of the shoot. The many questions I now ask before a wedding make a difference; still, some questions don’t get asked, some cannot be anticipated or asked tactfully.

A caller for a day I am already booked hears I am not available. Some persist. “Can you make sure that your event is still on?” My clients paid a deposit to hold me for the date, making a commitment to me, and I to them. If I called, and later the couple split, might they not feel that I “jinxed” it. I cannot think it would be proper for me to call them. Might that not suggest that I regret my contract with them, or that on their special day I might wish I was elsewhere? Suppose my client decides to change the event date. Do I then call the second prospect, letting them know I am now available? Would they not have already committed to another photographer? Having done their research, and made their decision, should I now notify them that I suddenly became available? How will this help them? It could only be a needless frustration.

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