This album page synthesizes the whole atmosphere of this Liberty Grand wedding: happy, dynamic, filled with intense love between the bride and groom.
Part of being a Toronto wedding photographer is understanding the local market. As such, I always visit bridal shows he myself informed about other professional photographers. While there are wedding albums portray the perfect big day, somehow they lack soul and look like a succession of poses in a predetermined order. We all know that there is no such thing as a perfect wedding and many things go wrong during the big day. While I agree that it is our job to paint a masterpiece of the couple's special day, often we, professional photographers go too far. The Internet is littered with examples of Photoshop gone wrong where overzealous retouchers or digital artists confuse fantasy with the wedding day.
The feedback I'm receiving from my couples is that they no longer want their glamorous idyllic picture of their big day. Rather, they choose a photojournalistic coverage capturing the love and moments of abundant in any nuptial. Many artists who didn't see this trend in wedding photography have gone out of business or struggle.
In the greater Toronto area the competition is so fierce that artists who were a few years ago on top of the pyramid are now seeing their business disappearing.
On the one hand, social media eroded the former advertising media and the older wedding photographers in Toronto have a hard time adapting. On the other hand, technology changes so fast that it takes a lot of effort to keep informed of the latest post processing techniques, equipment and trends.
In an age where everybody is a photographer it becomes harder and harder to differentiate against your competition. We all carry a camera in her pocket and the camera is better than the best professional cameras we had a few years ago. Often, the guests have even better cameras than we do.
Fortunately, so far, even the most sophisticated cameras have no understanding of light, posing and until cannot connect with your clients so our job as wedding photographers is not extinct. However, cell phones are catching up quickly and it is a matter of time until professional cameras will become extinct the way the point-and-shoot did. When that happens, only the brightest and the most nimble studios will survive.
If in the past he wedding photographer in Toronto make easily a few hundred thousand dollars, these days many struggle to keep their doors open. Brick-and-mortar studios located on the main streets of the city have disappeared being replaced by kids with cameras who master the art of Instagram posting, blogging and vlogging.
If in the past it was virtually impossible to enter the wedding photography market because photographers were so secretive and each photograph cost $0.25, these days in a few months you can learn everything on YouTube and taking photos is free. As such, what it took or predecessors years of hard work, trial and error and lost two rolls of film wasted, it takes a kid a few months to achieve the same level of skill.
Many of the older wedding photographers in Toronto detest social media by their missing a crucial point. It doesn't matter what you think! The only thing that matters is for you to be visible and known by your target market.
The bride and groom today does not shop and the wedding magazine so please stop wasting money on print advertising. Just open that instagram account and start posting. Don't be offended if you don't get any likes because if you don't post on a consistent basis you don't exist.
Even the mighty Kodak, a company that wants was the darling of Wall Street and wedding photographers went into bankruptcy protection. Fortunately Fujifilm were way smarter and recovered after their near-death experience. Nowadays, the offer in operative cameras and embraced the fact that everything is digital, wireless and connected. By the way things are going Canon is the next victim of the ever-changing customer tastes.
I went on a complete tangent and I'm sorry about my digression. My point? As a professional photographer is not about you, it is not about photography, it is about the marketplace. You cannot fight change! You either embrace it or you perish.
Location: 25 British Columbia Road, Exhibition Place, Toronto, ON M6K 3C3.
