*Just* Engagement Sessions - and my heart behind why I don’t (or rarely) do them
OK OK!! Before you start thinking “SAM, WHAATTTT???”
Let me start this off with - I LOVE DOING ENGAGEMENT SESSIONS!!!!!!……..for my couples that book me for their wedding day! This blog post is explaining my heart behind why I don’t shoot JUST engagement sessions on their own, and not their wedding day!
This blog post topic has been on my to-do list for a while now simply because of the number of emails and inquiries I have had about it! It lead me to start thinking….maybe people outside of the wedding industry don’t realize how streamlined a wedding day process is (if you want good relationships with your vendors), and it really starts as simple as who photographs your engagement session! CRAZY RIGHT? Let me explain.
As I continue to photograph more throughout my career, and grow this business it has become more apparent to me now more than ever that the process of creating a GREAT client experience, and wedding images don’t start with the bride and the bridesmaids in the bridal suite the first thing in the morning on the day of the wedding….it starts with that FIRST email the bride sends me. This “Sam Wynn Wedding Experience” I have started to create within my business is a process, and the wedding day is just one tiny part of the journey! In order to have genuine, natural, happy, fun images of my couple on their wedding day, I NEED for them to have a great experience overall, AND THATS WHERE THE ENGAGEMENT SESSION comes into play!
There hasn’t been a wedding day yet that I have showed up to, that I haven’t met and worked with them before hand at their engagement session! Thats simply because of how important this piece of the puzzle is to me and how it plays into the overall experience my clients have with me. I have had multiple brides inquire during that first email and say they don’t want an engagement session, or they aren’t interested….and every time I’m able to get them to do one by sharing how important it is, and they are SO THANKFUL!
When I show up on your wedding day, my goal is to NOT just be another vendor that walks into the room ready to do their job. MY GOAL is to walk into the bridal suite the morning of your wedding day, and you feel like you have a FRIEND there that just arrived because we made time to get to know each other at your engagement session and build that relationship!
Today I simply just want to emphasize that engagement sessions should be done with your WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER! There have only been a tiny tiny hanful of times that I have taken an engagement session outside of a wedding package, but overall I don’t, and there are a few reasons for this!
My free dates are for engagement sessions and need to be saved for my couples! Sam Wynn Brides take priority when it comes to my calendar and when I shoot 10-20 weddings a year..that means I have to find time to shoot 10-20 engagements! My top priority ever since I started this business was to balance LIFE and WORK! So saving my availability for my couples that have invested in having me a part of their wedding day is important!
By me shooting JUST an engagement session for a couple, I’m actually stealing very valuable time from another photographer! I think its so important that every couple needs time with their actual wedding photographer! Its the couples time to really get to know who they hired, the artist who will be capturing their day, and build that relationship with the person they will ultimately see THE MOST on their wedding day!! It’s such a vital part of the process, especially for me! Like I said above, when I show up on wedding days I feel like I’m meeting a friend again….and if a photographer misses out on that feeling with their client because I took their couples engagement photos, that’s just simply not fair to them. So anytime I get an email that inquires just for an engagement session, I ALWAYS encourage brides to connect with their wedding photographer for their engagement portraits of possible!
Last but not least, you want your galleries to be consistent! I think all photographers have a certain “look” to their images and all are slightly different! You want to be able to look back at, and even display images in your home that are the same consistency as your wedding images!
SO BASICALLY - I want my wedding couples to be exclusively mine, and I think it’s safe to say other wedding photographers do too! Especially if they value the client process. I don’t do this to be a jerk….actually its SO hard for me sometimes to say no to people haha! BUT I know that it will make for a much smoother wedding experience overall and I want the best for EVERY couple, even if you choose another photographer! You deserve to be able to work with them before hand to get comfortable in front of their camera. Here are a few of my couples from last year getting comfortable in front of the camera and practicing for their BIG DAY!!
