I want to be a 2nd Shooter!

[traceyhillphotography]

Okay, I've shot one wedding by myself and I shot a few photos at a cousin's wedding for practice. I need more experience so I would love to be a second shooter for someone. I can't get any local pros to respond. What do I do? I posted some examples on my flickr photostream Flickr: traceyhillphotography's Photostream

I would really love to get into this business.

[arich]

Might try posting here with more detail as far as your gear and whatnot.

Second Shooter Thread...Post Here if You're a Second Shooter

Might also read this thread and assess why it is that you think you want to start shooting weddings.

Discussion: Why so quick to jump into a Wedding?

[todd_a]

Spend lots of money and practice every type of photography you can then spend some more money....

Lovelady, TX? How many wedding pros are there in the immediate area? You are so close to Houston, you might want to start getting to know some pros there and see if you can begin to do some tag-alongs with some of them to gain some experience. That might be too far for you to drive though.

[Tom]

Become an expert at portraits. Most WedTogs hate the portrait aspect. If you kick ass at portraits, that is one thing they can cross off their list on things to do. Also, practice getting creative detail shots.

[arich]

^^must be important because Tom normally hates creative detail shots, I think he's told me something like 7 or 8 times in one day "Don't you dare be creative and for goodness sake don't show any detail!". That's why his portfolio consists entirely of fisheye panoramas.

[traceyhillphotography]

Thanks for the advice. I've done some paid portraits for friends and friends of friends. Here in Lovelady and Huntsville, it is hard to find a wedding to shoot. I went to one for my neighbor as a guest and she already had her cousin doing it for free so... We have two popular photographers and they always have their choice of second shooters. I wouldn't mind traveling to Houston since most of my family lives out there and I'm out there at least once a month anyway. After shooting my first wedding and seeing the horrible job my neighbor's cousin did, I realized wedding photography is something I really want to pursue.

[Tom]

Doing a few paid portraits for friends and families and being really good at portraits under pressure (weddings) are two very different things.

I'm not that well established a photographer (in fact, I am pretty new) but I am doing alright for myself. Prior to 2011, I had shot 14 weddings as a primary shooter for pay.

I get contacted at least weekly by someone that is new to photography that wants to second shoot for me or learn the craft from me by tagging along. I turn each and every one of these down flat. If you are really interested in learning from me, you are welcome to hire me to tutor you and I can run a personalized workshop for you personally where we can focus on what you need. You are going to learn A LOT more from that than you will from following me around for a few hours while I mostly ignore you. Also, my three primary interests are my wife, my friends and my business. If I am taking time away from one of those, I need to be compensated in some way.

But a wedding is a stressful event, and I don't need the added stress of having to watch a new photographer that I don't know and don't trust while I am trying to get all the images that the client expects from me. I am under contract to perform at a certain level and I try to minimize distracting things that could hinder that performance. That include things you wouldn't think about like watching what I eat a day or two before a wedding, staying in decent shape and not bringing a potentially stressful distraction in. I don't need to be instructing anyone on how to use their gear or how to get a better shot. For that reason, all my second shooters are people that I already have prior relationships with and can trust their character and people that I can trust their gear.

Speaking of gear, my personal requirements are:
Full Frame or 1.3x camera - the lowest possible noise, highest possible IQ
Lenses: I prefer Primes, but will accept 2.8 zooms (17-55 2.8 EFS, 24-70mm 2.8L, 70-200mm 2.8L or Nikon equivalents)
Brand: I prefer Canon, because I can let them use my gear or in case of a breakage in gear - at least we will both have the same brand. Likewise, a Nikon shooter probably prefers Nikon.

Style. I tend to choose my second shooter based on the style the bride prefers. When I have a more traditional bride, I tend to hire a more traditional second shooter. If the bride really loves the photojournalism/candid shots, I tend to hire another photojournalist. I have a photojournalist background, so I tend to prefer a more traditional photographer to compliment my style.

Skill: I expect all my seconds to shoot on manual and manual white balance. They should be pretty good at nailing exposure and white balance in the heat of the moment.

Lastly, it is an extremely competitive business. I would rather hire someone that isn't really interested in doing weddings full-time to second shoot with me than someone that is just looking to build up their portfolio so they can undercut/compete with me. My second shooters are allowed to blog the wedding after I have finished editing and have delivered all pics to the bride, but not before. Also, they have to say they shot the wedding with me and link to me in the blog (or in the description on each picture on their facebook fan page.) You are not allowed to take those pics to the venue or any other vendor to increase your relationship. I follow the same rules when I second shoot for other photographers (and I try to second shoot 2-3 times a year.) The reason being - they worked hard on getting that client or that venue. They did all the work. Part of the spoils of booking a wedding at a venue is to use that to increase your relationship there.

I hope that gives some of the perspective from a not very seasoned professional. I am fairly new, but my beginning price is at 2k and my average is around 4k, so I am about middle of the pack as far as pricing goes.


When I am looking for a second shooter, I want to know that they are experienced, that they are professional, that they will represent me well (and not try to pass out their own business cards or something like that). I want someone I can trust to go get family portraits, detail shots or even couple shots and get it right without too much fuss.

I hope that helps. Not trying to be an old curmudgeon, but it is just my perspective.

Good luck (and go become great at portraits!)

[d2creative]

Why is this industry thought of to be different than other industries?
I think it's great if someone can help you out, but it seems a bit odd to me.

If i walked up to the owner of a pool cleaning service and asked if I could tag along on a few of his jobs so I could get more experience and start my own pool cleaning service, how do you think he would react?

Thoughts?

[todd_a]

Originally Posted by d2creative

Why is this industry thought of to be different than other industries?
I think it's great if someone can help you out, but it seems a bit odd to me.

If i walked up to the owner of a pool cleaning service and asked if I could tag along on a few of his jobs so I could get more experience and start my own pool cleaning service, how do you think he would react?

Thoughts?

I'm totally with you on that one! That is why I have almost not tried at all to contact established wedding photographers in my market area whom I admire the work of to see if they would allow me to tag along and learn from them. I feel like an idiot doing that. As if I am asking "Hey, would you teach me to take business from you?" ... Instead I have made friends with a few of the extablished pros in other markets and have eventually been able to do tag alongs with them. It does cost me money for gas and I have to take a lot of time to make the trips, but it has been totally worth it to get some good experience and get to know these photographers even better. And eventually I would hope that from working with me and getting to know me better and watching my work improve, that eventually they may decide to hire me as a second shooter. At that point I would get some compensation to cover costs and maybe put a few dollars in my pocket. For now, I consider it educational costs.

And I agree with Tom - if you really want to learn a ton from a photographer in the shortest time, then hire them as a personal tutor for a day and let them really work with you and evaluate where you are lacking and give you direction as to how to bring up your weaknesses. Some of them even offer smaller, limited attendee workshops where they do something similar and usually around a specific subject. I am great at researching and figuring things out to a point so my plan is to advance as far as I can before doing that so I have some great experience to pull from and some more in-depth technical questions, business questions, etc. when I do get to that point.

Tom is right though, during a wedding, the primary photographer is busy and does not really have time to be spending with you trying to improve your skills. Tagging along is more a way to put what you have figured out alredy to the test in a real situation. Plus it is a great time to practice being aware of the other photographers around you and staying out of their shots.

If you did assistant work with a good photographer, you could at least be right there with them the whole time and see how they work with lighting and watch them as they select lenses for certain situations, etc.

I say research your butt off. Parctice portraits like Tom said (make sure and practice with groups of people), practice posing groups and individuals and couples and such, practice shooting in low light without blurring the shots, practice shooting in every lighting condition there is - direct sunlight, daylight shade, cloudy lighting, inside with all the different types of lights, all the different lights mixed together, action shots, learn to caprure significant moments photojournalisticly, Learn off camera lighting with multiple lights, learn to balance your lighting with the ambient light so you don't blow out the mood of the ambient lighting but still get a well lit subject, Learn landscape photography, learn architectural photography, sports photography, portrait photography, fashion photography, product photography ..... That is just some of the things that wedding photographers do at every wedding!

Oh yeah, I forgot... be able to do all of those things in a very limited amount of time as in seconds sometimes! And while not getting in anyone's way who is there to enjoy the show, in a cramped location with bad lighting, while you are dressed up, most likely sweating your butt off.

See, there is really nothing to it. lol

[ShutterSpire]

Originally Posted by todd_a

I'm totally with you on that one! That is why I have almost not tried at all to contact established wedding photographers in my market area whom I admire the work of to see if they would allow me to tag along and learn from them. I feel like an idiot doing that. As if I am asking "Hey, would you teach me to take business from you?" ... Instead I have made friends with a few of the extablished pros in other markets and have eventually been able to do tag alongs with them. It does cost me money for gas and I have to take a lot of time to make the trips, but it has been totally worth it to get some good experience and get to know these photographers even better.

That is the best thing to do IMO.

A few years ago we met a photographer in San Antonio. She lives and has her boudoir business in Houston. We shoot weddings in Dallas. She was interested in learning how to shoot weddings and we allowed her to follow along with us during one of our weddings. Since she was already an established photographer, I didn't have to worry about teaching her about her camera... just allowing her to experience the wedding and get what she could get. She worked like a second (third) shooter for us, gave us the images to edit and present to the client. She also offered to do a boudoir session for me as 'tuition payment'... =)

After doing that and marketing her wedding service for awhile, she realized that wasn't her main interest and she would stick with boudoir afterall.

It was a good experience all around, and we weren't training our 'competition'.