Wedding Album Production
4 September 2006 by: YervantHow long is too long ??
This is a hot topic “How long do wedding albums take to produce ? ”
My studio WILL take up to 4 (Four) months to make an album, yeap, and sometime I have taken even longer! Wow! How? Why? Oh #$%@ !, are probably some thoughts that will cross your mind right now.
I think the best way to describe this is to compare it to buying cars.
When someone wants a Ford or a Toyota, Mazda, Nissan, you just go to one of the dealers and choose the colour of the car you want, and then you pay your $30,000 and pick up your car the next day.
When you order a Porsche or a sports Mercedes Benz, you go to the specific dealer and choose the colour you want and place your order, then you will wait a few months for the delivery of your car with all the bells and whistles you specifically asked for, and…if you order a Ferrari, well, you wait up to a year to receive your car, you pay dearly for it and you are grateful that they made it possible for you to have one.
I like using this analogy, it may sound arrogant but, it is true!!! So, when a couple book at my studio, they are told from first consultation that we will deliver their album 4-6 months after order placement BECAUSE………….
OK, this is where my story unfolds.
In my studio, I have a simple rule: “Quality over quantity”. My two other photographers will shoot like I shoot, we have a certain Yervant Photography signature style which I make sure we all keep up with and continually develop, that’s all fine but for me, this is only 50% of a job well done, the rest is all in the FINISHING and presentation. For me, each and every image that goes in an album needs to be and must be and always is perfectly FINISHED! I want each album page to be a poster, I want each album page to be perfection. Each image is worked on to perfect from all conceivable angles. I expect perfect retouching, colour adjustments, cleaning, cropping and of course perfect story flow, colour matching and layout design. All this does take time and TIME is something irrelevant when it comes to producing the best possible.
I can easily skip a few images per album, send most of it to a lab for finishing, or just print and present, but this is not the Yervant signature product. One of the most repeated comments I get from my clients is “It was worth the wait”, now, I could take this slightly negative and think that I have been late in delivering, but I don’t.
In my early years of business, the era of film, I used to produce 2 albums a DAY, the studio I was a partner in used to shoot 300+ wedding per year, production was factory work, we had a style, a given number of mats for which a given number of print sizes were produced, we had a choice of 15 page, 20 page or 25 page albums and we ran the place like clockwork; print, cut, paste, assemble pages, box the album and out all in a very short time.
I don’t see any problems with this, this is fine for quantity driven studios or studios that prioritise account settlement to delivering highest quality product. When you run a studio which shoots 200 weddings, you simply cannot afford the luxury of ‘taking your time’ but in a boutique situation like my studio, we will shoot maximum 80-100 weddings per annum, we cater for a certain type of client who will spend more on their wedding, they like things ‘Designer’ and ‘Branded’, they appreciate exclusivity and they will demand absolute top quality for all the money they spend, they are not easily pleased and they certainly know quality.
I am talking about this subject on this blog because…. Well, it has been brought to my attention that my studio’s production time frame is being used as a negotiation tool by some of my competitors. It’s quite interesting really, many many years ago when I embraced shooting Digital, some studios were stating that Yervant’s studio, ‘They’re good but they shoot DIGITAL” and one can easily erase or lose a file and there goes their wedding!!!, Then when a lot more studios converted from film to digital, Yervant’s studio was good and shoot digital but, very EXPENSIVE… and now, Yervant’s studio is good, shoot digital, very expensive but… they take 4 months to finish your album!!!
Smile, smile smile!!!
Yervant
Here is a simple example. My studio attracts a certain type of client, this client likes the avant-garde style that we deliver, but most of all, this client expects very high quality service and product for the money they are spending, we deliver exactly that, even if it takes longer, they will see that it was truly worthwhile ART. Quality difference, well, “Art is in the eye of the beholder” !! 
A perfectly good image straight from camera, this type of image is totally acceptable to go to lab for print and straight in the album. 
Here is the same shot done the Yervant studio way……