About your Birth Investment…

I wanted to take the time to talk about your investment and why prices are set the way they are.  You can read about what sets a professional apart from non professionals HERE.

For Photographers:  While it’s tempting to charge very little in order to gain more business, it’s not practical.  Eventually you will burn out and either quit or raise prices.  After all the expenses listed below you still need to have some sort of profit to bring to your family.  It’s not fair to your family to be on-call and away for unknown amounts of time at any hours of the day and any day of the year.. you need to be making some profit.  You might want to read THIS post from a fellow birth photographer too.

For Clients: Birth Photography *is* an investment. It’s not something that everyone may want or feel they need, but if it’s important to you to have professional images of your birth then it may mean saving up in advance to afford it.  I am happy to take payments!

When you hire me as your photographer you’re investing in someone who’s skilled and knowledgeable about lighting, composition, and the equipment being used. I invest a lot of my time getting to know my clients so they’re comfortable with me at the birth, keeping in contact throughout the pregnancy, taking the time needed to get beautiful images, professionally editing each image, and making sure my clients know how and where to print their photographs. With DSLR cameras at very affordable prices it may be difficult to understand why someone should pay $800 for a birth photographer when a friend may do it for free or your doula offers it cheaper (but i’m really hoping you can SEE the difference in quality!). There is so much more that goes into birth photography than the camera and photoshop. Some of the *behind the scenes* work includes:

Time, time, and more time. This is the part where people think they’re just investing in the time it takes me to photograph the birth. So much more goes into it than that.. It involves on going communication with mom getting to know her and her birth wishes, talking about her birth wishes and how photography plays a role in them, and keeping in contact towards the end of the pregnancy.  I will make sure that you don’t think of me as an extra stranger in the room, just as I hope you don’t think of your midwife or doula as a stranger in the room.  Then there’s being on call from 38-42 weeks which means no vacations, no out of town trips (or having to take 2 cars if we go somewhere), always carrying my gear with me, having babysitters on stand-by ready for a call, having my phone near my side 24 hours a day, missing important events, skipping day trips in the mountains where there’s no cell service, etc.  It’s a very big sacrifice to make and you truly have to have a calling and passion for it {just like midwives, doulas, and other birth professionals do}.  It also involves the time it takes to drop the kids off at a sitter (and arrange for before/after school care or a wet nurse if you’re nursing a baby), show up to the birth, stay for an unknown amount of time, travel time home, and editing.  All time spent away from family {and it’s crucial to have support from your household!}.

Editing takes up a lot of a photographer’s job. I don’t open an image in photoshop and apply tacky pre-set filters, brighten your teeth and eyes until they’re too bright to look at, and turn your skin into a plastic doll. But I do sort through each session, eliminate duplicates and weed some out leaving you with an amazing birth story to look back on forever.  I may end up spending a couple weeks sorting through and editing your images before adding them to your gallery and posting a blog post.

Marketing and Advertising. Designing, printing, and passing out business cards and other marketing materials takes up so much time!  Finding places to display canvases, building relationships with other professionals, paying for an ad to run, etc… Not to mention maintaining a website- cost of monthly hosting and the time it takes to maintain it and keep it up to date.  I often pay to put my brochures in goody bags at local vendor fairs, or pay to attend the vendor fair in person.  They run between $50-$400!

Equipment. A decent camera and nice lenses is important and so is the knowledge it takes to use it correctly! It takes time to save up for a $2500 lens, but it’s even more important to have the skill to go with it!

Software, memberships, and insurance. A lot of money goes into upgrading software (photoshop, noiseware, monitor calibration, actions or templates, tax software etc) and yearly membership fees to organizations with PPA. Insuring 20K worth of gear is important too and costs an average of $550 a year to include liability.

Training.  Many would think that once a photographer is established that their ‘training’ comes in the form of taking photos for clients.  BIG misconception.  We’re ALWAYS learning as photographers, even big name photographers.  There’s also a new technology, new software to learn, a skill we haven’t mastered, a genre of photography we’d like to get into, an updated feature to our website to learn how to operate, etc.. Workshops average $500-$3000 to attend.  Yearly training seminars cost thousands to attend when you factor in hotels and airfare.  It’s really a never ending, and time consuming part of the business.

Taxes!! This one is HUGE, HUGE.  Taxes are my biggest headache.. federal ones especially. I spend a lot of time on other areas of my business so having an accountant is important.  When you hire a $50 shoot and burn photographer, do you really think they’re paying taxes?  All other businesses have to be running legally and pay taxes, photographers are no exception.  If you can’t handle paying taxes, then you shouldn’t be running a business.. or hire an accountant!

 

So why does birth photography cost so much?

If you read the above you now understand that there’s so much more that goes into photographing a birth than just the birth itself. It takes up a lot of time, sacrifices, and commitment. Most of all, it takes a professional photographer with the ability to work in all lighting situations. Talent and skill!   I think this is most important.  You’re responsible for photographing one of the most life changing events a family will go through.. a photographer has to know what they’re doing and be highly skilled technical aspects as well as have an eye for flattering angles and composition  As a birth photographer I need to know how to adjust my settings in a split second and be ready to capture in focus images at a fast pace.. maybe someone stepped into the light and casts a shadow, turned on a light, or mom moves into a room with completely different light, or baby comes extremely fast..I have to know how to adapt to those situations and many more.  You don’t want to hire a photographer and end up with blurry images with an ugly color cast!

 

Thank you for reading this. I hope you understand that, while I would love to try to help everyone be able to afford birth photography, I am still a person trying to make a living too. It may be difficult if you’re already paying for a midwife, but Birth Photography is an investment that may take planning and saving but will be worth every penny {just as I’m sure your midwife will be worth every penny!!} I know there will be a day when women don’t think twice about hiring a birth photographer, just as they don’t think twice about hiring a wedding photographer.. and just think, no matter what happens, the photographs from your birth will be loved forever!