Please before asking “how much for…?” keep in mind, when it comes to pricing a photoshoot the photographer need to have more information that you may think to give the right price, for example;

The most important factor would be the clients expectations of the images/product. Is it a simple picture that looks just better than one taken from a phone or a consumer camera, or are we looking for a more professional picture like the ones wee see in a high-end magazine? assuming that you need a photographer is because you want the high-end professional look. So for that we have to take in consideration a few things that we need to achieve the “professional look”. Like any other business, photographers price our time based in Cost of running our business + Cost of goods + Cost of time and labor + Taxes = Pricing

When some one ask a photographer how much for a job the first think that comes to our mind is this 3 things all measured in time and effort:

PRE-PRODUCTION — PRODUCTION — POSPRODUCTION (this 3 combined makes for the cost of labor)

PRE-PRODUCTION

• Cost of materials for the photoshoot (from staging to props), Final delivery of the pictures (Print or Digital, if Digital are they been sent or in a USB or Hard drive) with that packaging and shipping cost.

• Time in meetings with the client, traveling from to etc.

PRODUCTION

• Equipment used

• Transportation to and from of the equipment

• Time spend on the shoot (meaning we may need to put more time and effort to achieve the client expectations of the final product)

POSTPRODUCTION

• Time spend after the photoshoot in the computer to make the images meet the expectations of he job.

Often times most people don’t know that 50 percent of the magic happens in the computer after the pictures has been taken, retouching pictures is an art on its own, so much so that most photographer will pay someone else to do the retouching, in my case I do it myself. but it takes time too, now multiply that times each picture that needs retouching and voila!

So what do I need to know to give you the right price?

• What are your expectation based on the budget (if any).

• When and where will the photoshoot take place.

• Where are the images going to be used and for how long (People sometimes forget that images can have license fees depending where they’re going to end and for how long).

• How many images per product / subject).

• When do the images need to be delivered (Time frame from shooting to delivering the images).

• Type of delivery of the pictures (Digital like Dropbox or similar or hard copy (USB, CD, hard drive).

• How will the payment be handled.