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We found a great photographer that did one hour sessions for $250. Gave us a cd of over 50 images. It was awesome! Photog's are so expensive now adays!!
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@BandDmommy: oh yeah albums will get you. I think it all depends how important photos are in your life to determine if it's worth it. Some people see and use it as art, others just want something to document memories. We tend to splurge on big milestones but keep the family portraits to mini sessions because we don't usually display those as big prints in our home.
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We usually find someone who offers the edited digital files with the sitting fee which I find to be a lot more reasonable, cost-wise. Then I can use the disc to print, make books, canvases, etc which I prefer. We usually pay $300 or so for a mini session and that works great for us.
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$350 for an average priced photo session, $500 newborn - comes with 20-30 images editid
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@looch: same- odds that I even want to print a ton are small so something that comes w a handful of digital images is enough. I'm hoping I can do more mini sessions in the future.
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The NoVA photog we've used charges $500+ for her family/newborn sessions. She has different options if you want to include prints, canvases, or albums. We've always opted for the digital files only, and last time we did a mini session for $250. It was 20 minutes and was supposed to include 15-20 digital files, but she gave us 30. I agree that photographer prices around here are crazy, to the point that even average photographers are charging exorbitant prices because they know people will pay.
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We live in an fairly expensive area, but you can def find a wide range of options. We chose the cheapest; went to a Target Portrait Studio! We had a great experience. I had a few coupons/promotions so sitting fee was waived and got our full digital album for $99.
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I'm in the Seattle area and like others said there is just a huge range. Newborn/maternity seems is just generally expensive bc it's a different type of photo shoot. But for just family photos, I always look for the mini-sessions that are available during the year. I think our newborn photographer would run them about twice a year and it would be $350 for a half hour and 20-30 digital images.
My good friend just started her photography business so we used her this year and bc she was portfolio building we paid $150 for an hour and 30 images. I think she's now charging $225/$250 for an hour and 30 images which is still a great deal in this area
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I think I got ripped off when we did our family session earlier this year. All in it was like $3,000 and all we got was a 1 hour session, 7 prints and 30 digitals. I really didn't shop around, I waited last minute and went with the first friend's recommendation. I'm actually really mad at myself for not doing a better job of it. And the pictures weren't even so amazing that I can say it was worth it.
I think next time I will try to do a mini session as others have mentioned.
Just typing all of this makes me kick myself all over again. -
@SweetiePie: That is a lot! I'm sorry.
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@Mrs Green Grass: yeah, I'm stupid. I just assumed that they would all be that much and didn't bother shopping around. The photographer they sent was great with my son but once I started working with the owner/editor and seeing the end result I wasn't impressed. We got some great shots but wasn't overwhelmed with the whole package.
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I live in Chicago and got my newborn pictures for around $300 and that included the sitting fee as well as all of the edited digital prints. We did a mini session recently for $135 and that was for a 30 minute session and included 13 digital prints.
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@SweetiePie: We've all been there, friend. While $3,000 sucks to have "wasted" (feels weird calling pictures of your kid money being wasted, but you know what I mean), it could definitely be worse. I've done some really stupid stuff in my day. Being a grown-up sucks some times!
To answer the question, it depends on what you are ordering and the photographer's experience. For everything you described (album, canvas, experienced photographer) I would have expected more in the range of a wedding photographer - so while I personally would not pay $2,800 for my child's 1 year photos, I think the price for what you got sounds about right.
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@BandDmommy: I can see how your husband would be shocked because to me, $2,800 seems like a lot of money for annual photos. I live in Southern California, and also have had professional photos taken in Chicago, so that's what I'm basing my opinion on. However, I feel like you can spend as much or as little as you want to on a photographer-there seems to be a wide range in many cities. I'll echo others and say doing your own album will likely save you a lot of money. It also would be my bet that if your photographer has won a lot of awards, as you said, that she likely charges a premium for that. But if you love them, then hopefully it was worth it!
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Well seeing that photographers are small business owners and have taxes, insurance and other business expenses and typically it's how they support themselves, yes, I'd say that they would be more expensive in a high cost of living area seeing as their cost of living would be higher.
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We live in a really expensive area. I "won" a photography mini session with a well known local photographer. Plus an 8x10. It was interesting; they function like a really old school outfit (yet are a younger couple). They don't offer digitals at all and do all prints and framing in house. I was hoping the pictures would suck since everything was sooooo expensive. They didn't. So the free session wasn't free at all. There were one or two (or 5) really special images I just couldn't pass on. I only had one framed (and took the rest to have framed myself). I was unable to even purchase a digital file, which really rubbed me the wrong way.
We also had booked a family session with our wedding photographer over thanksgiving while home visiting family. She charges 800 for a family session. Lasted about an hour; 175 images. They are all stunning. If anyone lives in Virginia wall me, she is hands down the best photography investment we have ever or will ever make.
I always use apples aperture to make my own albums (iPhoto has the same feature). I'm also trying artifact uprising for some calendars this year
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I live in Southern California and I think the market here is really saturated. You can basically find a photographer at pretty much any price point! We paid $250 for our newborn pictures. It was a 3 hr session plus about 20 digital edited images. We used our own printing service (mpix) to print. I was quite satisfied!
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