What do you know about wedding photography in India? Have you ever given it a thought? As many wedding photographers in the world now include a gallery of an Indian wedding in their portfolio, it is clear that India has become a major player in the wedding industry. Indian weddings, spreading over a few days with colorful costumes and varied traditional customs, are a great opportunity for amazing imagery.
Great images are one thing, but there is also a business sense behind it all. In 2007, the Indian wedding market was worth over 800 billion US$ and was growing by at least 25 percent per annum. The current global economic recession has not yet affected the wedding market.
What makes wedding photography in India different?
What makes wedding photography in India different than anywhere else in the world? To understand this, consider the US, where organizations, conventions and competitions for fine art wedding photography are already a routine. Top photography magazines grade their list of ten best wedding photographers every year. In India, that has not yet happened. In other words, although the Indian wedding industry is a fast growing business, the field of wedding photography in India is still less developed than in other parts of the world.
Two types of wedding couples
There are many different traditions of Indian weddings, but there are mainly two kinds of couples who get married in India: those who live in India and those who live abroad.
The first kind are most likely going to hire a local photographer. In many cases, it will be the same photographer who shot the weddings of the family for many years.
The second kind – those who come to India for a destination wedding or come home to India to get married – have greater expectation from their wedding photographer and are more open to new styles and trends. They sometimes go to their home town but often prefer an exotic location like a beach or an old fort palace. They are looking for a dream wedding.
Traditional or photojournalistic wedding photography?
If you are a bride planning a wedding in India and looking for a wedding photographer, you have most likely run into the photography studio “in business for more than a decade” – the traditional wedding photographers. They know how to please your parents. They will take pictures of all your guests. They will also pose and photograph you in the same way as you can see in most wedding albums.
In contrast, a photojournalist wedding photographer captures the emotional and special moments of your wedding without being intrusive. The memories captured by a photojournalist wedding photographer are always unique and personal. Unfortunately, there are very few such photographers based in India.
JPG or RAW?
Nowadays, most professional Indian wedding photographers use the latest digital cameras. However, to cut costs, they generally shoot their images on the ’standard’ JPG setting (not even the ‘fine’ JPG setting). They argue that this is standard practice, and very few would notice any difference even in A3 sized prints. That is true, but only if their original exposure was perfect in 100% of the shots, something that even the best photographer in the world never achieves. Therefore, photographers seeking the highest quality in their shoots prefer the RAW format. It is more costly, but it provides far better control in the post-production phase. In other words, if your photographer uses RAW, you will pay more, but you will probably get more attractive photographs.
How much does it cost?
Photography prices in India range from Rs10,000-15,000 (US $200-300) for a few hours of shooting to Rs200,000-300,000 (US$4,000-6,000). At the end of the day, as the saying goes, ‘you get what you pay for.’
If you want to know more about wedding photography in India, feel free to write me.
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