This evening we all went to Tybee Island to meet a photographer to do family pictures.
What should have been an enjoyable time quickly turned into a fiasco! Not that the scenery wasn't beautiful but I learned a hard lesson about picking a photographer, and one that I should have already learned.
What should have been an enjoyable time quickly turned into a fiasco! Not that the scenery wasn't beautiful but I learned a hard lesson about picking a photographer, and one that I should have already learned.
Before going to see Heather, Mark, and the kids; my Mark and I had decided that we would do family portraits while we were there. This is something I have wanted to do with all the kids for some time now. We attempted to do it while in Utah with Brian and his family but the photographer, a family member whom we wanted to use unfortunately became unavailable, and we seemed to run out of time and never got to JC Penny or somewhere else to take them. Anyway...before we left for Savannah, I started looking for photographers on line. There were a lot of great ones but this one...I fell in love with the pictures on her website and called Heather. She felt the same way and contacted the photographer to see if she would be available during the time we would be visiting. To Heather's and my excitement she had some times available where we could do an "on location shoot" at Tybee Island so we picked a date and the photographer told Heather, over the phone, that she would put us on the calendar. Before we left I sent the photographer an email regarding the upcoming shoot and she had no idea what I was talking about. She stated that she had remembered speaking with Heather but she hadn't placed us for a shoot on her calendar, and thought maybe we had booked with a different photographer...sometimes the old saying of hindsight is 20/20 really stinks...I should have taken this as a bad omen and found another photographer!
The next mistake I made in choosing this photographer was not meeting with her when we got there and going over her prices...BIG mistake. I knew that our deposit would be $300 and that $200 would apply to a picture credit. I thought this is terrific!! WRONG!
It would have been if she would have been a creditable photographer and not had her prices on individual shots overinflated. Most photographers for what we would find that her pricees were would have given you a CD with the pictures on it or at least a good amount of them but not this gal. Her in studio style is like Anne Geddes but let me tell you, she is no Anne Geddes...maybe in her mind...but she is no Anne Geddes, except for her price.
As it was her communication skills are so lacking that when Heather contacted her about us not being on her calendar she was like, "Oh...I'm so sorry...I guess I must have totally forgotten!" Hellooooo Melinda...were you on drugs or something...where was your brain on this one??? Then she later contacts us to say that she can't do a shoot on Tybee Island and that we need to pick a different location...so we choose a park close to the kids house...either the day before or the morning of the shoot she contacts Heather to say she doesn't think that there will be very many photo ops at this park, but guess what??? We find out she's never been to this park so how the heck would she know there aren't any photo ops there??!! Then miraculously at the last minute she calls to say we can meet at Tybee Island after all!!! So in midstream we switch to Tybee!! By this time my husband is furious, he doesn't want to be doing the pictures outside in thefirst place, but I'm thinking the beach would be cooler temperature wise with the ocean breezes vs the park...MY BAD AGAIN...he was not a happy camper...heck non of us were!!!
So our son-in-law Mark takes Maddie and they decide to go ahead of us and find the location and we follow shortly afterward.
We get into Tybee and Heather has been trying to reach this chick, who is horrid at answering her phone but finally gets a call back from her leting her know we are trying to figure out where the heck she is talking about meeting us at. After I'm not sure how many phone calls between this chick and Heather's Mark, we finally get it figured out, tell the photographer that Mark is at the gas station waiting fpr her and we will be there shortly, don't leave until we get there! We get there...they're gone!!
Another 15 minutes of daylight is now being wasted while we run circles around the lighthouse trying to figure out where the heck they are!
Daylight is fading fast and we finally arrive, in need of a bathroom for my husband, two little girls, and one very pregnant daughter!! Again, more light fading...
We are informed that her mother is sitting in her van with her. I think 7 kids, and she's expecting as well...
We finally get down to the beach and she starts asking us how we want to be posed??? Uhhh...you're the photographer, shouldn't you be directing us?? In the mean time...did ya happen to notice that the sun is going down???
Both Mark's are not smiling...the photographer is trying to tell the girls to look for the monkey in her camera, and Maddie is saying...THERE'S NO MONKEY IN YOUR CAMERA!!! WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM...STUPID?!!!! Well she didn't say the last part but she did tell her there was no monkey in her camera...and she was quite adamant about it!!
We finally finish...I write the #$!!%%# a check and we head to Texas Roadhouse for supper...we're all starved and it's about 9PM by this time!!!
What a nightmare...and the fun was just beginning!!
I wouldn't find out until we got home just how little our $200 was going to get us...
To get the pictures we would have wanted was outrageous...if we didn't buy one of her "packages" they were $75 a file AKA picture...a 5x7 was $25...we ended up with 8 5x7's and will never use her again...a hard lesson learned...and one that I hope anyone reading this will take to heart and research their photographers well before agreeing to use them...always...always...always...meet with them ahead of time and get a signed contract...otherwise it is all in their favor and you have no one to blame but yourself!!!
I will never, Ever, EVER do that again!!
AMEN!
The next mistake I made in choosing this photographer was not meeting with her when we got there and going over her prices...BIG mistake. I knew that our deposit would be $300 and that $200 would apply to a picture credit. I thought this is terrific!! WRONG!
It would have been if she would have been a creditable photographer and not had her prices on individual shots overinflated. Most photographers for what we would find that her pricees were would have given you a CD with the pictures on it or at least a good amount of them but not this gal. Her in studio style is like Anne Geddes but let me tell you, she is no Anne Geddes...maybe in her mind...but she is no Anne Geddes, except for her price.
As it was her communication skills are so lacking that when Heather contacted her about us not being on her calendar she was like, "Oh...I'm so sorry...I guess I must have totally forgotten!" Hellooooo Melinda...were you on drugs or something...where was your brain on this one??? Then she later contacts us to say that she can't do a shoot on Tybee Island and that we need to pick a different location...so we choose a park close to the kids house...either the day before or the morning of the shoot she contacts Heather to say she doesn't think that there will be very many photo ops at this park, but guess what??? We find out she's never been to this park so how the heck would she know there aren't any photo ops there??!! Then miraculously at the last minute she calls to say we can meet at Tybee Island after all!!! So in midstream we switch to Tybee!! By this time my husband is furious, he doesn't want to be doing the pictures outside in thefirst place, but I'm thinking the beach would be cooler temperature wise with the ocean breezes vs the park...MY BAD AGAIN...he was not a happy camper...heck non of us were!!!
So our son-in-law Mark takes Maddie and they decide to go ahead of us and find the location and we follow shortly afterward.
We get into Tybee and Heather has been trying to reach this chick, who is horrid at answering her phone but finally gets a call back from her leting her know we are trying to figure out where the heck she is talking about meeting us at. After I'm not sure how many phone calls between this chick and Heather's Mark, we finally get it figured out, tell the photographer that Mark is at the gas station waiting fpr her and we will be there shortly, don't leave until we get there! We get there...they're gone!!
Another 15 minutes of daylight is now being wasted while we run circles around the lighthouse trying to figure out where the heck they are!
Daylight is fading fast and we finally arrive, in need of a bathroom for my husband, two little girls, and one very pregnant daughter!! Again, more light fading...
We are informed that her mother is sitting in her van with her. I think 7 kids, and she's expecting as well...
We finally get down to the beach and she starts asking us how we want to be posed??? Uhhh...you're the photographer, shouldn't you be directing us?? In the mean time...did ya happen to notice that the sun is going down???
Both Mark's are not smiling...the photographer is trying to tell the girls to look for the monkey in her camera, and Maddie is saying...THERE'S NO MONKEY IN YOUR CAMERA!!! WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM...STUPID?!!!! Well she didn't say the last part but she did tell her there was no monkey in her camera...and she was quite adamant about it!!
We finally finish...I write the #$!!%%# a check and we head to Texas Roadhouse for supper...we're all starved and it's about 9PM by this time!!!
What a nightmare...and the fun was just beginning!!
I wouldn't find out until we got home just how little our $200 was going to get us...
To get the pictures we would have wanted was outrageous...if we didn't buy one of her "packages" they were $75 a file AKA picture...a 5x7 was $25...we ended up with 8 5x7's and will never use her again...a hard lesson learned...and one that I hope anyone reading this will take to heart and research their photographers well before agreeing to use them...always...always...always...meet with them ahead of time and get a signed contract...otherwise it is all in their favor and you have no one to blame but yourself!!!
I will never, Ever, EVER do that again!!
AMEN!
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