7 mistakes in choosing a photographer that couples realize too late
Seven mistakes couples usually notice only when the album arrives. All of them can be avoided with one calm conversation and a little planning.
Lazar Mihajlović
Published: 11 September 2026
Almost every season a couple gets in touch whose wedding is long past, and the album still hurts. When we unravel the story, it turns out the mistake was almost never made on the day itself. It was made months earlier, when the photographer was chosen. Sometimes the culprit is haste, sometimes a wrong recommendation, but the pattern keeps repeating.
The good news is that the same mistakes keep repeating, so they can also be predicted. Here are the seven I see most often, without scare tactics and without complaining, with a clear way to sidestep each one.
Seven mistakes, in short
- A decision made on price alone, without looking at the work
- Booking without going through a single complete gallery
- A photographer whose style does not match your sensibility
- A deal on a handshake, with no contract or with one nobody read
- Booking at the last moment, when the sought after dates are gone
- Not a single real conversation before signing, in person or over a video call
- Cutting the coverage, so the album is left without half the story of the day
Let us go through them in order, because each one has a simple solution.
Price as the only criterion and the gallery nobody saw
The budget is real and you will think about the price, that is completely normal. The problem starts when it becomes the only criterion. Photographs are the only thing left from a wedding once the cake is eaten and the music has gone quiet, so the order of looking should be reversed: the work first, everything else after. Once you look at the work before anything else, the list of candidates usually halves on its own.
The second mistake goes hand in hand with the first: booking on the basis of ten frames from a profile. Everyone has ten good photographs. You are not getting ten photographs, you are getting an album from a whole day, so before you decide ask for at least one complete gallery. Why that is decisive I explained in detail in the text a whole gallery or Instagram.
A style that is not yours and a contract nobody read
The third mistake is the quietest and the hardest to correct. A photographer can be excellent and his style simply not be yours. Some people love darker, dramatic tones, others bright and airy frames. Neither is wrong, but if the two of you do not recognize yourselves in those photographs, the album will never fully make you happy. While you look at the work, ask yourselves one thing: do I want our day to look like this? The style is easy to check: open several albums by the same photographer and see whether you like the average, not only the strongest frames.
The fourth mistake is a deal on a handshake. A contract protects both sides and there is nothing unpleasant about it: it states in black and white what is photographed, for how many hours, what you get and what happens if something goes wrong. A serious photographer offers it himself, without anyone asking.
Late booking, a skipped conversation and a shortened day
The fifth mistake is waiting. Sought after dates, especially Saturdays at the peak of the season, go much earlier than couples expect. The sooner you start looking, the wider the choice and the calmer the decision. That goes especially for weddings from May to October.
The sixth is a skipped conversation. The photographer is with the two of you all day, longer than any of the guests, so chemistry is not an unimportant detail. If you feel light and comfortable after the conversation, that is an excellent sign. That lightness shows in the photographs later. In that conversation ask everything you want to know, including what seems trivial to you.
The seventh mistake is cutting the coverage down to the ceremony and an hour around it. The morning preparations and the party in full swing are often the most emotional parts of an album. Before you cut the hours, go through whole albums and see how much of the story the beginning and the end of the day carry. All of this sounds like a lot of work, but in practice all seven mistakes are solved with one calm conversation and a little planning.
Lazar Mihajlović Photography
One calm conversation solves all seven
Send me the date and location of your wedding. We go through everything you want to know, you browse the albums and decide at your own pace whether I am the right choice for the two of you.
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