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Grace Tan
In Musings, Relationships, Running a Business, Tips + Ideas

How to keep your photographers happy (& ultimately give you better photos)

How many times do you walk into a restaurant and think… “How can I make life better for this waiter?” If most of us are honest, we rarely, if ever think about those thoughts. We expect to be served, to be treated well, and when things don’t go the way we expect, we rant and complain. It is probably true for a lot of people working in the service industry… hotels, hospitals, tour operators…

And even photographers.

When I first started working in this industry, I knew that it was the little things that differentiated a good service from a great one. The client and their needs are always top on my mind, and I made sure to communicate that to our entire team… from our communications to the photographers on the shoot, and up till delivery stage. Someone told me once, that if you show genuine care to your clients, they know it. It has always been our principle to make sure our clients get the best experience from us. So it does sadden us sometimes when we get the occasional client who doesn’t treat us the same way.

I do admit, most of our clients are amazing. They are thoughtful, kind, generous… even when there’s a million other things to think about on their wedding day. It makes us feel so appreciated. To know that we’re not just another ‘vendor’, but that we’re treated as friends. Ultimately, we just want to do even better and more for these clients!

* The Stories team at work (left to right, top to bottom): Johan, Diane, Ben, Weiming, Felicia and Mark

Here are some simple ways that can keep your photographers happy throughout the wedding day:

1. Do remember to feed us – Being on our feet for 10 hours on your wedding day, carrying kgs of equipment is not an easy task. Most Malaysians are really hospitable and make sure that we are well fed during lunch and dinner. We do not expect to be seated at the table with your guests since we’ll be moving around a lot during dinner anyway. It’s always best to just order a vendor’s meal like fried rice or a burger from the hotel for the team. Sometimes though, there were days when all we got for dinner were soggy McDonald’s that were bought hours ago, or a pack of egg tarts for dinner. A hungry photographer can sometimes turn a little grumpy. Sometimes.

2. Please prepare a room at the hotel for us – This is relevant if you require a same day slideshow to be created by us. Our base is in Petaling Jaya, so sometimes it may not be feasible for us to travel 30 minutes from your home in Klang to PJ, work tirelessly without a break to create a slideshow and then drive another 30 minutes to a hotel in KL, all within 4 hours. Photographers hardly get any rest. It would make our life a lot easier if we didn’t have to spend so much time traveling, but can go to a dedicated hotel room just for the team to work, take a nap if necessary, and have a shower to freshen up.

This room should not be shared with other guests because it’s really difficult to work comfortably when we have people looking over our shoulder, expecting to see images or wanting to talk to us when we really have a deadline to meet. Sometimes, we are given function rooms to use, but that is not really ideal. Most of these rooms do not have shower facilities, nor proper seats to rest comfortably. I find it sad when a client or wedding planner expects us to shower in the public toilet at the hotel, or not freshen up at all prior to dinner. Even sadder when we are placed in a store room somewhere to prepare the same day slideshow (thank God this only happened once).

3. Do give us sufficient time for portraits – We know time is precious on your wedding day, but we want to do the best for you too. Do allocate at least 30-45 minutes sometime during the day for a portrait session for the both of you. We know that sometimes, this eats into your mingling time with guests, but we feel that it’s important to make time for it. Please be patient with us if it seems like the portrait sessions take a while, or overruns in terms of time.

4. Do tell us how you feel at the end of the day – We love to hear feedback! If you are happy with our service throughout the day, do let us know before we say goodbye. Those little words like thank you goes a loooong way! 10 hours (and sometimes more!) of exhaustion is worthwhile knowing that our clients appreciate our work and attentiveness.

*Mother hen – Grace

Grace Tan
In For Photographers, Life, Musings, Running a Business

Stolen: Our photography images

UPDATED AS OF: 17 May 2011, 1:05am

They say that copying is the best form of flattery. But not in this case.

Thanks to one of our Stories’ readers (Cecilia Loh), I discovered today that a fair bit of our work has been copied by another photographer in Indonesia and claimed as his/her own. Our watermarks were removed, replaced with this photographer’s logo, and fake blog posts were written about the shoot experience… The amazing thing is that it’s not just one image, but a whole series of images from multiple clients of ours.

I am a little sad to see things like this happening. It has happened to other photographers I know, but I never thought the day would come when it would happen to me. Enraged? Violated? Of course, but at the end of the day, how am I do react to such a situation? What do I do to bring justice?

It’s interesting to see how many photographers have banded together to help support me and make it known that plagiarism has happened. While I am somewhat thankful, I would also like to hear what Yuda Photography has to say first. Everyone makes mistakes, and the key is to learn from them. I’m sure this serves as a shock to them, knowing they can be found out.

Should they reply to my email and apologise, I am more than willing to forgive, as life is too short to hold grudges. I always recall the words from the bible that say…

You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.

Matthew 5:43-47 (The Message)

I have yet to hear a response from Yuda, but rather, I see their blog posts and Facebook pages disappearing quickly, as if it is more important to cover their tracks first, before responding to me. To all our clients who are affected, I am truly sorry this had to happen. I am taking measures to make sure this is rectified.

I feel sorry for the clients that have booked this photographer, with the assumption that these images are theirs. I wonder what kind of images they got in the end. Here are just some of the screenshots I’ve saved based on the plagiarism.

All of these thumbnails below are our images.

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Grace Tan
In Chinese Weddings, Weddings

Kevin + Denisse

Photographers: Grace & Ian
Location: Concorde Hotel, KL
Make Up & Hair: Kimmy

When I first met Denisse, she told me that she is a really simple person. They like to keep things simple, have a simple wedding and a simple dinner. And that made her one of the least stressed brides I have ever photographed. I think it must come from the fact that Denisse is from Miri, Sarawak. A lot of East Malaysians I know are super friendly and laidback!

And so, Denisse and Kevin had a simple wedding. But one that is full of good memories, laughter and friendship.

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Grace Tan
In Life, Musings

Musings: God Made Me Female!

I’ve always considered the world of photography as a predominantly male industry (which it is!) and initially when I considered joining the ranks of wedding photographers, I thought, “Oh my goodness, I’ll have to grow a goatee, wear an ugly vest and talk tech all the time.” Well, that was like 2 years ago, and now, after having met lots and lots of cool female photographers like Jenny Sun, Fiona Lim, Anna-Rina, Asther Lau, and myself included *ahem*… I am jumping for joy. There’s hope for us yet!

I can look stylish and hot as a female photographer! It sounds incredibly vain, I know, but hey, at least I’m being honest!

female

I’ve thought through some of my strengths and weaknesses of being a female photographer, and thought I’d share some here:

Strengths:
– I can connect with the brides out there who are usually my first point of contact during any form of client consultation. I am genuinely excited to hear about their wedding plans, how they met their fiance and what kind of decorations they’ll be having on their big day. You know, girly talk.

– On the shoot day, I can get access where most male photographers cannot. For example, brides would usually allow me to be in the room while they change. They have no qualms cupping their breasts in front of me while my shutter goes clicking away.

– I have more wardrobe options than male photographers. Yay!

– When I started photography, I didn’t really focus a lot on the technical aspects of it, but rather the composition and story of each shot. I think that is still one of my greatest strengths. I look for emotions and storyline above everything else.

– I smile a lot to people. I think that warms them up and breaks the ice. Ok, ok, this is not really a gender difference.

Weaknesses:

– I’m female and small. Being small can be another blog post in itself, but the fact that I’m female, most people would tend to look at the male photographers first before looking at me. They probably think that I’m a guest taking photos. They are quite surprised when I command the situation especially during group shots etc!

– The other male photographers I shoot with can shoot off anything technical in one breath, talk about the latest gadgets in the market, explain ALL the features in the various camera bodies available in the market AND refer you to the websites that has great reviews about them. I am a little slow in these things. :)

– I cannot push large heng tais away, especially those that block my view during the chip san leong session.

– I like to be pampered way too much, so sometimes I spend my hard earned cash on things like massage sessions and pigging out sessions with my girlfriends.

So, what are your thoughts out there? What are the advantages or disadvantages of being a female/male photographer?