Professional photo shoot. How to organise the photos for gifts, costs racking up!

[Horehound]

Help! I need some organised people to tell me how they sort photos from a professional shoot to give as Christmas gifts. It seems to be racking up costs!

So we had a mini Christmas shoot with out 14m old and thought we'd send some photos to grandparents /great grandparents for Xmas plus maybe a few older family relations.
The shoot cost
£30 for the session
£70 for 5 digital images, 1 large print and 2 smaller prints.

The shoot was great all Xmas themed and the photos are great, really happy with them.

Then we see all the photos and the photographer says usually if you want a photo on top of the 5 you choose they are £25 each (!) But I'm doing a deal for Xmas so you get ALL photos for £70.
Well, I can't choose 5 so I've bought them all.
But now I'm thinking I need to either use her or use an online print shop to send me copies so I can then send on to relatives.
Plus frames I guess!

I mean, is this normal? I am really happy with the photos.
She also has packages such as £100 for 12 mounted photos which I guess if I then sent to 12 relatives that actually works out not to expensive as a gift.

It's just then that is £270 if I did that. Eek. Think my husband is a bit at it all lol although he does like the photos too

[Akire]

£25 per photo is huge but I’d add to the experience cost. So one off session and pics over £200 ok as a treat and if you are happy for the price.

Are you over estimating how many photos you will use? Grandparents yes but will these photos end up on the wall? Or will they just get replaced in 6m with the next birthday photo? It’s nice to get family photos as everyday fun smiley faces that I can replace and change when I get bored. If I knew it cost £40 I’d feel guilty about upgrading it. I’m sure your baby is lovely and any photo or a frame would look great. Just buy nice frame yourself since you have photos. The effects be just as good.

[mooncakes]

I’d get one or two photos printed for each set of grandparents (Snapfish or Photobox etc - that bit is very cheap) and put them in a nice frame - it doesn’t need to be a hugely expensive frame.

[Horehound]

Yeh that's the thing because it is Christmas themed I dont think they would be up all year. Hmmm

We don't really have photos up around our house at all!

Yes I am happy with the photos and the experience. I do have a Snapfish account and actually I think I get 50 free prints each month.
:)

[MrsExpo]

Yes, this is normal - even if it feels excessive for a few photos!!

I do a bit of semi pro photography and know a few people who are full time pros. The costs you're quoting don't sound excessive tbh. Given the time for the shoot, the cost of the theme setting (I assume they were studio shots) and the time taken to post process the images, which people always forget when they look at photo shoots (can be hours), printing, decent quality mounts etc. I assume the photographer did the shoot in a studio with lights/props etc, used a decent pro camera, and will have processed them on an equally decent computer. All of these things cost money (my portrait camera set up cost over £5k).

I charge £60 for a shoot and anything from £15.00 upwards for a mounted print depending on size. I know a pro who does mostly animals, who charges £450.00 for a shoot including digitals and prints. So, I'd say your costs aren't excessive.

If you're going to get 5 digital images, make sure they are high enough quality to print yourself. Usually, they are lower resolution for putting on your social media and won't print up to any decent size. Photographers do this precisely to stop you from printing them yourself, so you have to order prints through them as they hold the high resolution file.

[FelicityPike]

If the photographer has (rightfully) watermarked her photos, then online places won’t print them (or at least they shouldn’t by law).

[Horehound]

The photos were watermarked but now I paid the extra £70 as part of her offer so I now had a downloadable file of all photos with no watermark.

Yeh I think the costs are fair for all that's involved and they are so good it's just when I was thinking of all the gifts and stuff I'm like eek it is alot.
I was just wondering if people do usually pay for just the five photos rather than the full photo set but there's no way I could whittle them down as they are so good.