039: Daniel Griffiths – Shoot More, Edit Less for a Streamlined Wedding Photography Business

039: Daniel Griffiths – Shoot More, Edit Less for a Streamlined Wedding Photography Business

Andrew Hellmich: Alrighty, I'm really excited to have Daniel Griffiths on the line today. Daniel is a Sydney-based wedding photographer. He's got a photo journalistic background, and in his words, he's passionate about creating stunning images without the cheese. He's been rewarded with a ton of photography awards. He's photographed weddings right across the globe. He's opinionated in a really good way, and has what I believe to be a very unique workflow, which we're hopefully going to dive into today. Daniel, welcome to the podcast.

Daniel Griffiths: Thanks, mate.

Andrew Hellmich: Mate, did you have a wedding on the weekend?

Daniel Griffiths: I did.

Andrew Hellmich: How was it?

Daniel Griffiths: It was good. Yeah, really nice couple, really easy to shoot. And, yeah, I think a lot of it is, you know, how good the couple sort of work in with you on the day.

Andrew Hellmich: For sure, for sure. Do you want to give the listener a bit of an idea of your background? I did say you had a photo journalistic background, so maybe you can tell us a little bit about that. And then what led you into wedding photography.

Daniel Griffiths: Look, I joined newspapers back in 89, you know, the weekly wage as a cadet was only about $145 so, you know, I needed to pay the rent, pay the car, live, and weddings was a good fit. It was really something I did on the side. I didn't really, back then, I didn't really have that much desire to be a wedding photographer. Press work was, you know, was my main, main target. But eventually I got a bit tired of the press work. Same old thing. Wedding seemed a bit more and more fun and entertaining, and there was more control, more creative control. When you're shooting for a newspaper, you shoot the image, you put it into the system, you shoot JPEG, you put it in the system, and you never see it again. If it makes it in the paper, great. If it doesn't, you know, it's sort of no skin off your nose.

Andrew Hellmich: It's surprising to hear you say that the wedding sounded more exciting than doing your boring newspaper work. I mean, to me, I would have thought it was the opposite.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, look, it's not the, you know, it's definitely not the Lois and Clark sort of thing that you see on TV. Nothing like that at all. You know, it's extremely exaggerated. I mean, newspapers. You go in, there's a nine o'clock and 10 o'clock and 11 o'clock or 12 or one or two, and then you've got, say, three hours to come back and process, to develop your film and print in the dark room. And you know, it's all, it's all pre-planned. And you rock up, knock on the door, ask questions, take photos, and then go to the next one. It's, it's really that simple. It's very spontaneous, and you have to be able to think on your feet really quickly and make decisions about how you're going to tell the story, how you're going to shoot it within, you know, within 15 seconds of walking into someone's house or school or job or, you know, the local mayor opening up a hall, or whatever it is. So it's, it's, some of it is photo journalistic, some of it is contrived and sort of controlled. You know, it's very spontaneous. And I think with one, with my wedding photograph, if I haven't been to a place before, actually prefer not to see it beforehand. I don't want to, I don't want to go there beforehand and, you know, take photos and work out where I'm going to stand them and where I'm what I'm going to do, and I'd rather just turn up blindfold-off, camera in hand, and start shooting.

Daniel Griffiths: Because you get better results that way or is that because of your photo journalistic background?

Daniel Griffiths: I just think I get better results that way. It's new, it's interesting, it's inspiring. When you, you know, you rock up to a place and you haven't been there before. It's, you know, I want to be inspired. I don't want to go, "Oh yeah, okay, well, I did this last week, so I'll just do the same thing this week." And, you know, I want to, want to do something different and be inspired by, you know, the light at the, on the day, and that how much time we have, and by the couple and their personality and, you know, all those other factors.

Andrew Hellmich: Sure. So with, with the photo journalistic stuff, are you constantly thinking in the back of your mind when you're doing it, "Okay, this is going to be good for my portfolio. I'm going to do this for this shoot." Or you get in, you get your shot nailed, and have a bit of a play. Or is it all just work, work, work?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, it's pretty much work, work. You, you walk in, you read your job sheet. You know the client, the journalist, has written nothing on the job sheet to tell you what the job's about, which tends to be the case. And you, you shake hands with a person, and they tell you a little bit about what they've done, and they might have written a book on car racing or go karting or something. And you say, "Well let's, show us the go kart, and we'll go out the back and get you tinkering on the go kart", or, you know, whatever it happens to be, and just shoot it and get to the next one. You don't really have time to think about, you know, award winning shots. If they happen great. You just go in do the best you can in the limited time that you have.

Andrew Hellmich: And then you said that, basically, you follow your photos, and if you see them in the paper, that's great. So you don't actually do any editing, or you didn't have your own images.

Daniel Griffiths: Oh, no, nothing. Look when I, when I, one of the first jobs I did for newspaper back in Liverpool Leader, I had an FM too and, you know, it was, it was at a bee's knees at the time, 4000 of a second top shutter speed. I shot three rolls of film in black and white of an archer firing a bow, firing an arrow above me, and so I'm laying down the ground with a 20 mil, and he's shooting over the top of me. I shot about three rolls, which was, you know, a lot of photos to take off of one job, and shooting it at 4000 to try and get this arrow leaving the bow, came back, processed them, had a look through them, and there's one frame with the arrow actually leaving the bone. The arrow is trapping it three, 400 feet a second. It's fast as a bullet. I've got one frame. Printed it up. You can see where this going. Printed it up, took it into my editor, gave it to him, and they put it in the paper. They cropped up the arrow. And I remember, it was one of my first jobs, and I was really devastated. And the more senior photographer there just said, "Look, you know, your care for this print, or this, this image stops once you've printed it. You know, if they tear it up and throw it in the bin, it shouldn't matter. If it goes in the paper and goes first page, great, you know, just don't worry about it. Whatever happens to it afterwards, after you, you know, your job stops when you open the door of the dark room and walk outside. That's it done, don't, you know, stop caring about it after that point." So, you know, it was a, was it a lesson, I guess, to..

Andrew Hellmich: Did you adopt that feeling or that philosophy after that?

Daniel Griffiths: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, you had to.

Andrew Hellmich: Do you carry that same philosophy today when you shoot a wedding? Like it's, you're doing what you think's right, if, whether or not the couple like it, or is it totally different?

Daniel Griffiths: No, it's a bit different. I'm shooting for myself. I'm shooting for the couple. I know that the couple want family shots and they want detail shots and things like that. So I'm going to do those. I'm going to ask them, you know, if they want them and try and make time for it and things like that. You know, I've got more control over the whole, the whole thing from capture to printing, you know, to the treatment, that the entire job, I've got control over, whereas I didn't have that with press work. And there was no point, you know, getting bent out of shape because you didn't have that control. You know, you couldn't last in a newspaper if you were worried about how they were using your images.

Andrew Hellmich: So you were there for about 16 years. Is that right?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, 16, 17 years in newspapers. I did 13 at News Limited, two at Rural Press, one at News.. so, yeah, probably another, yeah, four years after the 13, before News Limited. So yeah, about 17.

Andrew Hellmich: And then you started shooting weddings, sort of part time on the side.

Daniel Griffiths: I did my first wedding in 89, was two rolls of film and 100 bucks, and it was all direct flash. And, you know, I didn't know how to back in that area everything, everything was flash. The bigger the flash, the better. You know, you weekly wage was, you know, less than 140 bucks. So $100, you know, for a couple of hours sounded pretty good to me.

Andrew Hellmich: Sounds good.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, yeah. So I did that wedding and, and I must have got a referral, and did another one and another. And eventually, you know, I was doing weddings every weekend.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice and just tell me just last question with the photo journalistic stuff, when you said you shot three rolls for the archer, were you limited to the number of rolls you were allowed to shoot for a job?

Daniel Griffiths: No, no, no, it was, it was you could shoot whatever you wanted, really, but because you're only there for, you know, 30 minutes to, sort of 45 minutes. You didn't really have much time to go, you know, insane shooting 10 rolls on anything. You're just increasing your workload when you get back in the afternoon and they haven't given you enough time to process everything printed in the dark room or then go and scan it. So the more images you take, the longer you're going to be there after work, so you have to sort of really maximize the film, usually half a roll to a roll per job, something like that.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so fast forward to today, to give the listener a bit of an idea of where you're at now. So talk about the makeup of your business. What portion is weddings, what's portraits, and maybe how many weddings you're shooting a year?

Daniel Griffiths: Portions, weddings, it's 99% weddings. Don't have much time for portraits, unfortunately, yeah, it's, yeah, it's probably, do you know, two or three portraits a year, that's about it.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay. And how many weddings do you think you're getting a year or?

Daniel Griffiths: 60 to 70.

Andrew Hellmich: 60 to 70. And do you know? Do you know at the top of your head the average spend of a client?

Daniel Griffiths: About 6k .

Andrew Hellmich: Perfect. Now let's, let's dive a little bit deep into this workflow, because, from what I understand, you have a pretty different sort of view on the way things should be done, or the way you do them anyway. So how about we start with, how much do you shoot at a wedding?

Daniel Griffiths: I shoot usually around 4000, 4 and a half thousand frames. I still, still shoot like a press photographer, that part of me hasn't really changed. And, you know, I figure if there's, if there's a spontaneous laugh, you know, why take one frame or two frames, take 10, take 15, you know, and do a series across a spread, you know? If I take 10 frames of the bride looking directly at the camera, guaranteed she will pick one of those frames above the other nine that she thinks her hair looks better in, or she looks slimmer in, or, you know, she looks younger in, or whatever. I mean to me, they're identical, but she will pick one that is, you know, the one that she wants to put in the album. And I mean, why, for me, I'd say like, "Well, why waste time deleting the other nine and just giving her one or two when I can just give it all to her and she can make that decision herself."

Andrew Hellmich: So what you're saying there is you're giving the clients pretty much all the photos that you shoot.

Daniel Griffiths: Yep, everything.

Andrew Hellmich: So they're getting four or 5000 photos after a wedding.

Daniel Griffiths: Yep, yep. It's, look, it's the same when I shot film, you shoot a wedding in film, you shoot 10 rolls, so 360 photos. And it was considered a lot 10 rolls back then, and they'd say, "Oh, out of a roll of 36 how many photos do we get?" And I said, "We get 36", and they go, "How many can we use?" "We can use 36 of them." Oh, no, I guess what I mean is, no, they're all in focus. They're all sharp. They're all exposed. You know, if you blink, sure, there might be some you don't want to use, but there's 36 that you could use. And it's the same sort of principle with the 4000 you know, you might delete frames when you get home, 30 frames where, you know it's back focused, or it's fired off the ground, or, you know, something like that's happened. But so far as blinks and funny expressions and, you know, things like that, I let the client decide.

Andrew Hellmich: Wow. So you don't even really pull out blinks. You leave them in.

Daniel Griffiths: No, because she will love a shot of her walking down the aisle with her dad. She loves her, dad's got his eyes closed, so she'll go "The frame before that can we take dad's eyes and put it on the frame that I like?", "Yeah, no problem. Let's do it. We've got, we've got multiple shots that are taken in a really short time frame. So it's quite easy to bring the eyes across and make that complete image.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, sure. Okay, so talk a little bit more about the workplace. So you've shot four to 5000 images at the wedding day. What happens when you get well, first of all, how many cards are you shooting? And what size cards?

Daniel Griffiths: 64. So, I've got D4. Nikon D4, so a 64 gig XQD card and a 64 gig SD, so two in each camera. And that's pretty much it. I don't really need to change cards. I can shoot the entire thing on those. I just, I don't like shooting on smaller cards and increasing the probability that I'm going to lose a card or misplace it, or accidentally shoot over it, or things like that. I think if you're changing your cards on a yearly basis and buying new cards, you're minimizing your risk of any sort of data corruption on the card, which you will always have, whether it's a large card or a small card. You still have that risk there, but I think you can minimize the risk of losing a card and dropping one. A mate of mine did last year. You can minimize that risk by not changing cards the whole day.

Andrew Hellmich: It's funny, because when we first went digital, I remember everyone shooting on smaller cards and being too scared to put all their images onto one card. And now it's a different philosophy altogether.

Daniel Griffiths: There's risks with both. You know, there's no foolproof way of doing it. I know myself, if I was shooting on 20 cards, it would just be a real headache to maintain those cards. And, you know, check which ones I've used and which ones I haven't. And, you know, be so easy to mix that up.

Andrew Hellmich: You mentioned the XQD cards. I think a lot of listeners may not have ever heard that before. What's an XQD card?

Daniel Griffiths: It's the Sony card for the Nikon D4, it's smaller than SD, it doesn't have the little kins that the SD card has, or, sorry, the CF card has in the camera, so you can't really sort of bend the pins if you put it in the wrong way, or something like that. You know. I mean, obviously they tell you they're newer technology, and they build better and stronger and all the rest of it, they do seem to download a bit quicker than the, you know, thousand speed SanDisk or Lexar.

Andrew Hellmich: Are using the XQD as a backup to your compact flash card, or you, as an override, overflow, sorry.

Daniel Griffiths: So XQD at first, and then the CF, it just overflows to the second card.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, right. So you'll be coming away with a basically 128 gig, possibly after a wedding.

Andrew Hellmich: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so you get home, what happens?

Daniel Griffiths: I pull the cards out, stick them in my reader, and start downloading. Just, literally, just create a folder and name it with the client's name and date, and drop all the folders into there, and then check the folders that, you know, if there was 999 photos on the card that 999 have actually transferred, because they don't always do that for some reason. Just thoroughly check that all the photos have transferred, and then put them into a folder and sort by date created in Bridge, rename and back up, and then put the gear on charge and get ready for the next one.

Daniel Griffiths: Do you do that on the night of the wedding, the night you get home, or you do that next day?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, now, you, I prefer to do it on the night of the wedding, just I, or at least, you know, the following morning. I know guys that will shoot three weddings, and then they'll, they'll do all that stuff during the week. I don't want to shoot three weddings and then realize that there was a problem with our camera in its capture on the first wedding, and then I've then, you know, stuffed up two more weddings. Never happened, but hopefully you can minimize that risk by just checking the files when you get home or the following morning.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, and it sounds like you're shooting with one body only, is that correct?

Daniel Griffiths: No, two.

Andrew Hellmich: So you've got the same setup. So you've got another XQD card and another Compact Flash in a second body.

Daniel Griffiths: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: So you've got the potential to shoot 256 gig at a wedding.

Daniel Griffiths: Yep, yep. Looking at what I shot on the weekend. Oh, this wasn't, wasn't too bad, that's 130 gig. But yeah, with the D800 that I just got rid of, a lot of the weddings were around 200 gig total capture. .

Andrew Hellmich: Wow.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so you've got all your files on your computers. You've backed them up in the client's name, you've checked, you got all the, all the images there that you've shot, and then you come back to them during the week. What happens next?

Daniel Griffiths: Next I would wait till I hear back from the client, and soon as, when I finished the wedding, I say they kind of "Look, have a great honeymoon. Let me know when you're back, and I'll send out all the files." Drag 4000 files into Lightroom. As they import into Lightroom, they import a preset that I've already, already created, and that adds a bit of sharpening and clarity and saturation, you know, all those sort of general things. Once they're imported, it only takes three minutes or something to import 4000 into Lightroom. And then once they're imported, basically start the treatment. It's generic enhancement, is what I give on the 4000 so basically it's the preset. You do adjustments for color and density if you need to, and then export the files in high res and low res and put them on a USB and send them to the client.

Andrew Hellmich: You make it sound so easy.

Daniel Griffiths: Well, it takes, takes me, sort of 30 minutes to an hour to do any adjusting of the files before I send them and then it'll just sit there, computer will sit there for maybe five hours, exporting 8000 files.

Andrew Hellmich: Just let me back up a touch there. So what did you use Bridge for in the very beginning?

Daniel Griffiths: Just to sort and get them in the right order, time, time sequence.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay. And then you rename them.

Daniel Griffiths: Rename them with Bridge clients name and wedding date.

Andrew Hellmich: Right.

Daniel Griffiths: And then that's, that's it, as far as Bridge is concerned. Then just drag them into Lightroom.

Andrew Hellmich: So in Lightroom you've got say, let's say you've got, I don't know, 800 photos at the bride's house getting ready.

Daniel Griffiths: Yep.

Andrew Hellmich: So do you go through one by one? Do you, see, because you told me you don't, you don't individually delete. So what's that process there? Let's, let's deal with this 800 at the bride's prep.

Daniel Griffiths: Okay, so I've shot, I've shot manual exposure. I've shot preset y balance. I'll walk into the house and I'll have four settings for my preset. I have one by the window, one in the center of the room, one maybe in another room, and one might be outdoors in the shade.

Andrew Hellmich: So you're setting up these presets every time you go to a new location, or?

Daniel Griffiths: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: Okay

Daniel Griffiths: Yep, yep, and changing it within the location. And I, I do like to check my files. I don't want to shoot 24 photos and then find out they're all over or all under. You know, I want to shoot them right when I'm shooting it. So shoot a shot. Look at it. Yep, make an adjustment if you need. And then take the other 19, or whatever it is. So there's, there's not really much to do to the files once you put them in the Lightroom, they're, they're exposed well, the colors consistent, as long as it's consistent. Obviously, sometimes you get those churches that'll have fluoros and you'll get a bit of a color change depending on the shutter speed you're working on. You know, just the 800 shots only takes a, gosh, a couple of minutes, and then you just move on to the next part of the day and the next and the next.

Andrew Hellmich: And so you're not, you're not really going into individual files. You're just sort of doing little batches at a time. So by the window, you might have 20 shots, then you do a correction on those and off to the next 20.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Andrew Hellmich: Really cool. So, I mean, I know that the listener is just going, "Holy crap, like this guy shoots 4000 images and saying that it takes him 30 to 60 minutes to process." And it really does.

Daniel Griffiths: Look, there's no right or wrong way. And just because I do it this way doesn't mean, you know, anyone else needs to, you know, listen to what I say. I mean, I think the trick is to find out what works for you. But I mean, for me, I don't want to sit there for three days culling 4000 down to 600 then giving the 600 to the client, and then to get an email from the client a week later saying, "Oh, we know you took more photos here. Can we see those?", which, you know, if you spend any time on the Facebook groups, this, this happens a lot, and then they get into these arguments with the clients. But we only give you 600 and we told you that up front, and the client's going out, "We know, but we'd really love to see more." And you know, you end up with this back and forth for the client, and the client's always going to get the sheets eventually with that. And I've never had a client say, "Can we see any more photos?" She has everything, the good, the bad, the ugly. "You pick, and you decide, and you get back to me when you're ready, and we'll make the album."

Andrew Hellmich: And you said that you export from Lightroom as a low res file and also a high res file.

Daniel Griffiths: So high res printing 300 DPI, low res just for emailing. They email us the low res files. We match them up to the RAWS, and then, and then use those, those RAW is to make the album. I don't want them to come back and sit down with them for eight hours choosing photos. I just want them to, I just want them to email me, you know, 40, 50, 60, photos and then we do a design.

Andrew Hellmich: I'm loving this work. Well, I really am. So, see a couple, they received the disc in the mail. They've got all these photos, so do you give them card? First of all, how many? What proportion get an album with you?

Daniel Griffiths: Probably 95%

Andrew Hellmich: Oh, okay, so albums, are they part of your packages?

Daniel Griffiths: Yes.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so they're getting an album, and you telling them what to pick so many photos,

Daniel Griffiths: If they've got a 40 side album, then I tell them, pick 60, 65, 70 photo, and then they'll, usually stick to that, some of them, some will go over. And then we just design whatever's in their package. So I don't, I don't do the old, "Oh, we had so many lovely photos, and we've designed you 18, but you've got 40. And now you have to decide which ones you don't want. And if you want them all, it's going to cost you another five grand. I just say, "Well, if you've bought 40, we'll just do 40, and here you go."

Andrew Hellmich: Okay

Daniel Griffiths: They have the option of upgrading if they want, you know, there's a box they tick if they want to upgrade to another, you know, 20 sides. But most of the time, they just take the 40 and they're happy with that.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. And does all this happen online? Or have you got paper forms? What is this?

Daniel Griffiths: They just email me.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, I see them on the wedding day. I see them for their first interview, and that's it.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so who's doing the album design? Is that you?

Daniel Griffiths: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: Are you using software for that?

Daniel Griffiths: InDesign.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so that's pretty technical, so a lot of people wouldn't be using that. So is that because of the album company you're going with?

Daniel Griffiths: No, no. The great thing about InDesign is you can create your own libraries. You can design the sort of like a free flow thing. You can design the album as you go, see, using two screens. InDesign on the left, Bridge on the right, with their chosen photos. And you look at what's coming up on Bridge. And then you go, "Okay, well, these two here, and this one will go here, and then you draw it on the page." I've had no training in InDesign. I just Googled. I searched YouTube actually for InDesign, and watched a couple of tutorials, and that's it. I just, it's really simple. It actually looks complicated when you, did my head in the first time I opened it up. "I can't understand this." And look five minutes on YouTube, watch a few videos, and it's suddenly, it's actually really easy. And you create your own library. So if you're doing a super books, you know, vision art, your or magazine style, you know, doesn't matter what it is, you create your own library for your book, and then you just export those pages once you've, once you've designed it. The good thing with InDesign is you can use Smart Objects. So my, in my entire workflow is all Smart Objects. So there's no, there's no JPEGs, there's no TIFFs, it's all a PSD saved as a Smart Object. So this is probably, I don't know anyone else that does it this way, but I'm sure they're probably a few. But you take one image, a RAW file, you open into Photoshop, comes up in Camera Raw, I'm gonna make my adjustments in Camera Raw, I hold shift while I open it, it opens as a Smart Object. I save that Smart Object as a PSD, and then I use that PSD in InDesign. If I double click the image in InDesign, it opens back into Camera Raw. So then I'll make more adjustments in Camera Raw and save it. And I'm not actually doing any treatment in Photoshop. It's all done in Camera Raw.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, that's really cool.

Daniel Griffiths: There's no, there's none of this making 100 layers, adjustment layers for, you know, an image, and flattening it, and doing all that sort of crazy stuff, which just takes forever. You know, if I spend more than 60 seconds on an image, treatment wise, you know, it's, it's unusual.

Andrew Hellmich: So you said treatment wise a couple of times, "I'll give it the treatment". What are we talking about with the treatment?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, I mean, the treatment could be, depending on the image. It could just be normal color, normal skin tone. There could be vintage effects, you know, filters, things like that. Clients love them, and I don't mind them myself. You know, the old Instagram type of, type of stuff. I think it's, it's cool for some of the shots, and you just use the tools within Adobe Camera Raw to create presets and your own vintage effects, or whatever effects you want to fix, you want to save.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. Okay, sounds really simple, so just tell me, Daniel, so when you're doing the album design and the clients, you know, pick two photos, but you think "I really do need a third one here to make this sequence look right?" Do you just bring one in yourself, or do you email the client?

Daniel Griffiths: No, usually, we'll stick to what they've chosen. If it's two, we'll make the two work. If they've given us three, but we only need two, then we'll drop one. So we tend to use sort of, you know, 80 to 90% of what they've chosen. Occasionally, they'll choose a photo that, you know, they might, she might have her eyes half closed or half open, and because she's sort of smaller in the frame, you can't really tell. But we'll pull in another file to, you know, to replace that. But nine times out of 10 will just stick with what they've chosen. They like those shots, and they've chosen them for a reason.

Andrew Hellmich: It sounds really simple, really easy. So when you're on Facebook and on these forums and in groups and people are say, saying, you know, "Man, it's crap that you give 4000 photos to a client?" You know, what's your response?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, I think, you know, and without trying to, you know, it's always hard to say things, you know.

Andrew Hellmich: You can be as opinionated as you want right now.

Daniel Griffiths: Just depends how it comes across. I mean, I suppose, like I started shooting slide film in the early 80s, and it was Kodachrome 64 and slide didn't have any latitude, you know, if it was over half a stop, it was no good. If it was under half a stop, it's no good. And then I went to negative film, then E6 came on. It was all the rage in weddings and some black and white. And then got into digital in probably 2003-2004. I think, when you've, you know, when you're a young teenager, and you're spending 20, 30, 20, $24 on a roll of film and sending it away to Kodak in Melbourne, and waiting six to eight weeks for it to come back. You want to make sure that it's right. You want to make sure that you've shot it right and you spot metered off a card or your hand or whatever. And I think, I don't know. I think perhaps these days, people maybe go, "Well, I've got a five stop latitude with my Canon or Nikon. I can just shoot it on aperture priority or shutter priority and change it later and shoot auto white balance and just correct it or later." I'd rather shoot it right and correct it and do the color treatment and balance and all that at the time of capture. So I'm not doing it later. So I'm checking, I'm checking my camera constantly through the day, checking focus, checking color and density and all the rest of it.

Andrew Hellmich: What about when you're on these groups and people are trying to, trying to, you know, change your point of view, or say, you know, tell you that you're doing it wrong, and 4000 photos is too many.

Daniel Griffiths: Ah, doesn't bother me. I mean, everyone's got their opinion. And look, I suppose when you've been doing something a certain way for so long, it's really, it's really difficult to change. And if you know, I suppose I do try and take less where I can. I don't want to really shoot over four and a half thousand. I think that's, you know, that's plenty for the client. You know, I'm always, I suppose, every wedding, I'm trying to shoot every wedding better than I shot the last one, and always looking, be on the lookout for new photos. And, you know, different, different shots that I haven't captured. You know, on last weekend or more, more emotion between the family members and things like that. And look, these days, you've got guys that turn up to weddings. The wedding on Saturday, there's two guys there with professional DSLR, and they were running around like, you know, like anyone's business shooting a million photos here and there, and if the paid guy is only going in and going, snap, snap. You know, it's, yeah, it can be a bit, a bit odd for people watching. They go, "Oh, these guys are taking a lot more than him. And maybe he's not the pro." I shot a, last July, and the pro-photographer was actually friends of mine. And the pro-photographer there, he didn't get it walking out of the car, he didn't get it walking down the aisle with the dad. He came into the ceremony for about five minutes, stood in the middle of the aisle, right near the front. He did the rings, and then he left, disappeared, didn't do the kiss, didn't do the signing.

Andrew Hellmich: Really?

Daniel Griffiths: Didn't do any of that. He went into a back room, and then he set up stage photos with a family really, really formal ones, where she's sitting in a chair, the groom standing behind her, you know, with an arm on the shoulder kind of thing. And then family members were sitting on the floor, and then others were standing behind, really, sort of old school portrait style images, did a bit of that. There was a really nice shot of both sets of parents at one stage sitting under this really large stained glass window, and they're just sitting there casually talking. And it was an awesome shot. He just didn't, I don't know if he didn't see it, or if he just didn't care. I think he was just so focused on, you know, repeating what he's been taught and the way he's shooting, that he wasn't looking for anything outside of that. And it was, it was interesting to see how little he actually shot, you know, compared to, compared to what I was shooting.

Andrew Hellmich: So that's amazing. I can't believe how little he shot.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, yeah. All the significant moments, I mean, the significant moment of the bride walking down the aisle with a dad is, you know, something you aren't missing in the wedding industry. Now, I just don't know where he was. I just, yeah, I don't know. Maybe there were restrictions by the priest or something. But, I mean, I certainly got out of the aisle and moved around and no one, no one told me off.

Andrew Hellmich: So I imagine you're shooting on Continuous High most of the time, right?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, I shoot it like a press drop.

Andrew Hellmich: Do you ever copy grief from the from the pastors and the priests, the ministers?

Daniel Griffiths: Once, only once, and that was only, probably a month ago, and the priest said, "Oh, do you have to make that sound?" And says, "Ah, that's going to drive me insane." And I'm like, "Hmm, okay." I said, "Oh, all right, no worries." And I just kept doing what I need to do, is anything to me, I'm going to just say, "Well, perhaps you should choose another career. If you know, if cameras and weddings isn't your thing, you know, perhaps you should stick to teaching Sunday school."

Andrew Hellmich: I knew we get some opinions coming out.

Daniel Griffiths: Usually it's not a problem. But this one guy was, yeah, he was, he was shocked that I was saying, and I'm not, I'm not up in, in your face with a 14 mil. I'm, you know, I'm usually using a 24 7200 in the church and being, being as discreet as possible. So, yeah, that's the anytime I've really encountered that.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. But let me change gears a little bit. You sound like you're flat out. I mean, shooting 60 to 70 weddings a year. It's, it sounds like a great, a great business you've built up. How are most of the weddings coming to you? How are the couples finding you?

Daniel Griffiths: Mostly referral. It's, mostly been referral last, you know, 10 years, I suppose. There's this, you know, you still got, you want your referrals, but you still want new clients coming in as well. So new ones will be coming via wedding websites, like I do Easy Weddings, Facebook, Google, that's probably about it. I don't do expos, yeah, that's, that's it. I don't do magazines really, either. I mean, I've done magazines, and I used to do, you know, one a year, but it's, I just don't see the value for money in print anymore.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay. And then with your referrals, are you? Are you encouraging the referrals? Are you asking for the referrals?

Daniel Griffiths: Not really, I, like I treat my clients like I would want to be treated if it was my wedding. And one of the things I don't want to do, if I was hiring a photographer, is I don't want to pay five grand up front and then pay another five grand later that I didn't expect to pay. Sure, I might have a $10,000 sale, but if the client walks out, if they tell me they're happy and they love their album, they still might be bitter, bitter about the experience, and it's the experience that, you know, means you get referrals or you don't. So I'd rather charge six and they leave with a 40 sided album. There's no upsell, and then they refer me to two more people. So the two new people, it's cost me nothing to get those bookings. It hasn't mean I've had to spend, you know, 50k a year or 100k a year on advertising. So any client that walks through my door has cost me a thousand, you know, before I've even done the wedding.

Andrew Hellmich: So what would you say if someone was coming to you asking for help, and they lived in a smaller town and they just, they just couldn't ask for $6,000 even though they were great photographers up front. What would you say to them?

Daniel Griffiths: Find out what your client wants, and then find out a way to provide it to them and keep yourself happy and the client happy. It's the same scenario with negatives back in the day, you know, people would retain the negatives and they would charge, guys are charged, you know, a $100, they probably do still $100 for a, you know, six by four. And the client always felt trapped, and they always felt like, you know, they were holding the negatives to rants, using them as a bit of emotional blackmail. So clients want the negatives, it's okay, well, charge 3000 and then you could either add $1,000 on for the negatives and charge them at, you know, a $1,000 and say that, "You know, it's going to cost you a thousand", or you could just charge 4000 and include the negatives. I just thought, well, whatever the price is that I want for the negatives, I'll just add that onto my package and include them, and they're not aware of how much they're paying for the negatives, they're included in the package.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, that makes sense. That makes so really your advice then sounds like just to be upfront and charge what you need to charge to be profitable.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, I, you know, after going through the wedding experience two years ago, it's amazing how many companies try to get more money out of you during the whole experience. You know, it was $150 for a bag of rose petals. You know, it was $50 to print an A4 sheet of paper, you know, from the reception. If you want the candles lit, you know, that was going to be another $500. If you want the, you know, that was going to be an X $100, everything was an added extra. And I think by the time you get to the wedding day, you're like, you're so over the whole wedding process, because you've been, yeah, you've been held over a barrel for that past 18 months with every supplier. And then right at the end, the photographer goes, "Oh, by the way, yeah, it's your album", and it's the final, you know, knife in your back. I think, that's how I would say it. So just, you know, I think just find out what your client wants and give it to them, but just include it in the package.

Andrew Hellmich: I mean, I've never looked at it like that because, I mean, as a photographer, you think you're the only one that's doing the upsell, but really it's every single service along the way.

Daniel Griffiths: Yep, every service is doing it. And it's really frustrating, and it's really annoying, and, you know, it's like those Jetstar fares for $29 to Perth from Sydney. No one ever pays $29 because that's, you know, that's assuming you don't want to breathe oxygen, or you go to the toilet or buy any food or take any luggage or, you know, or anything like that, you know, if it doesn't include your taxes, and by the time you bought that actual ticket, it's cost you $200 and it's, it's misleading.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, it is, okay. That makes total sense. That's great. One thing I have noticed on your website is, you know, all these awards, you've been around for a long time, you're obviously super successful. Why aren't you running workshops?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, workshops aren't my thing. I'm not a good public speaker. I'd rather jump out of an airplane than stand up in front of people and talk. So I don't really know if I've got that groundbreaking, that people would want to, you know, come and listen to anyway. It's just, you know, I do what I do. And that's, and that's it. It's, yeah, it's not really my thing. I think, in in some ways, depending on who's doing the seminars, it can be harmful to the industry as well. That's, you know, that's certainly been the case for some, some people that I know in the past. And look, having gone to a few of those seminars, one in particular, it was really just a, was a free seminar. Sorry, no, it wasn't free. It was $175. It was a seminar to try and sell me their Actions.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so another upsell.

Daniel Griffiths: And I just, well, I walked out of that about one o'clock. I was just so pissed off, pissed off that it wasted my day. You know, I was really busy, was in February a couple years ago, and it was, I was really busy, and it was just a total, complete waste of my day. And I just walked out of there, I mean, the guy, great photographer, but he said, "Look, this is how I do my black and white conversions. I hit a four on my keyboard." And that's like, "Well, that tells me nothing." "The gradient map, do you do it in Camera Raw? What do you do?", you know. And it was, I suppose, the way it was represented, as a technical seminar, and it wasn't. It clearly wasn't. It was a fluffy seminar with the, you know, with the idea of trying to sell Actions at the end of it.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, that's, that's not nice. What do you say that they can be harmful for the industry?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, I think, you know, if you went into Coles and you said to the owner of Coles, "Look, I want to come and hang around with you and watch what you do. And I'm going to set up my own Coles and call it, you know, Moles", is look at you and go, "Well, why am I going to bring a competitor, you know, into the industry?" So some of it seems really sort of contrary to, you know, business. I don't understand a lot of it when, you know, when people do the seminars, and then you know a guy opens up in the same suburb and knows, you know, everything about the guy doing the seminar, knows their prices and packages and workflow and everything, and opens up two doors down and then as a competitor. So there's risks in doing that. Think, I think there's enough photographers doing it already. I don't think, I don't think we need, you know, to add thousands each year to the industry.

Andrew Hellmich: Now, fair enough. Mate, are you ready for these 10 quick questions?

Daniel Griffiths: Sure.

Andrew Hellmich: 10 quick questions, 10 quick answers, 3-2-1 go!

Andrew Hellmich: I think you already answered the first. Let's ask you Canon or Nikon, but you're Nikon D4 all the way, aren't you?

Daniel Griffiths: Yes

Andrew Hellmich: What's your favorite lens? And why?

Daniel Griffiths: Ah, favorite lens. It's probably, probably my 85, 85 1.4, I mean, it's just such a nice, sharp lens, and I can't, yeah, it's, it's just such a good portrait lens. Probably next would be the 7200 because it's, you know, so practical. Maybe the 50 as well.

Andrew Hellmich: You got a few. Are you Mac or PC?

Daniel Griffiths: PC.

Andrew Hellmich: Have you faced any setbacks along the way with your wedding photography business?

Daniel Griffiths: No, no, not really. I suppose the only, the only setbacks, I think you can really have a, you know, depends on how much work you, you put into it. No, I haven't really had any, any major setbacks.

Andrew Hellmich: So you've just seen growth each year?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah. I mean, look, I've actually been trying to cut down for I used to do about 80 a year myself, been sort of just trying to cut down to around the 60 mark.

Andrew Hellmich: How do you cut down? By saying no, or increasing your prices?

Daniel Griffiths: Increasing the prices.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. What's, what's one thing you can look back on, you know, during your wedding photography career, and think, "Yeah, when I did this, the business took a big step forward."

Daniel Griffiths: Probably destination weddings.

Andrew Hellmich: Okay, so what you're doing, more of them, or that helped the business?

Daniel Griffiths: I did my first one in 2005 in Sri Lanka. And I think having been to places like that, people always go, "Oh, wow. You get paid to go here and here." And, you know, they, they sort of create this idea of what, you know, what you must be like as a photographer, based on, you know, where you've been and places like that. I mean, doesn't necessarily mean you're, you know, a great photographer, but it creates a perception in their mind that you know, you're being paid to fly around the world and go to all these amazing locations. So it, I guess, creates a point of difference.

Andrew Hellmich: Nice. If you had to move, let's say you moved to another country, English speaking country tomorrow. What would you do to kick-off the wedding photography business? How would you get rolling quickly?

Daniel Griffiths: Well, say I went to America. Also, you did say English speaking.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, yeah.

Daniel Griffiths: Look, say I went to Canada, I would probably just advertise in advance.

Andrew Hellmich: Are you saying the Americans aren't English speaking?

Andrew Hellmich: More or less.

Andrew Hellmich: They're gonna love you.

Daniel Griffiths: They're cool. I go, got a lot of friends, so I guess I would just go there and advertise in advance.

Andrew Hellmich: How? What, using what?

Daniel Griffiths: Facebook and internet, Google and things like that.

Andrew Hellmich: When you say Google, like Google AdWords or just get a website up?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, Google AdWords and, you know, promoting that, I suppose.

Daniel Griffiths: Do you watch what other photographers are doing?

Daniel Griffiths: No, not really. There's this, probably only in Australia. There's maybe only two or three guys that I would look at, you know, every couple of months, just to see what they're doing. But I don't really have much time to do that.

Andrew Hellmich: So you just do, go and do your own thing and concentrate on what you're doing and what you're shooting.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, yeah.

Andrew Hellmich: Cool. What do you what do you wear when you're shooting weddings? I don't need to know underwear either, by the way.

Daniel Griffiths: That's good. Usually, well, usually just a suit. I try and just dress I'm a guest. And you know, that sort of confuses the white staff too, sometimes, because you can put your camera down and you can get some hors d'oeuvres..

Andrew Hellmich: So you wear a suit and tie as well, or just open collar?

Daniel Griffiths: Just a shirt.

Andrew Hellmich: Have you got an embarrassing photography moment or stuff up that you're happy to share?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, I think I've been thinking about this one. I remember I shot a wedding in the Hunter couple of years ago, and the dad stands up on the microphone and he says, he's talking about his wife. And he says, you know, "I married Miss Right. I just didn't know her first name was Always". Her, and they obviously, you know, they'd split up. I went up to the groom, and I said, "So it was obviously pretty recent, because, you know, your dad's still pretty cut up about it." And the groom turned around said, "No, no, it was 22 years ago that they split up." So he's waited, you know, 22 years to have this moment where pay-out on his ex-wife, who's sitting on the other table. And it just, it just was really inappropriate, and nobody really laughed that they were, they were, yeah, just, you know.

Andrew Hellmich: Mate, you got that pretty easy, because that wasn't embarrassing for you.

Daniel Griffiths: I, look, for me, embarrassing for me. I can't think of one for me.

Andrew Hellmich: That's fine. Let me just ask you quickly one last question. How did you choose your wedding photographer?

Daniel Griffiths: I got quite a few mates in the industry, and I guess I chose, I chose two of my mates to come along. And, you know, one of them I knew would do what I needed. You know, dot the I's and cross the T's, and the other one is just a really good candid shooter. He's, one of the particular, he's got an amazing ability to go in shoot a wedding and make it look like he's not even working. He makes it look so easy.

Andrew Hellmich: Can I ask names?

Daniel Griffiths: Janis

Andrew Hellmich: How do you spell Janis?

Daniel Griffiths: J-A-N-I-S. He's Latvian and e's based in the UK.

Andrew Hellmich: What was his surname?

Daniel Griffiths: Ratnieks. R-A-T-N-I-E-K-S. So we've, we've done a few weddings together in the past, and both in Australia and overseas. And he's, he's got this ability to shoot and pretty much make it look like he's not even working, not even trying. And he just, I'm sure he is, like work really hard, but to watch him, he just really uncanny, to see how effortless he is at taking photos.

Andrew Hellmich: And did you say you had two photographers, or just Janis?

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah, two.

Andrew Hellmich: Who was the other one?

Daniel Griffiths: Pascoe. So he's been a mate of mine. He was a press photographer as well. So I knew him from the newspapers.

Andrew Hellmich: You said Tim Pascoe, didn't you?

Daniel Griffiths: So he was a mate of mine from the newspaper days. And Tim came along and shot them, you know, majority of the, you know, the must haves and those sort of things.

Andrew Hellmich: Tim's an awesome bloke. Yeah, no, I know him quite well.

Daniel Griffiths: Yeah. We've been friends for a long time.

Andrew Hellmich: Lovely. Mate, how can people check out your work and follow you around the internet?

Daniel Griffiths: Follow me around the internet, but you can, you can check out the website, dgphotos.com.au, yeah, just, you know, I'm not a huge fan, I guess, of following people. I do, one thing I probably do find is it's even worth, photographers that work you don't like, because you know, you can, I guess, you know, I want to challenge my style and challenge, you know, how I capture things, and by even looking at someone's work that I might necessarily like, that'll give me more insight into how I shoot and why I'm shooting it that way. And rather than just going with, you know, the safe, sort of well-known photographers. Look at many different guys and girls and find out what they're find out what they're doing and how they're shooting.

Andrew Hellmich: That's a great tip. I haven't heard anyone yet say to check out people that you don't like and challenge yourself. That's a great tip.

Daniel Griffiths: I just, you know, there's certain, certain people that have completely different style to an approach to how I would shoot it. And I think by trying to understand that, or at least looking at that style, I can go, "Yeah, I don't really like that, but I can understand how a client might like that", and what are they actually liking, and is it, can I, you know, extract a bit of that and put it into mine? Or am I doing it already? Or, you know, do I need to change? Do I need to add anything? Or can I just ignore it? Yeah, just getting some insight.

Andrew Hellmich: Yeah, that's great. That's great, Mate, I want to be conscious of your time. I really appreciate you coming on the show, and it's fantastic. I'm sure there's going to be few follow up questions, especially regarding your workflow, and I'm going to encourage the listener to post those in the comments section, and I'll see if I can get you to come back and check that out. If there's anything there specifically, you can answer, if that's all right.

Daniel Griffiths: Great.

Andrew Hellmich: Thanks, Daniel. It's been a real pleasure.

 
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