Choosing a wedding photographer is one of the few decisions from your wedding day that you keep for the rest of your life. The flowers wilt, the cake gets eaten, the playlist becomes dated. The photographs are what remains.
I photograph weddings in Montreal and across Quebec, and I want to be useful here rather than sell at you. So here is what actually matters when you are choosing someone, and what working with me looks like.
Look at full galleries, not highlight reels
Every photographer can produce five stunning frames. What you need to know is whether they can hold that standard across ten hours, in changing light, when the schedule slips and the ceremony runs late.
Ask any photographer you are considering to show you a complete wedding, start to finish. Not a curated selection. A whole day. How do the images look when the reception lights go purple? When it rains? When the venue is darker than anyone expected?
The quiet moments are the ones you will keep
Couples often come to me with a shot list built around the big set pieces. The first look, the vows, the first dance. Those matter and I will get them.
But the photographs couples end up framing are almost never the posed ones. They are the half second before a kiss. A grandmother watching from the second row. The groom exhaling when it is finally over. Those cannot be scheduled, only anticipated, and that anticipation is most of the job.
Montreal light is its own skill
Shooting weddings here means adapting constantly. Summer ceremonies in Mount Royal and the west island parks give you beautiful open shade and hard midday sun in the same hour. Winter weddings mean short days and early darkness, so the timeline has to be built around the light rather than the other way round.
Old Montreal is gorgeous and awkward in equal measure, with narrow streets, stone that eats light, and tourists in every frame. Knowing the city means knowing where to stand and when to be there.
Ask what you actually receive
Packages vary wildly, and the price alone tells you very little. Before you sign anything, get clear answers on hours of coverage, whether a second shooter is included, how many edited images you receive, how long delivery takes, whether prints and albums are extra, and what happens if the day runs over.
A cheaper package that delivers sixty images four months later is not cheaper than a fuller one delivered in three weeks. Compare what you get, not what it costs.
Meet the person, not the portfolio
Your photographer is beside you for most of your wedding day, closer than almost anyone except your partner. Technical skill matters, but so does whether you feel comfortable. If someone makes you tense in a twenty minute conversation, that tension will show in your photographs.
Working together
I cover weddings across Montreal and the surrounding region, and I travel for the right couples. Every wedding begins with a proper conversation about your day, your venue, your timeline and what matters most to you, before we talk about money.
If you are planning a wedding and want to talk it through, get in touch. Even if you decide I am not the right fit, you will leave the conversation knowing more about what to ask the next photographer.