One of the most important parts of your wedding and defiantly one of the hardest decisions for your wedding is deciding what photographer will capture the portraits that will provide generations to come with memories of your special day. Unless you have a close friend, who recently married that gives you a raving review of their photographer; you will have to rely on looking at a few portraits and asking a few questions to choose your wedding photographer.

While there is no exact formula for selecting, the perfect photographer; armed with the right information and questions you will be able to make an intelligent choice.

Experience Level
Has the photographer photographed wedding before. If so how many and how many years of professional experience does, he/she have? Photographers come and go and only those with a true God given talent will survive. While a fresh out of school photographer may be pretty good, and everyone deserves a chance, you have to ask yourself do you want to trust your wedding to a novice.

Meeting the Photographer
Typically a photographer meeting centers on a portfolio of photographs that the photographer has shot.

When looking at the photographers portfolio look for magazine quality in his/her photography and most importantly make sure it feels right to you. After all it is your special day and the only opinion the counts is yours. When looking at the portraits and candids pay particular attention to those that were taken in low light surroundings. A good example of this is an older church or reception in a banquet hall. Even though the lighting in the church may be poor, the exposure should be clear, sharp, colorful, free of dust and free of graininess.

The exception to this is if the church of place of marriage prohibits flash photography. In this case, the only way the wedding ceremony can be photographed is with high-speed film or higher ISO setting on digital capture. Therefore, the image may appear grainy and if done in color the colors of the churches lighting will affect the colors of the image resulting in the colors may be off.

The next thing to do is look for details in the bride's dress. The brides dress should have details including lace, buttons, (see picture to left) and transparent sections should not washed-out by the flash. While you’re looking at the bride and grooms portraits see if you see the different shades of black, and even see the creases in the grooms tuxedo. For the photographer to capture this kind of detail requires using expensive professional equipment, and professional labs for processing.

Has the photographer been published? Published work tends to give the photographer more credibility. Almost all photographers do some other kind of photography besides weddings. Ask to see the photographs other work including landscapes, commercial advertising, and journalistic assignments.

Talk to the photographer about the studio’s philosophy of shooting weddings, and the type of lighting they prefer. Ask him/her how they are prepared for "Murphy's Law" situations. Or to put it another way, do they have backup equipment and arrangements with another professional photographer should they be ill the day of your wedding. Finally ask them what photographic style they use to photograph weddings Photographers are passionate about their work and this spills over into the their style of photography. Each photographer will have a particular method he/she uses for recording your wedding and for the most part over the past few years two different style of wedding photography has evolved.