Chances are if you are in the Chicagoland area or the surrounding suburbs you are expecting to have to fork up an arm and a leg for a local Chicago wedding photographer to photograph your wedding day. No matter where you are located, the decision factors should stay the same.

Today, there are many studios that specialize in event photography. They range from small one-man home studios to multiple franchise-type operations. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. Your first decision to be made is if you want an individual photographer or a larger multi photographer studio to photograph your wedding.

One reason you may opt for hiring the independent photographer is because they are known to put personal care and attention to detail into their work. However this is not guaranteed to be the case. The best reason to have a one-man operation shoot your wedding would be because a friend referred him or her and you love his/her work. If a friend or family member did not refer this photographer for you, check for references or online reviews. The disadvantages of a one-man studio are that you are not guaranteed to have the security that a larger, more established studio may have. It is extremely important that you make sure the photographer has back-up equipment and a back-up photographer in case something unforeseen comes up and the photographer cannot make it to your wedding. It is very important that you read the contract to make sure that you will get all your money back in the case that no photographer ends up showing up.

The main advantage of hiring a larger, multiple photographer type studio to shoot your wedding is security. They have the experience of running a business to keep customers happy as well as the responsibility of their photographers. Your money is usually safer (larger business cannot just take off so quickly). They usually guarantee a substitute photographer in case something happens to your assigned photographer and should always guarantee that their photographers carry back-up equipment.

The quality of the photography itself, strictly depends on the photographer. It makes no matter if it is an independent photographer or a photographer from a large studio. You are never guaranteed to have a better one at either operation. Always ask to see a sample wedding of the work of the photographer you are hiring.

Never assume that the price you pay is in any way related to the quality of the photography. Quite often the most expensive studios are only so expensive because they have to pay so much in advertising to keep up their “high-end” photography business. They also have huge overhead costs as they have to pay for many employees and high rent. Keep in mind, it could very well be that the individual artist photographer will shoot weddings for a lot less because he is more interested in being an artist than in running a business. In other words, expensive does not necessarily mean better!

Recently, we at Jolie Images realized that we’re actually in a prime position to offer all of the advantages of both small and large studios! We wanted everyone to be able to afford beautiful wedding photography so we’ve strategically priced out our wedding photography packages to start at only $595.00 so that our brides & grooms get the most value out of our services. We hire the experienced artists that have a true passion for what they do. They don’t have high business expenses so they are willing to shoot for us for less. Our photographers are true artists. We do not dump tons of money into advertising costs or fancy brochures. In fact most of our brides are referred to us by their happily now married friends. J With no outsourcing and low overhead, we are able to bring you all the wedding products and wedding service at the lowest prices around (at least in the Chicagoland area). You can also expect the personal care and attention to detail that’s known to come with a family owned and operated business. You will get the best of both worlds…

We at JolieImages have a saying: “because memories should be priceless, not expensive…” If you are in the getting married anywhere in the Chicago metropolitan area and need a wedding photographer, check out our pricing page and portfolio on our main website at: www.JolieImages.com

Jolie Images is based in Illinois and serves the entire Chicagoland area.

Some people out there pay excessive amounts for wedding photographers. Especially here in the Chicago area.  We know of one guy that actually charges over $50,000 to shoot an 8 hour wedding. He sold the photos from the wedding at ridiculous prices to. Let’s just say a wallet sized photo was $60.00. And guess what??? The bride & groom and their family ordered tons of pictures at those bloated prices? Do you know what the photographer paid for the photo? Lets just say he made out like a bandit. Wow. So basically if that photographer shot only 2 weddings a year that would be a pretty nice income for most people.

So why did all these people pay so much money for their wedding photography? Were the photos better quality? Were they on diamond covered photo paper? Did he have a special camera? No, no and no. This “high-end” photographer actually used to work at just a regular priced photography studio. He left that studio and confident that he could get a high price for his work, began marketing himself in more affluent areas with very classy looking, artsy ads. That was it. He only needed one or two weddings a year to make a good living but what he did do was change his perceived value. Perceived value when it comes to anything is a funny thing. Was his photography so amazing? We didn’t think so. He wasn’t bad but he wasn’t any better than the art student that came in with photos he took from his cousins wedding. He definitely in my opinion was not worth 50k. He shot weddings in the same nice attire that all the other photographers shot in, he had the same photography equipment as most of them… so what it comes down to is how he marketed himself and what his perceived value was. Word of mouth among the affluent about this “high-end” photographer allowed him to do very well in his business but behind the scenes, he was laughing all the way to the bank.
So the question comes down to are expensive wedding photographers better than inexpensive photographers? Well this can’t really be answered accurately because price really doesn’t matter when it comes to the skill of the photographer; but we do know one thing, a good photographer is a good photographer. You can change his/her perceived value around with a twist of marketing and words. When we first decided to open our photography studio, we could have easily charged thousands of dollars for our wedding photography packages, printed up some fancy brochures and taken out full page ads in the most elite bridal magazines studio around. After all our work is beautiful, professional and high quality just as the expensive photographers are. The fact that our work is so amazing shouldn’t be what is surprising…after all, our photographers are not trying to be business owners. If they were, they would open up their own studios and charge whatever they like. Our photographers are true artists. They prefer to focus more on their passion of photography & shooting weddings rather than being businessmen & women. This I believe shows in their work. The only thing that should be surprising is our price. This comes back to our mission. We strongly believe that everyone should be able to afford beautiful, photographic memories. We know that not everyone out there can afford to pay thousands of dollars for wedding photography so here we are.

You can view our prices here.

Here at Jolie Images we believe that memories should be priceless… not expensive.

These days there are countless studios that specialize in event photography. These studios range from small, in-home, single photographer studios to multiple franchise-type operations. Both types of studios have their many advantages and their disadvantages as well. Jolie Images actually began in our family over 40 years ago as a professional photofinishing lab printing pictures only for professional photographers. Recently, however, we realized that we, as a lab in contact with so many talented photographers, are in a prime position to offer all the advantages of both the small and the large studios.

We have now opened the doors of our still active professional lab and are inviting you, the customers, to take advantage of the opportunity to get great photography coverage of your special day rom the best photographers around. With no outsourcing and low overhead, we, at Jolie Images, are able to bring to you all the photo products and services at the lowest prices possible.
About Us

When you use Jolie Images as your event photography studio, you can expect the personal care and attention to detail that is known to come with a family owned and operated business. As a lab, we serve almost every quality photographer in the Chicagoland area and beyond. Before we opened our doors as a studio we asked our valued professional photographer customers what they thought of our plan…

To our delight, some of the best photographers around were thrilled with the idea and offered their professional photography talents and services to us here at Jolie Images.

We knew right away which of these experienced photographers would offer us the most confidence, trust and experience in working for us. These are the same great photographers that you would have shooting your special event with any large studio or any small studio… but simply saving the you the expenses and costs that would incur when the photographers have to pay for photofinishing and lab fees.

Our goal is to capture every moment and detail whether it was planned or unplanned. Every smile, tear, glance and kiss for you to remember forever…at a price that you CAN afford!

Hi everybody. Welcome to our blog!

As a Chicagoland wedding photography studio, we at Jolie Images have alot of information that may be useful to you brides and grooms out there. Throughout our 40 plus years in the wedding industry we have seen and heard it all ( If anyone sees it all it would be us wedding photographers). We would love to pass our wedding wisdom and helpful tips onto you. Congratulations on your engagement. Enjoy!