Craig Beck : Cyprus Wedding Photographer: Finding a professional wedding photographer in County Durham

A quick search of the internet will reveal an unending array of wedding photographers. Type the search term 'wedding photographers' into Google and you will be presented with 985,000 photographers in the UK alone. When you consider that last year there were only 288,000 weddings there appears to be an obvious anomaly. Even if we narrow the search to Durham Wedding Photographers we are still left with 137,000 photographer links. How on earth can a bride make the right decision and find the perfect wedding photographer for her wedding in the North East?

Lets start with the reason there are so many people who fancy their hand at being a wedding photographer. Everyone has been to a wedding and watched the wedding photographer having fun taking pictures of the happy couple and thought what a great job. A few people have also thought I could do that and before they know what is happening they are on their way down to Curry's to buy a digital SLR camera. No sooner as the camera is out of the box, without any training or experience they publicly declare themselves to be a wedding photographer.

Over 80% of wedding photographers are simply amateurs trying their hand. Assuming there are a thousand people in the North East who claim to be a wedding photographer, 800 can be discounted instantly. Of the remaining only 5% are award winning or qualified to a professional level and registered with a trade organisation such as the SWPP (society of wedding and portrait photographers) which gives you 10 photographers in the whole North East who a capable of creating something you would call wedding photography of distinction. Creative, artistic and unique images that really make a beautiful statement about the most special day of your life. Craig Beck is a full time professional wedding photographer and a full member of the SWPP. He has trained with some of the world's best and most awarded photographers including multi award winning Trevor Yerbury.

Finding photographers of this standard can appear to be a daunting task. With all the other parts of the wedding that need planning, normally by the bride on her own. How do you find the proverbial photographic needle in the haystack. Here are a few quick ways to seperate the amateurs from the professionals:

Website: The first clue is the website, does it look professional. This is the photographer displaying his very best work, remember these are the photographs he is most proud of - if they are not amazing the chances are the ones he doesn't want you to see are nothing short of terrible.

Price: A crude but effective way to tell if the photographer is dedicated to his art or if he works in B&Q during the week and takes snaps at the weekend to make money. Truly great wedding photography is like an ice berg, you only see 20% of the work. For every hour of the wedding there are many, many hours spent in post production for the professional wedding photographer. This attention to detail is reflected in the price, if you are considering a wedding photographer and his very best package in under £1500 chances are he is an amateur.

Availability: Full time professional wedding photographers can cover a wedding anywhere, any day, any time. Amateur 'photographers' have 9-5 jobs and must fit their hobby in around their day job.

Examples: Ask to see examples of their past work. Ensure they show you a full wedding album taken at one wedding and not a collection of single shots. You can also ask to visit the photographer to see his work, if they refuse it's normally because their 'studio' is the back bedroom. A professional photographer will be proud of his studio and happy to show you example of his/her work there.

Selecting the perfect County Durham wedding photographer for your own special wedding day, should start with compiling a shortlist of potential candidates, then go and chat to them in person. Great wedding photography can only be achieved if you can be confident that your chosen photographer will match the style of images you wnat and will work in the way that suits you on the wedding day. Remember you can never go back and taken the photographs again and this is the one part of the wedding that will always be there - so make the right decision at select a wedding photographer who you love the work of.Craig Beck is one of the most sought after wedding photographers in Durham, he covers weddings all over the North East from his base in Darlington and is also available for Yorkshire weddings.