Hiring a photographer holds two surprises. The first is the spread: most couples pay $1,150 to $3,000 for a wedding, while a straightforward headshot session starts well under a hundred dollars. The second is that paying the bill does not buy the pictures. Copyright belongs to whoever pressed the shutter, and what a client takes home is permission to use the files on the terms the contract sets out.
| Service | Typical |
|---|---|
| Wedding photographyNational range | $1,150 to $3,000 per job |
| Portrait sessionNational range, package pricing | $250 to $1,500 per session |
| Headshot sessionNational range | $75 to $700 per session |
| Real estate photographyNational range, home of 1,500 to 3,500 square feet | $150 to $300 per shoot |
| Event photographyNational range | $150 to $500 per hour |
Ranges last checked September 2026. They come down automatically when they are due to be rechecked.
Every figure above comes from a named source we can link to, with the date we last checked it. We publish ranges rather than single prices because a range is what a provider will actually give you: the same job moves with what is being worked on, the materials, how hard it is to get at and how busy the trade is locally. Treat these as the order of magnitude to expect before you call, not as a quote.
The figures here are national. Where a source publishes figures state by state, the state pages carry that local figure instead of this one. We do not scale a national number by a multiplier of our own invention.
Every range carries a review date. When that date passes the number comes down until it is rechecked, rather than sitting here undated.
In most trades on this directory you pay for work and end up owning the result. Photography does not work that way, and the gap between what people assume and what the law says is where most disputes start.
The US Copyright Office puts it plainly: the author and initial copyright owner of a photograph is the person who shoots or takes the photo. Protection exists from the moment the work is fixed in a tangible medium, which for a digital camera is the moment the file is written. Paying an invoice does not move that ownership.
What a client buys instead is permission. The contract decides how wide the permission runs: whether the files may be printed, posted, cropped, used in advertising, or handed to somebody else. Two photographers charging the same amount can be selling very different permissions, and the difference does not show up in the price.
Work made for hire is the phrase people reach for when they want to own what they commissioned, and for photography it usually does not apply. Copyright Office Circular 30 sets out the only two routes. Either an employee creates the work within the scope of employment, or the work is specially ordered or commissioned, falls inside one of nine listed categories, and is covered by a written agreement signed by all parties expressly stating that it is a work made for hire.
The nine categories are a contribution to a collective work, part of a motion picture or audiovisual work, a translation, a supplementary work, a compilation, an instructional text, a test, answer material for a test, and an atlas. A wedding, a family portrait and a set of headshots are none of them. Without an employment relationship, a private commission cannot be turned into work made for hire by agreement alone.
Where a client genuinely needs to own the copyright rather than license it, the statute is specific. Section 204(a) of the Copyright Act says a transfer of copyright ownership, other than by operation of law, is not valid unless an instrument of conveyance, or a note or memorandum of the transfer, is in writing and signed by the owner of the rights conveyed. A verbal promise that the pictures are yours transfers nothing.
The Copyright Office states that a US work must be registered before an infringement suit can be brought, and that the timing of registration matters to what a court can award. Ownership arrives automatically at the shutter; the ability to enforce it does not.
Price attaches to time and to deliverables, not to the picture. Hours of coverage, how many edited images are released, how many people are in front of the camera, whether a second shooter is needed, and how fast the files come back are the variables. They are why the same job quoted by two studios can differ widely without either quote being wrong. The table above breaks the variables out per service.
Read the license before the portfolio. The portfolio tells you whether you like the pictures. The license tells you what you may do with them afterward, so ask for the usage terms in writing and check that they cover the uses you actually have in mind, including social media, printing at the size you want, and commercial use if the images will sell something.
Match the photographer to the job rather than to the aesthetic. Wedding coverage, headshots, real estate and event work are different disciplines with different equipment and different ways of going wrong, and a portfolio full of one says little about competence at another.
Settle what happens if the shoot cannot go ahead. Illness, weather and venue changes are ordinary events, and the contract should already say who bears the cost, whether a deposit comes back, and whether a substitute photographer may be sent in.
Ask how the files are backed up and how long they are kept. Practice ranges from an archive held for years to files deleted soon after delivery, and the answer decides whether a lost drive two years from now is recoverable.
Be careful with a quote well below the others that does not explain what has been left out. Usually something has been: fewer edited images, a shorter shoot, no second shooter, or a longer wait for the files.
It depends on the job more than on the photographer. Most couples pay $1,150 to $3,000 for a wedding. A headshot session runs from a short sitting releasing one or two retouched images up to a package of several. Real estate shoots are priced by the size of the home, and event work is usually billed by the hour. The table above gives the sourced range for each, with what the figure covers and what is quoted separately.
Usually not. The US Copyright Office says the author and initial copyright owner of a photograph is the person who shoots or takes it, and that protection exists from the moment the work is fixed in a tangible medium. What you buy is permission to use the files, on the terms the contract sets.
Only in narrow circumstances. Copyright Office Circular 30 allows it where an employee creates the work within the scope of employment, or where a specially ordered work falls inside one of nine listed categories under a written agreement signed by all parties. A wedding, a family portrait and a set of headshots are not among the nine categories.
In writing. Section 204(a) of the Copyright Act says a transfer of copyright ownership, other than by operation of law, is not valid unless an instrument of conveyance, or a note or memorandum of the transfer, is in writing and signed by the owner of the rights conveyed. A verbal assurance achieves nothing.
Because the price attaches to time and to deliverables rather than to the picture. Hours of coverage, how many edited images are released, whether a second shooter is booked, and how fast the files come back all move the figure. A quote well below the others usually has one of them removed.
Registration is a separate step from ownership. The Copyright Office states that a US work must be registered before an infringement suit can be brought, and that the timing of registration matters to what a court can award. Ownership itself arrives at the shutter without any filing.