An Experiment with Low-Cost Wedding Photography

How I became the most hated photographer in the country

Photo by author

Prelude

In 2013, I was at the peak of my artistic ability as a photographer. I had visited galleries from London to Paris and regularly attended festivals in Perpignan, Vienna, and Bratislava. I was hanging out with the best in the field, learning a ton from them, and even putting on a couple of good exhibitions on my own.

Yet I struggled commercially.

A jumbo poster for my exhibition at the Vienna Metro Station, 2013. Photo by Markus Hippmann (with permission)

Though I was well-established among my peers, it seemed like clients didn’t even know I existed.

I was frustrated!

I saw photographers with less than half my artistic ability counting cash while I was counting peanuts at best. Envy and the desire to work kept me up at night. If only people knew how good I was!

One night in the autumn of 2013, I realized I needed to do something radical. But what? I needed an icebreaker that would crack through the thick layer of ice I felt hanging over my head.

Then I got an idea so insane that I started laughing frantically, rolling in my…