Working with Brian has been so frustrating that I don't even know where to start. Be very wary of…read moreBKM photography. They have much cheaper prices than some of their competitors, but I guess it all comes down to you get what you pay for.
My biggest frustration was the EXTREME amounts of time we had to wait for our products. My package included 100 wallets, which took over 6 months to receive, a framed 16x20 which took 5 and a half months, 200 4x6 prints which took over 5 months, and our album and 2 parent albums which took a full year and 3 weeks to receive.
Worse than the waiting was the customer service. Never once did I get proactive information from him regarding wait times. I would wait for the duration that his instructions indicated were set for the different items, then I would wait a week or two because I understand there can be delays but by that point after not hearing anything, I was frustrated. I always had to follow up with him myself. Often I didn't hear back from him at all, I tried leaving message and emails at different times. Now this makes it sound that I was nagging him, but I can honestly say that was not the case, I never called and asked him about the status of my products until at least a week or 2 after the amount of time he had indicated I should expect to wait.
I even had to have my mother get involved. I am 30 years old and definitely am not one of those millennials who has there mom do everything for them. I've been scheduling my own doctors appointments for about half of my life and my mother has never once interfered in my college, job search or professional careers, however, when I call Brian, and don't hear for a week, so I email, and still don't hear for a week so I call again, at some point I had to take it one step farther. It's funny how after not hearing from him for weeks, within hours of contact from my mom, I would have a response... very interesting.
I can honestly say that in contacting him I was polite and merely asking when I might expect to get my items. It's probably hard to believe in a review such as this, but if you know me you would understand, and you can check out my other reviews to see they are very fair and honest. What was frustrating was Brian's response to my followups which were lectures about waiting your turn, and how they work in order received to be fair to everyone, and how he doesn't rush things because he takes so much pride in his work. Now I can fully appreciate those comments, but in waiting 5 and 6 times the number of weeks indicated to receive my items, at some point those words stop meaning anything.
The albums were my biggest frustration, and made me question Brian's comments of how he takes so much pride in his work. Now the album itself is nice enough, leather sort of cover, thick pages which look nice and the photos are clear, but many of the pages are off center, with the margins having extreme differences from top to bottom (i.e 1 inch margin at the top of the page and 1/4 in margin at the bottom), etc. This after waiting 23 weeks from the date of sending in my final designs, a time which according to all of the directions he sends out to his clients should have taken no more than 8 to 10 weeks. Each updates took an average of 10 weeks, when the directions say 2 weeks. Not only that, but often the changes I requested were not honored and I had to ask for them again. Needless to say i'm a little disappointed that after all that time, many pages are not centered.
As for the wedding day itself, Brian and his partner were there all day, and overall I have some good shots. They are nice enough, but are very standard bridal party and bride and groom photos, however they definitely are missing the creativity that seems to be popular these days, and I see in some of my friends photos. They are not centered well either. They are simply ok. It also was a windy day, which obviously the photographer can't control, but he did very little to try to come up with solutions for my veil blowing all over and getting in peoples faces for the photos.
On the day of the wedding we were getting ready is this gorgeous brick building at NU and outside they had purple mums and pumpkins adorning the stairs and entryway. As my colors were purple and orange this was a perfect set up. My mom asked Brian to go take some photos outside by them after he finished taking photos of us getting ready and he told her no. I heard him and when I asked he did agree, but rather grudgingly. The photos from there were gorgeous with the backdrop and my only regret is not pushing him to take more there, and i'm frustrated I almost missed out on the opportunity.
Overall Brian was very frustrating to work with, however he was much cheaper than the competition. Just know going in that you will wait a long time to get your items and face a lot of frustration in doing so.
