Blog

Every website audit I do starts the same way. Before I open the homepage, I ask multiple AI models to find me a photographer in the same niche & city my client works in. More often than not, the photographer doesn’t show up at all.

Visibility used to mean ranking on Google. Now it also means being findable inside ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Overview, because that’s where a meaningful share of couples now begin their search.

I see it constantly on wedding photography websites: jaw-dropping portfolios, awards & years of experience. But the homepage either just has a slideshow, or the hero still says “Capturing your special day with passion.” With no clear differentiator, with a confusing nav menu, with hard-to-find service & contact information. The photographer thinks they’re presenting their craft. But the visitor is left impatient and confused. Five seconds, decision made.

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It’s been a while, but the Podcast is back, and with the special Doc Day 2026 episode!

Doc Day is a special, special thing – and it’s amazing that This is Reportage is partnered with it. 2026 was the best year yet – a heady mix of incredible speakers, group hugs, photo walks, late-night-chats, dancing and Don’t Look Back in Anger singalong-ing. Just epic.

Tickets are on sale right now for Doc Day 2027 – presented by Loxley Colour – and is being held on February 9th 2027 in Dublin, Ireland. It will feature talks from some of the best documentary wedding photographers in the world, including Andrew Billington, Samm Blake, John Gillooley, Susan Stripling & Shaun Doherty.

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At the end of the year, instead of asking for the best images, we asked something much simpler – and, in many ways, much harder:

What was your favourite documentary moment you photographed in 2025?

Not the most awarded.
Not the most “impressive”.
Just the one that stayed with you.

And 115 TiR members took part.

What came back was a brilliant reminder of why documentary wedding photography matters. Across these images, you’ll find joy, chaos, quietness, humour, grief, relief, tenderness, silliness, love – and everything in between. Moments that happened despite the camera being there. Moments that couldn’t be planned, repeated, or refined by direction.

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David Scholes has just achieved something truly extraordinary: winning both our This is Reportage Photographer of the Year and our Storyteller of the Year titles for 2025. To take either award is incredibly difficult. To take both in the same year is almost unheard of — a rare combination of vision, timing, consistency and sheer documentary instinct at the very highest level.

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Bringing our 8 Years of This is Reportage series right up to date, Matt Badenoch (UK) reminds us exactly what documentary wedding photography is all about: emotion, connection, and the quiet power of truth.

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