Jay Zhang Photography

Jay photographed our wedding in August and it has taken me a while to find the words to capture just how amazing our experience was with him. First, from the very first meeting with Jay, his attention to detail, professionalism while still being so personable, and genuine interest in our love story sold us right away. Then the pandemic hit and while we weren’t even a 2020 couple, he made a point to reach out just to see how we were doing and check in. Our engagement session with him was amazing, he is a lighting and timing wizard and the experience we had and the way the photos came out were even better than we dreamed. Our wedding day, Jay created the perfect timeline for us and was superhuman in his ability to execute everything we wanted and more. It was SO HOT and like 100% humidity, Jay made sure everyone was hydrated and did not stop going and making sure we were taken care of all day. Weeks after the wedding, we had guests talking about how pleasant and wonderful our photographer was. Knowing Jay was out interacting with guests in a way that made their experience that much more amazing was the best thing a bride could ask for. He kept track of family dynamics and groups to take pictures of, certain elements of our ceremony and reception that were important to us, and so much more. Again, superhuman. Our prints and album from him are the most beautiful things we have ever owned and we can’t thank Jay enough.

We initially booked Jay for our wedding because in our search for a photographer we searched many photographer's websites, and we found that the people in Jay's photos looked so natural and not forced. Their smiles were genuine, they looked comfortable and weren't doing silly poses. All these things absolutely held true in our own photos. We could not have been happier with how our photos came out. We got the photos back very quickly, within a month of the event. There were almost 2,500 photos total for us to choose from. Jay made us look like models. We now have the problem of having to choose which ones to frame and blow up. There are too many good ones! Jay also did our engagement shoot back in 2019 at the Brooklyn Bridge and surrounding area. Those also came out amazing and we used a photo for our Save The Date. Also of note, we had a snafu with the sparkler send-off we had planned. Someone forgot the sparklers, but the venue had about 20 leftover. Jay suggested 20 guests in a semi-circle around us, which came out great. He was resourceful and creative with his shots. In addition to the amazing quality of the photos, Jay was just a pleasure to deal with. He always had time for us and is such a great person. He took charge and was the driving force behind the entire wedding timeline. Even though I'm sure he's dealing with 100 weddings on his docket at once he made us feel special. We couldn't imagine our wedding without Jay. He was such an integral part and we loved all of his work.

I would 100% not recommend working with Jay Zhang if you are having an outdoor wedding. I got married at the end of August and it has taken me 5 months to write this review because it's such a touchy subject, but I feel it is important to warn other potential brides that they will be disappointed. I was and still am extremely upset with my photos. They make me wish I hadn't hired a photographer, or just made relative take some photos on my phone. I haven't shared any of them and cannot hang up the ones my mom framed for me because I hate looking at them. I also reviewed on wedding wire and posted my photos if you’d like to see those. The specific issues with the photos are: -lighting and exposure -photo composition -subject placement Lighting: It doesn’t seem like he knows how to use his camera in the daylight. The lighting indoors was just fine, but almost every photo outdoors was over exposed, to the point that half the photo is white. The sky and lake in the background is way too bright and distracts from the photo's subjects. There are shadows on our faces, the lighting is not flattering at all. We had a beautiful, puffy white cloud, blue sky day, (we were so lucky) but it looks like a overcast, dreary day. Not at all representative to how beautiful the day was. I uploaded a cell phone photo a guest had sent me at ceremony time for reference. Photo composition: Jay apparently doesn't know how or won't put in the effort to crop his photos so you have a decent composition. The straight line of our arch was never horizontal. For our portraits, Jay placed us off centered with respect to the arch and it looks terrible. Cropping is easy for me to adjust, but it just shows you that he probably doesn’t really post process the photos much. Subject placement: Like I mentioned before, the off center with respect to the arch was an issue, but he also loves backlight photographs. Every amature photographer knows backlight photos makes for a dark subject and an unflattering photo in general. It's still true, even though he things it's not. He had us do parents first look in front of a window in a dark room. It looks awful. When I asked him to fix these issues, he allowed me to fix 50-60 photos (I would have chosen 120), and I really appreciate that he was willing to try to work with me. He was unable to make them look like they had natural lighting. Adding blue back to she skys was done poorly, with choppy lines and unnatural lighting. The water was still glowing. I appreciate that he tried to work with me to fix the issue, so I won't share those because the additional work was done as a favor and not in the additional contract. I would not recommend Jay if you are planning to have an outdoor wedding with beautiful weather. He might succeed in a winter setting, with lots of white snow, but his photography does not belong with outdoor summer scenery. Frankly, I would hire a friend with a phone before I would hire Jay again. Pros: I did like how Jay ran the operations in his business. His website is easy to navigate and use. He is easy to talk with and work with, and he was very organized on wedding day. I do like that I have the digital images. Quite flexible to our requests. We did get some great photos, but every ceremony and family portrait photo is so bad I can't even look at them without feeling sad and regretful.

If you want amazing wedding photos you need to hire Jay! He has such a fantastic eye for shots and lighting - the photos he has delivered were EXACTLY what I was looking for and hoping they would be. We didn't want photos that were too posed and something that would be too dated in the future and he did such a great job at delivering what we were looking for. The photos are timeless, and do a great job of capturing the joy from the day - both our wedding day and engagement session. Jay is such a professional and I'm also so impressed with how efficient he is as well. Jay was able to get the shots we were looking for in such an efficient manner that we were able to make it back for our cocktail hour, ahead of schedule! As two people who are shy when the camera is around us, Jay did a great job at making us feel comfortable and at ease throughout the whole process. I am so happy that we have these photos and memories to look back on our wedding day - and I would hire him again in a heartbeat and recommend him to everyone I know who needs a photographer!!