Vancouver weddings come with a particular kind of editing problem. A ceremony under flat grey cloud, portraits in a forest where everything is green including the bride’s face, a rain shower halfway through, and then a clear evening on the water. Then a trip up to Whistler the next weekend, and a multi-day wedding in Surrey the week after.
This guide is for photographers and filmmakers across Vancouver, the Lower Mainland, the Sea-to-Sky corridor and the rest of British Columbia who want to know how outsourced editing handles West Coast work.
Overcast and rain: keeping greens and skin right
Grey skies are common on the coast, and summer weddings get them too. Overcast light is soft and kind to faces, but it comes out of the camera flat, cool and a little dull.
What we do in the grade:
- Add depth without killing the mood. Gentle midtone contrast and slightly deeper blacks, not a heavy clarity slider. The day should still feel soft.
- White balance for skin, not the sky. A grey sky pulls the camera cool. We warm skin until it looks like the couple, then leave a little coolness in the background.
- Control green spill. In forest and park portraits, light bouncing off foliage puts a green cast on faces. We clean it from skin with local adjustments while keeping the trees green.
- Hold the greens back. Wet leaves and lawns go neon when you lift saturation. We bring green saturation and luminance down a touch so the background supports the people.
- Rain frames. Umbrellas, wet streets and reflections are often the best frames of the day. We keep the reflections bright and the rain visible, and lift faces under the umbrella.
Our greenhouse wedding gallery shows green spill cleaned from skin across a whole day, and our mountain ranch wedding film gives grey-sky footage depth without losing its soft mood.
Whistler, Squamish and mountain weddings
The Sea-to-Sky corridor gives BC photographers a second kind of wedding: mountain light, lakes and big views a short drive from the city.
The editing jobs are close to those of any mountain wedding:
- Faces first, then recover the sky and the snow on the peaks with highlights and a sky mask.
- Lift valley shadow gently, adding a little midtone contrast back so the landscape doesn’t go flat.
- Treat lake water on its own, so its colour stays true when skin is warmed.
- Warm skin locally against cool rock and sky.
- Match the gondola-top portraits to the ceremony below, where the light can be very different.
If you shoot winter weddings and elopements in Whistler, our post on editing winter weddings in snow covers grey snow, blue casts and the white gown against a dark suit. Many BC photographers also shoot in the Alberta Rockies, which we cover in the Banff and Canmore editing guide, including the Parks Canada permit and drone questions.
South Asian weddings in Surrey and the Lower Mainland
Surrey and the rest of the Lower Mainland are home to many South Asian weddings, and studios that shoot them know the pattern: several events, long days, big guest lists and vivid outfits under very mixed light.
| Event | What we watch in the edit |
|---|---|
| Haldi | Turmeric yellow that stays bright on clothes without making skin sallow |
| Mehndi | Bright decor and outfits without orange skin; henna detail that stays deep |
| Sangeet | Stage light and coloured washes on skin; noise in the dancing |
| Baraat | Hard outdoor light, fast movement, coloured smoke |
| Wedding day | Every key moment in order; vivid reds and golds that clip easily |
| Reception | Banquet hall tungsten, LED walls and uplights; entrances, speeches and family portraits |
How we work these:
- Per event, then together. Each event is graded on its own, then the whole set is checked for one consistent look.
- A must-have list. Send the family members and groups that must be in the gallery, with a few reference frames. We cull against the list and flag anyone we couldn’t find, so you can check before the couple does.
- Films per event plus a highlight. One film for each event and a highlight across all of them, with speeches and performances kept in full where the couple wants them.
- Standard prices. Multi-day and big weddings are charged at our standard package prices, with no special quote. The Wedding gallery covers up to 3,000 raws across the whole wedding, all days and events together.
There is more on the cull and the brief in our post on culling and editing a South Asian multi-day wedding. It is written with the GTA in mind, but the workflow is the same in Surrey.
Time zone: a team that works around the clock
Vancouver is 12 hours behind Pakistan in summer and 13 hours behind in winter. Pakistan stays on UTC+5 all year, so the gap only moves when BC changes its clocks.
The gap matters less than it sounds, because the editing team works 24 hours a day, in shifts. Whether you send a wedding in your afternoon or after midnight, the link is picked up soon after it arrives, and a question about the brief can come back to you at any hour.
What it doesn’t change is the clock. Standard turnaround is seven business days from the point your link works and the brief is complete. Weekends and Canadian public holidays don’t count. Rush is 72 hours for +50% on the whole order.
A written brief still works best, because it gives the editor every answer up front. Our post on working with an editing team in Pakistan covers what to put in the brief so the first version is close to right.
Prices in CAD and the free trial
All prices are fixed in Canadian dollars, set by hand and not converted on the day you pay. The same packages apply to every wedding, from a city hall elopement to a multi-day wedding.
| Package | What you get | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Engagement gallery | 100–200 images from up to 1,000 raws, Lightroom catalogue, 2 revisions | C$70 |
| Wedding gallery | 300–500 images from up to 3,000 raws, Lightroom catalogue, up to 3 revisions | C$110 |
| Highlight film | 5–8 minutes, 1–3 cameras plus drone, project file, 2 revisions | C$140 |
| Feature film | 15–40 minutes, vows and speeches in full, 1-minute teaser, 3 revisions | C$205 |
| Essential | Wedding gallery plus Highlight film, one grade across both | C$205 |
| Signature | Wedding gallery plus Feature film, one grade across both | C$275 |
Add-ons: Social reels (three 9:16 cuts) C$55, Drone-only edit C$40, Album design (20 spreads) C$80. If you send five projects a month, the retainer takes 15% off, which suits a busy June to October.
Your raws stay in your own Dropbox, Google Drive, WeTransfer, pCloud or Box. We download working copies from your link and delete them once the project and its revisions are finished, unless you ask us to keep them. If you need to tell couples their photos may be edited outside Canada, our post on PIPEDA and Quebec’s Law 25 explains what the federal guidance asks of you, and our data processing terms set out what we do. Provincial rules can differ, so ask your lawyer which apply to your studio.
Send your next BC wedding free
- Your first Gallery project or Highlight film is free, edited and delivered like a paid one. Start the free trial, with no card.
- See finished galleries and films in our work, and every shoot type we take on in what we edit.
- Compare every package in CAD on packages, and see each day of a project on how it works.
- Other questions are in the FAQ.