About

Overview & Vibe

Luke Simon has been a professional photographer since 2004 and works from a studio at Colonel Light Gardens, a few kilometres south of the Adelaide CBD. He shoots weddings across the city, the Adelaide Hills, the Barossa, the Clare Valley and McLaren Vale, and has photographed couples in Darwin, Sydney, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Bali, Laos, Sweden, Italy, the Maldives and South Africa. He is warm and family-centred about it — he talks about his wife and two boys before he talks about his cameras — and he is unembarrassed about loving the job.

Style & Approach

Candid, and built around the pace of the day rather than a shot list. He asks couples for a list of the family and group members they want photographed and nothing more, on the grounds that the set-ups and angles are what they are hiring him to worry about. A second shooter can be arranged where the guest list warrants it, working long lenses from other angles to catch what one camera cannot.

Ideal For

Couples who want an experienced pair of hands and a flexible amount of coverage rather than a fixed package — you buy a base rate and then buy exactly the hours you need. Equally suited to a short elopement and to a nine-hour city wedding, and a genuinely good fit for anyone marrying in the wine regions, which he covers at no extra charge inside 200 km.

The Need-to-Knows

One base rate secures the date and covers the first hour, then each additional hour is charged separately and adds roughly a hundred more images. His own guide is that most full-day coverage, from preparations through to dancing, runs between seven and nine hours. Travel is included up to 200 km; anything beyond that is quoted per job. The online gallery arrives within three to four weeks and stays live for two years.

Standout Feature

The Love List — his own catalogue of South Australian wedding venues, from Alru Farm and Mount Lofty House to the Currant Shed and Saltram, each one somewhere he has actually worked. Paired with the pre-wedding meetings, where he draws on well over a decade of weddings to help couples work out how long to allow for each part of the day, it is planning help most photographers do not offer.

Albums & Prints

Flush-mount Pano album. Price: [None]. Description: Printed direct to fine art matte paper with no mattes around the images, so the pages print right to the edges and across the centre fold. Built for hero shots to run full width across a spread.
Prints and wall art. Price: [None]. Description: He recommends professional printing for a wall or an album over keeping the images digital, and does the printing himself rather than sending couples elsewhere.

Appointment Policy

The studio at Colonel Light Gardens is open by appointment, Tuesday to Friday.
Get in touch by email or on (+61) 439 890 198 to check whether your date is free.
He meets almost every couple before the wedding, and will do a video call instead for couples marrying from interstate or overseas.
Booking starts with a proposal he sends you.

Areas Serviced

Adelaide, the Adelaide Hills, the Barossa Valley, the Clare Valley and McLaren Vale, with travel included up to 200 km.
Country South Australia including the Riverland and the Yorke Peninsula, and destination weddings worldwide, both quoted per job.

Booking & Deposit

The session fee is the booking fee, and it includes the first hour of coverage.

Hours of Coverage

[1,9]

Nearby Landmarks

Colonel Light Gardens, about 8 km south of the Adelaide CBD
Mount Lofty House, Bridgewater Mill and Alru Farm in the Adelaide Hills
The Currant Shed and Coriole Vineyard at McLaren Vale, and Saltram and Chateau Yaldara in the Barossa

Photography Packages

Session Fee plus First Hour. Price: $1,550. Description: The booking fee and the first hour of photography coverage, all pre-wedding and post-wedding consultations, a secure private gallery with two years of online access, and roughly 100 to 200 print-ready high-resolution images to download. Travel is included up to 200 km.
Each additional hour. Price: $475. Description: Coverage is bought by the hour on top of the base rate, and each extra hour adds roughly another 100 images. The rate covers the planning, the photography, the editing, the digital image supply, the gallery with two years of backup, and business costs including insurance and GST.
Elopements and shorter custom coverage. Price: From $2,800. Description: His own stated floor for a wedding, covering elopements and shorter custom coverage. He also states that couples budget between $4,000 and $5,000 with him on average.

Photography Style

candid

Price Notes

Coverage is bought by the hour rather than as a fixed package, so the total depends entirely on how many hours you book.
The hourly rate covers the planning, the photography, the editing, the image supply, the gallery and the business costs including insurance and GST.
Two current price lists are published and they disagree on the base rate, quoting $1,350 and $1,550; the figure used here is from the more recently updated of the two.
Album prices, USB delivery and travel beyond 200 km are all quoted rather than published.

Services Offered

Wedding photography
Elopement and engagement photography
Destination wedding photography
Wedding films through an in-house team of cinematographers
Wedding albums, prints and wall art
Family photography
Commercial, corporate and event photography
Second photographer coverage, arranged on request

Starting Price

From $2,800

Travel & Destination

Travel is included up to 200 km from Adelaide.
Beyond that, interstate and overseas travel and accommodation are quoted per job, and he books the flights and car hire once the quote is approved.

Turnaround Time

The link to your online gallery arrives within three to four weeks.
The gallery then stays online for two years, with backup included.

What You Receive

High-resolution print-ready images, roughly 100 to 200 for the base hour and about another 100 for each extra hour
A secure private website gallery with two years of online access and backup
Images you can download directly from your private gallery
All pre-wedding and post-wedding consultations
High-resolution files on USB, available at extra cost on top of the coverage
Uncorrected raw files are not supplied

Similar businesses

Barossa Valley, South Australia

Emily Westhoff Photography

Emily Westhoff photographs weddings from a base in the Barossa Valley, and has been building what she calls a collection of love stories since 2019.

Contact

Website: lukesimonphotography.com
Phone: (+61) 439 890 198

Barossa Valley, South Australia Open in Maps