When hiring your wedding photographer you may come across the option to hire a second shooter or a second photographer. Most packages for photographers now days include them, but there are some photographers who give you the option to cut out the extra cost a second shooter can add to your package, making it more affordable.
While the option to cut your second shooter from your photography wedding package may save you a few hundred dollars, you may miss a few moments that, I believe, far exceed any dollar amount.
I do offer these one photographer options for my clients and do believe I am able to generally cover the day sufficiently and well. But, when I photograph a wedding with one of my second shooters, the moments that they capture that I missed, just blow me out of the water. Not only that, my second shooters will even get a different angle on my same shot. Many times I’m in front of people directing them, but my second shooters are able to get in weird places to get these stunning shots. For reasons like this, I truly believe you should hire a second shooter if you can afford it!
Here are just a few examples. At this Silverthorne winter wedding in December last year (which you can see here) my second shooter, Mark, was able to get a stunning angle on a photo I was posing.
Here is my photo:
And Here is Mark’s:
Being a bride you may honestly want both, because you love the whole wedding party, but the closenesses Mark caught of the bride and grooms faces is just so fun!
Then of course there is the whole catching the grooms face and the bride walking down the aisle. Depending on the set up of your ceremony this may be possible for one photographer, but if you’re wedding is in a tight space it will be near impossible for your photographer to get both.
And you don’t want to miss him crying for once! 😉 haha jk…but kinda.
Another great part about have a second shooter is you can fit a lot in a small amount of time. If you want photos of the bride and bridesmaid together as well as the groom and the groomsmen together before the wedding without having to see each other a second shooter can help that not take so long. Having a second shooter that can go take photos with the guys and have the main photographer stay with the girls.
I cannot forget to mention its always fun to know what was happening before you saw each other too. 😉
While a second shooter might add a few hundred dollars to your wedding photography package I’d say it may be worth cutting back on something else to make sure those stunning moments are captured. Two eyes are better than one! 😉
