Hey Mamas my SO and I are getting married next summer and are frantically planning things right now for the day...

I am totally undecided on if I want a photographer or not. I don't want the whole day to be a photo shoot.. I kind of feel like in this day and age everyone has pretty decent cameras anyway and all of my family and friends are pretty snap happy.

I'm kind of leaning toward not having one.. but then I see all these professional wedding photos and I see how beautiful they are.. I also don't want to regret not having one!

What do you think? Did you have a wedding without a photographer? Regret it? xx

Definitely get a photographer, people with nice cameras just isn't the same and if you just explain to them you don't want the whole day to be a photo shoot they can just take a lot of candids. It's definitely worth the money IMO.

my mil tryed to tell me her friend was a photographer so i let her take the photos i had family members there with better cameras there and all the photos she tooj were terrible!! my biggest regret was not having a proffesional photographer!! all i really have now are the memories and some really smurf photos!

I didnt care if i had one or not. In the end i just designated a family member to be in charge of taking photos for me and then i edited them myself with photoshop.

the photos you have are the only thing that you "walk away with" of that day to preserve the memories. If they don't exist or are smurffy, you can't recreate that day and get that back. Its the place I splurged the most on with my wedding and I don't regret it

I had a photographer & a videographer. I don't regret any of it. It's your memories!

We had a photographer at our wedding he was a man who worked my sisters FIL he was 300 he also does magazine shoots are pictures were beautiful my hubby's grandma died a few months after our wedding some of the pictures were used at her funeral. Unbenouced to us she refused to start chemo so she could have hair at our wedding we only found out after she had passed away. I would go with a photographer it's nice to look back and remember all of the moments as the day flys by in blur

It's a must
As a photographer just a nice camera doesn't do smurf. I'd hire one & I wish I could stress that to people more

<blockquote><b>Quoting Goodnight Moon, goodnight:</b>" It's a must As a photographer just a nice camera doesn't do smurf. I'd hire one & I wish I could stress that to people more"</blockquote>


Agreed, I have a nice camera and my SIL is a professional photographer. The pictures I took at my brothers wedding aren't anywhere near as good as hers. It takes a lot more than a nice camera.

<blockquote><b>Quoting Nigel Thornberry:</b>" <blockquote><b>Quoting Goodnight Moon, goodnight:</b>" It's a must As a photographer ... [snip!] ... The pictures I took at my brothers wedding aren't anywhere near as good as hers. It takes a lot more than a nice camera."</blockquote>




Exactly! Same thing as giving credit to the stove vs the chef  

Hire a photographer it's their JOB

I charge 1500$+ per wedding and invest! It's the only part of your day you get to physically KEEP and show  

Explain to your photographer that you only want to pose for a few photos after the ceremony but the rest should be just pictures he/she has taken throughout the day, natural and un-posed. Also you could leave one of those 'one-use' cameras on every table for your guests to take their own pics.

I'd get a professional. Get some posed pics with the wedding party and family, then ask them to just take candid shots of everyone having fun. Those are the best wedding shots   I think you'd be glad you got someone in the end.

I got kind of lucky, as I had an acquaintance who was a photography hobbyist who had done weddings in the past. I think he charged us $300-$400. He took a ton of pictures and then gave us a CD of all the pics (he didn't print anything). My wife and I were extremely happy with this arrangement.

We didn't have any videos. (How many people ever actually watch the videos of their wedding?)

We're dishing out a lot of money for a good photographer team, and cutting down costs on the flowers and decor..

We're not doing videography though