Short answer: talk to your photographer. It depends on a few things!

So you’ve hired your wedding photographer – awesome! Or maybe you’re shopping around, and you’re seeing that some photographers include a second shooter in their packages while others offer it as something you can add on. You might benefit from having a second person there taking photos of your day, and you may not really need it at all.

A lot of couples and vendors think that this decision depends on the size of the wedding. The more guests, the more need for a second shooter. While this may be true to an extent, for me as a photographer, it depends less on the guest count and more on the schedule. I’ve captured intimate weddings where I needed a second shooter to maneuver the ceremony layout easier or to capture two things happening at once, and biiiiig weddings with perfectly padded schedules where I was just fine riding solo! Let me break it down:

Getting Ready

Are you and your partner getting ready at two separate locations across town? Maybe one of you is in the bridal suite of the venue while the other is at a hotel 15 minutes away. Depending on the hours of photo coverage you’ve booked, this may pose a lil’ problem. To take up less time traveling back and forth, a second shooter can definitely come in handy so these photos can be happening at the same time. Trust me, your photography coverage hours can be used more efficiently than driving back and forth to capture a small part of the day!

First Look or No First Look?

If you choose not to do a first look before your ceremony, you’ll have a lot of photos to snap after. Your couples portraits, family photos, and wedding party photos will all have to be after your ceremony, since you kept away from each other during the first half of the day. And that is completely fine – if not seeing each other until the ceremony is important to you, that’s what you should do! Just know that you’ll have to take some photos after the ceremony, during your cocktail hour. This is when a second shooter comes into play: they can be snapping candids of your guests mingling during cocktail hour while you knock out some of those photos.

Not to mention, the first look itself can be captured better in some cases by having a second shooter to get both of your sweet reactions at the same time without just shooting your side profiles, as seen below:

Your Ceremony Space

Is your ceremony taking place in an unconventional venue? Like in the photos below, some ceremony spaces have tighter aisles, are restricted by walls around the sides, or have balconies. These are instances when a second photographer might be a good idea – so they can get extra angles and reactions throughout your ceremony without squeezing through guests, blocking views, or creaking floorboards or stairs.

Guest reactions

During your ceremony, speeches, spotlight dances, and all the other moments in between – a second photographer can be capturing the giggles and tears of your guests while the lead photographer focuses on you. This will result in a really amazing final photo gallery to relive forever, showing you extra angles and other sweet moments that were happening while you were living your day. I’m all for a gallery jam packed with photos that show what it felt like to be there, versus just the picture perfect portraits of the couple.

Other add-ons: film, etc.

In my case and like many other photographers, you can add 35mm film and super 8 video footage to your photography coverage. Juggling film is an art and it can take an extra second or two, so I like to have a second shooter with me capturing in between moments while I juggle my cameras capturing your day on all these different mediums. I know a lot of photographers who work a second shooter into the pricing for this type of coverage, as well. There’s nothing like an extra person for insurance that all your precious moments are being captured!

Things to remember:

• If you’re still not sure, just talk to your photographer! Everyone works differently and they may have opinions on whether you need a second shooter or not, and suggestions for what time frames you might want one.
• Your photographer will be the one to choose, contract, and plan with the second photographer as well as edit their photos into the gallery. You don’t need to seek out the second shooter yourself, and you shouldn’t – as that would likely violate your contract with your main photographer. Let them bring someone they already work well with!