Are you getting photographer and videographer?

We did both as I arranged the whole thing and day planning. The memories are something to look back as you were first married and how special it was with everyone there.

View quoted message Thanks for the response. Yes mine will be there for 10 hours and does amazing work plus a slide show of all pictures. I think it should be enough as well.

My fiance and I have decided against videographer and just a photographer for two reasons. One, we didn't to spend additional money on something like this just because it's the cool thing to do now. Two, we have our photographer for 12 hours and we're very confident that she'll have amazing photos for us to see for years to come

I was back and forth with this decision too and we decided to opt out on it. Some people said it was worth it and some said it was not worth the price so we decided to save cost and not do it.

If I can have a full wedding (ceremony + reception) then yes. It's a great way to document the day.

If I can have a ceremony with 50+ then yes but I will be extremely conscious of how much I spend for it since the workload will amount to no more than 3 hours including travel. I may even opt for videographers who don't have as much experience.

If I can only have a ceremony with 25 or under, then no. Such a small event will not make hiring a videographer worth it, no matter how much I want video of my wedding. And they would take up seats in my gathering limit that I would rather have someone close to us be at instead of a vendor.

We are only hiring a photographer. We are trying to get married on the tightest budget so videography just isn't in the budget. Someone in our bridal party has a decent camera and she said we could use that to record if we want and would just have to find someone going to the wedding who could do that.

We skipped the videographer. I don't think I ever would have watched a wedding video, so it wasn't on our list! It was a huge added expense for something that we didn't want, we would much rather spend that money on something we could enjoy with our guests.

View quoted message Great idea!! Total makes sense to me and seems a lot of us are on the same page! Glad it worked out!
Thank you!

We were also very torn on this - I wanted a videographer and my fiance thought it wasn't necessary. We spent what we thought was reasonable on a photographer(s) we absolutely loved for 11 hours (yup 11 haha). We were not about to compromise on quality or style for photography - like others said, the photos are definitely most important as they are what you'll look at more. We did both agree it would be so nice to have a recording of the ceremony, speeches, and dances - but not just from a phone because the voice potentially won't get picked up. We tried to find a recent grad or a film student (the college here has a form you can fill out to request one) because we didn't care about the editing or highlight real, I just wanted the footage, but our wedding was originally planned for their holiday break. We then had a friend who makes movies on the side offer to rent a good camera(s) as a gift and do our video. This was perfect! Longer story short, we ended up live-streaming our ceremony and reception professionally (by videographers) and we were able to download the videos after! It was perfect! And given they don't edit, it was also much cheaper. Hoping maybe I gave you some ideas for a compromise 😊. I am so grateful to have the videos even if we don't watch them all that often - we HAVE them.

I’ve also been torn on this! As a photographer myself I gravitate towards photography, and honestly I do think pictures are more versatile because you can display them. However, I’d love to be able to watch back the speeches/first dance/vows because I think you can easily miss things in the moment (and you can’t watch yourself say your vows!) I’m hoping to ask one of our guests who does videography as a hobby whether she can film some of these highlights, I was thinking I’d suggest it as a wedding gift, though I don’t want to sound greedy and as though we’re expecting a gift regardless 🙈


I think home video would be a fun compromise - just make sure they remember haha

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I agree! Photos last a lifetime and are always on display. Videos you have to pull out from your closet and make sure you have the appropriate hardware for it to be able to play. Things are advancing quickly and those who have wedding VHS tapes can only watch it if they are able to convert it or have a very hard to find player for it to be seen!

That's an other thing I keep in mind.

View quoted message Totally agree!! I always record things from concerts etc and never watch them back lol. My friend said they watched their wedding video once and never since. I think photos are more important overall!

Initially, my fiancé and I were on the fence about it as well until I started looking at some of the prices for them. In Alberta they are pretty pricey, and the least expensive one was somewhat decent and not really the style I was looking for.

Also, a lot of people mentioned that they have rarely looked at their wedding videos except for a few times after the wedding. I have over 100 videos on my phone that I have never looked at after initially videoing them. So for myself and my fiancé to look at the video all the time is most likely not going to happen.

Lastly, everyone is always taking photos and videos on their phones so I really feel we wont miss anything special. Especially if I am paying over 2500 for two photographers to catch everything, I am not going to pay the same or way more for a video version of it!

We opted for just a photographer. We were planning for a fairly budget wedding and a videographer just wasn't in the budget.

I guess we could have hired a cheaper photographer, but because good photographers and good videographers are both so expensive on their own that would have meant hiring a mediocre photographer and videographer and potentially having poor photos and poor video. If you can realistically only afford one then just get someone quality and choose which you want more. I assume most people would want the photographer.

If it's not a financial burden to have both and it's something you really want then why not go for it? But if photography is important to you I wouldn't borrow from that budget just to get video as well.

View quoted message Thanks! Same to you of course! ☺️


That’s kind of my thoughts exactly! I would rather hire a photographer that I vibe well with and get some awesome pictures that can be framed or put into an album than settling on some nice pictures and a video that would maybe get pulled out once every blue moon. Plus I like the idea of letting family being in charge of the video, as I feel like it has the potential to be a lot more fun than just a polished retelling of the day. I’m sure the re-watch value would be a lot higher anyways! 😄

View quoted message Congrats on your engagement! And Yes! Good idea. I was thinking I would ask one of my uncles who is usually the one taking pics at family functions if he could record some of it here and there. Some from ceremony, first dance, speeches etc. I feel like people watch the video a couple of times and not really much after that. At least picture you can frame, put in walls and in albums 🤷🏻‍♀️

My fiancé and I are having the same discussion right now (planning for summer 2023). I’m kind of torn, because I would rather put the money from a videographer into higher quality images, but at the same time I feel like a videographer might pick up all kinds of fun things that you might miss at your wedding, because there’s just so much going on that day. An alternative I’ve thought about is maybe setting up a camcorder on a tripod and capturing video of the ceremony that way and then for the reception giving the cam to one of my little brothers (they’re both late teens) and then turning the footage into a cheesy homemade wedding video, but we’re honestly still undecided at this point.