5 Reasons to Hire Husband and Wife Wedding Photographers
Congratulations! You’re engaged! You’re about to become a WIFE. Finding the person you will spend the rest of your life with is such an amazing miracle. Now that the truly difficult part is over, it’s time to plan your wedding!
Did anyone else walk into wedding planning like we did? Blissfully unaware of the HUGE undertaking it really is? It was only 4 years ago that we were in the same boat as you are. With a wedding to plan and the internet to search for all the things we’d need, we started planning our wedding with a few priorities in mind: photographer, venue and food. Everything else to us was not as important as those three things. Everyone has a different priority list when it comes to planning a wedding and it’s important to decide on the things that take priority while planning a budget so that you know where you should splurge and where you should save.
It’s probably no surprise to you, but we valued photography over everything else because we knew that the images we received would adorn our walls and our albums for decades to come and we wanted to still be head-over-heels in love with the photos when we were showing our great-grandchildren. Although we didn’t end up choosing a husband and wife team (though we wish we would have if we knew what the future would have held), we do still love and adore our wedding photos.
Choosing our wedding photographer was one of the hardest decisions we had to make because it was THAT important to us. And it should be for you too! Your wedding photos are literally the only things (other than a stray ceremony program or a favor or two) that you will probably have from your wedding day in 50 years. They are WORTH your investment. And when you’re thinking about who you want to hire as your wedding photographer, we hope that you’ll consider hiring a husband and wife team. There are so many benefits to hiring two photographers that love one another as your photographers, but below I’ve listed out the 5 most important reasons.
1.) You’re getting two fully trained professional photographers who, in our case, have been shooting alongside each other since the day they first met
Perhaps the greatest thing about hiring a husband and wife wedding photography team is this: you get two for the price of one. Husband & wife teams are not just a lead photographer and their second shooter/assistant. They both work equally as hard during the wedding day and both have very specific roles. They will both produce a weddings worth of images and work together throughout the day to make decisions on how to serve you best.
When booking Rowlands Photography, you get the added bonus of hiring two wedding photographers who have been shooting alongside each other from the exact moment they met. If you’re not familiar with our story, we met when we were both photographing a concert at the NorVa in Norfolk, VA. Chelsea entered the photo pit and Michael turned and smiled at her. The rest is history.
(Top photo: 2012 – one of our first photos we worked together on (peep the early watermark) | Bottom: 2018 – during our family session)
2.) You and your groom will be most comfortable on your wedding day
When you’re getting ready for the biggest day of your life with your girls, would you feel more comfortable with another female in your getting ready room while you’re putting on your dress or a male? Or maybe the better question is, would you be more comfortable with another female in your groom’s getting ready room or a male? I’m going to go ahead and make the wild guess that most brides would MUCH rather not have another lady in your future husband’s getting ready room and most grooms would rather not have another guy with their future wife. While we totally and completely believe that 99% of the wedding photographers out there are trustworthy and professional, this is about YOU. What is going to make YOU most comfortable on your wedding day?
When you choose a husband and wife photography team for your wedding, you don’t have to choose between making you or your groom uncomfortable. On our team, Chelsea is with the bride and her bridesmaids throughout the beginning of the day and Michael is with the groom and his groomsmen. There is never a time when Michael and Chelsea flip roles and never a time when either of them put themselves in a situation where they might make our bride or groom uncomfortable. We remain respectful of our agreed upon roles and trust that the other is absolutely killing it.
3.) Varying perspectives for each moment of the day = DOUBLE the amount of portraits
As wedding photographers, one of our goals is to provide our clients with many varying styles of portraits that they will ultimately want to print out and hang on their wall. When you hire a solo photographer, there are plenty of ways for them to vary their shots to get several perspectives and several images for you. It takes composing, recomposing, moving, changing lenses, etc., but most of all, it takes time. Well, what if there isn’t time? What if, on your wedding day, it begins to rain and your photographer, who thought they had 20 minutes for portraits now only has 2 minutes. How will they conquer that and still give you a large amount of portraits in your gallery? While it’s not impossible, it certainly requires a seasoned veteran to do it well.
When you hire a husband and wife team, your wedding photography will have two unique perspectives throughout the day. While Chelsea gets the tight, intimate portrait, Michael shoots from the side to get the wide, scenic shot. All throughout your day, husband and wife photographers are on separate sides of the room or venue capturing two completely different scenes. They each of their own creative minds that are constantly thinking about howto capture each moment the best. When we tackle bride and groom portraits, we are both shooting the entire time. This translates into double the amount of photos in half the time and two different perspectives.
Below you’ll see a few examples; during two engagement sessions and one during a weddings. Both images in each set were taken within seconds of each other and both provide two completely different perspectives. Our favorite example of this is the bottom image, taken at Callawassie Island, South Carolina. Don’t they look like two completely different places? Nope. They were taken at the exact same time; the wide shot was taken by Michael and the tight shot by Chelsea.
4.) Moments don’t get missed and neither do the little details
Since we’ve already touched on the obvious benefit of having double the amount of images from your wedding day, another great reason to consider hiring a husband and wife wedding photography team is because little details are not missed. When we’re shooting together, we are either getting two different perspectives for you OR we are allowing one of us to be the main shooter and the other keeps their eye out for small details that we don’t want to miss like fluffing the dress, fixing the grooms hair, re-pinning boutonnieres, etc. Because we always have two sets of eyes on our subjects, little details are typically not missed. This keeps you and your groom looking good and gives you the confidence to know that we will always tell you if you have something in your teeth.
5.) Get two new best friends
“Did we just become best friends? YUP.”
Ever since we start shooting weddings in 2014, we have been insanely blessed with the most amazing clients. We love each and every one of them and still follow all of them on social media and keep up with their lives as much as we can. However, there are a handful or two of clients that we have clicked with from the very beginning that we have the pleasure of calling friends. Our bond with them exceeds their wedding day. While we watched them plan their wedding, get married and buy their first houses, they watched us as we started our own little family and introduced our son to the world.
And while even though we know that it’s somewhat unrealistic to think that every couple we have is going to become our best friends, we secretly always hope for that. We didn’t get into wedding photography to make money – we got into wedding photography to impact people’s lives with our marriage and with how we serve our clients. It’s such an honor to play a part in someone else’s love story, but it’s wonderful when they want to be a part of yours as well.
Here are some kind words from our past clients about what it was like to work with a husband & wife photography team on their wedding day:
“Sarah and I built our relationship with Michael and Chelsea for almost 2 years, from surprise proposal through engagement session before culminating in our wedding in South Carolina, and we couldn’t have asked for a more perfect couple to work with! They took the time to get to know us, investing in our relationship every step of the way, which made us more comfortable and natural in front of the camera. Their talent is obvious when you look at their amazing pictures, but what you won’t see online is how gracefully they take on this important role. So many of our friends and family commented that they never felt like Michael and Chelsea interfered with anything, but effortlessly integrated themselves into the day to get wonderful candid shots. They may start off as just two hired photographers, but they will leave your wedding as dear friends.” – David & Sarah, 2018 Rowlands Photography Couple
“Finding a good wedding photographer was one of the most important aspects of wedding planning for me. I lucked out and found two! I love this power-couple team of photographers. With Rowlands Photography, you get double the value for your dollar. They get several shots from different perspectives since they are both actively shooting. Quality, communication, creative eyes, and plain old GREAT company are all reasons I highly recommend working with Michael & Chelsea.” – Courtney & Caleb, 2017 Rowlands Photography Couple
“I don’t know that I could say enough good things about Chelsea and Michael to ever truly be satisfied. They really have an eye for their art and their love for each other shows in the harmony of the pictures they capture. I am beyond thrilled that I chose them as I went through hundreds of portfolios before seeing theirs and ultimately choosing them. They made the whole experience comfortable and enjoyable, while providing beautiful pictures at the end. They are truly wonderful.” – Emily & Nathan, 2018 Rowlands Photography Couple
“Chelsea & Michael were amazing during our engagement shoot, and ESPECIALLY the wedding. They were like silent ninjas— capturing every moment & making us feel so comfortable, never disturbing or getting in the way of the day. The photos they took were BEAUTIFUL & will be displayed in our homes for the rest of our lives!!” – Kendall & Jordan, 2017 Rowlands Photography Couple
“After doing my engagement session with these two last November, I knew we made the right choice in a wedding photographer team. They are superb to work with. My husband commented that Michael was so good with all his groomsmen in regards to giving them direction. Nothing about the night felt posey or forced because they are genuinely a creative and wonderful team.” – Brenna & Hunter, 2017 Rowlands Photography Couple
Blessings,
Michael & Chelsea
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