Should you have a photo booth at your wedding?
The honest answer is: maybe, but not for the reason most people think. A photo booth is entertainment, not photography. If you want one because you are worried the fun parts of your evening will not be captured, that is a photographer problem, not a booth problem. If you want one because your guests would genuinely love dressing up and being silly in front of a curtain for an hour, that is a great reason.
What a photo booth actually adds
A good booth gives your guests something to do between the meal and the dancing, and it produces silly, instant prints that end up stuck to fridges for years. For big evening crowds with friends who love a prop, it can be brilliant. Guests who would never ask the photographer for a portrait will happily pile into a booth with an inflatable guitar.
What it costs
Hire for an evening usually runs a few hundred pounds, depending on the setup, the prints and how long it runs. That is money that could also go towards more hours of photography, a second photographer or an album, so it is worth being honest about which you would value more in ten years.
The downsides couples miss
Booths take up floor space, they often pull a queue of guests away from the dance floor at exactly the wrong moment, and the novelty can wear off after the first hour. The prints also have a habit of being left behind on tables at the end of the night. None of these are reasons to skip one, but they are worth knowing before you book.
How it fits with your photographer
A booth is not a substitute for coverage. The moments that matter in the evening, the first dance, the friends you have not seen in years actually talking, your gran on the dance floor, happen outside the booth. If your photographer is there for the evening, you get both: the posed silliness in the booth and the real story everywhere else. If budget is tight, the coverage wins every time. It is worth reading about how many hours of photography you need before deciding where the money goes, and what evening coverage usually looks like.
When it is worth it
If you have a big evening crowd, a gap between the meal and the dancing, and guests who will genuinely queue up for it, a booth earns its place. If your venue is tight on space or your budget is stretched, skip it without guilt. Nobody looks back at their wedding and wishes they had a moustache on a stick.
Want the real moments covered either way? Get in touch and tell me about your day. Full day wedding photography from £3,500, with travel included anywhere in mainland UK.
