We were excited to work with CDB when we first hired him, and throughout our experience, he was friendly and a nice person. When we booked him, our package included an engagement session. However, to receive any of the photos from that session, we had to pay (on top of what we already paid for the wedding package), and it was not cheap. We felt like the photos should be included in the package, but maybe us being first timers to book a wedding photographer, we should have known that, but I had worked in the wedding industry for almost six years, and I had never heard of that.
Finally, the wedding day came, and we had paid for a second shooter. During the ceremony (which was not at a church, so there were no shooting restrictions), there was only one close up picture throughout the entire ceremony. All the rest are from the back of the aisle, and you can barely see us at all. We felt at least one of the photographers should have been close so that we had closer shots to get our facial expressions, and a close up of our first kiss. I had even made an announcement to have no phones out during the ceremony so that they could get the best photos. Needless to say, I am regretting immensely making that announcement.
During the reception, we felt like there was no effort put forth to get the best shot. My husband has long hair, and during our cake cutting, neither photographer bothered to move so that they could get shots of our faces while we cut the cake. There are no shots of our first dance that we love, and again, during the speeches, and while we sat at the head table, all of the shots are from the back of the room and you can barely see us.
We simply are very disappointed. We felt there was no effort put forth to get the best shots, and we could've gotten the same quality, if not better for a quarter of the cost.
My husband and I will be hiring another photographer to do a photoshoot in my wedding dress, and his wedding tuxedo because there are about nine photos out of almost 1,000 photos from the whole day we like. We can never experience our wedding day again, and we can never get those shots.
I've even heard from my parents, and other family members that they were not thrilled at all with the shots either. Just very disappointing, especially for how much we paid.