If I was doing another event, I would definitely hire Phil. I highly recommend him as your photographer. We actually had another photographer for our son's bar mitzvah who had to cancel less than 36 hours prior to our event due to Covid. The owner of the venue we were having the event in happens to be friends with Phil and called in a favor. He explained to Phil what happened in a five minute call and Phil must have taken pity on us and agreed to do it. From the minute he got there he just wanted us to get the photos we wanted. We were just happy he was able to be there. So we weren't planning on micromanaging him. We just told him to do his thing and he did. I set up my phone on a tripod to record the ceremony because we didn't have a videographer. But I didn't think about having to move the phone around to catch different parts where our son was moving about the room. At one point I saw Phil take my tripod and move it around to catch what I would've missed if the tripod just stayed stationary. He didn't have to do that but he thought quickly and did it. Then, during the party, I saw him a few times when he told me to get with whomever I was standing with to get a shot in, but otherwise he was totally unobtrusive, which is what we wanted. We're not a posed photo family. We didn't want old fashioned posed "table photos" like it was a prom. None of that happened. He got the important stuff. He was super friendly and nice- very easy to work with. His turnaround time is about a week and he'll give you your photos on a flash drive or Dropbox or however you want them.

He shot exactly what I wanted, and offered a few of his own ideas which I ended up using too.