Five reasons to book a photo booth

1. It solves the first hour

Every event has a slow start. Guests arrive in ones and twos, nobody wants to be first on the dance floor, and the host is stuck greeting people. A booth gives arrivals somewhere to go and something to do, and it turns a thin room into a busy-looking one faster than anything else you can put in a corner.

2. Guests do the sharing for you

A photo a guest sends themselves gets posted. A photo you post gets scrolled past. Because every session goes to the guest's own phone by text, email or QR code, the event is shared by the people who were at it. For a corporate client that is the entire point of the exercise.

3. It produces a keepsake, not a file

Unlimited 2x6 prints on real photo stock, in hand in about ten seconds. Digital photos live in a camera roll of eleven thousand other photos. A strip lives on a fridge. If you double-print, one goes in a guestbook with a note beside it.

4. It carries your design without being an advert

Names and a date, a school crest, a company logo. The design sits on every strip and every digital copy, and nobody minds because they wanted the photo anyway. That is a rare thing in event branding. How the design gets made is on the photo layouts page.

5. Nobody has to run it

This is the one hosts underrate. An unattended booth becomes somebody's job by nine o'clock, and that somebody is usually a family member who was meant to be enjoying the night. Every attended Aura package includes a person who runs it, fixes it and packs it down.

What it costs

Essential is $550 for 2 hours, Signature is $650 for 3 hours and is the one most people book, Ultimate is $800 for 4 hours. An extra hour is $150. The digital self-operated booth is $350 for 2 hours in Burlington, Oakville and Waterdown. All plus HST. Travel is included across Halton, Hamilton and Mississauga, and Toronto and the rest of the GTA carry a flat travel fee, quoted up front.