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I entered the wedding photography world as a music/editorial/documentary photographer. At first I was a little skeptical. I kept to myself and didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to what other wedding photographers were doing. Until I realized that there are AMAZING wedding photographers out there. Photographers that inspire me to be a better photographer no matter what my subject is. One of the first things I noticed was that there was a photographers’ association that kept coming up when I looked at the work of those who I thought were the best in the industry. This was ISPWP -The International Society of Professional Wedding Photographers. I’m proud to have reached a personal goal of mine to be approved as a member of ISPWP and to be among the best wedding photographers in the world!
They say it best….
Click on the image below to be directed to ISPWP and see what they’re all about:
I thought this might be interesting to read for brides looking for a photographer:
I feel lucky to do what I do, to have access and a window into the happiest days of people’s lives. It’s a pleasure and a special challenge to document weddings in a creative, original, and artistic way and create images that will serve as reminders and homages to this amazing moment of people’s lives for generations to come. I find each wedding to be special, exciting, romantic, and magical in their own way… it never gets old to me. After I moved to Mexico and met the design and coordination team The Dazzling Details, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. The sheer effort and imagination that they put into every wedding boggled my mind. At every wedding I work on with The Dazzling Details, I find myself behind the scenes at some point saying, ‘You are crazy people! How do you do it??’ (This is my highest compliment of course). From the start, they made a decision not to do the same idea, altar, design, etc. twice. I really respected that stance and have come to look forward to seeing what they create. As if my job of photographing these magical moments couldn’t get any better, enter the Dazzling Details into the equation and I’m one happy photographer.
Here is a collection of images from weddings designed by this extraordinary team….
I love the idea that when I bring an extra photographer on a shoot, I can guarantee we will see and shoot things in different ways. I can look over at another photographer shooting something and have no idea what they are doing with their composition. There are times that I’m with clients and putting them on a dirty lot or a run down area, and as they look at it trepidatiously, I just have to say, ‘trust me, this looks great’. I’ve had a few reviews by brides and grooms exclaiming at how I laid on the ground or climbed trees, my pants sullied by the end of the day, and I’ve been labeled ‘ninja photographer’ by several people independently. Here are two fun examples, one of me standing on a chair (which you can’t see in the photo), and one of me lying on the ground. I find it interesting how you would have no idea what my picture looked like until you’ve seen it. I know people must think I’m crazy sometimes, but I don’t care because I’m looking through the lens and I’m liking what I see.
Taken by the very talented photographer Mark Callanan:
Through my lens:
Taken by my second shooter extraordinaire of 2 years, now on his own doing amazing things Nathan Cordova:
Yes friends, after a long dry spell since the day in nursery school when I guessed the right amount of jelly beans in the jar and proudly ate my winnings at home, my luck has changed. With the help of my 3 rock star photographer teammates Olivia Brown, Kirsten Lewis, and Kathryn Kreuger, we won big. Like a 4 year old with her own big jar of jelly beans, the 4 of us are proudly savoring our 37,000 dollars worth of photographer goodies. Witness the Firing Squad.
A few days before my annual trip to WPPI (photo conference/learning and information frenzy/photographer hang out) I got a note from my BPF (best photographer friend) Kirsten informing me that we were going to partake in a photography scavenger hunt held by the super hip album company Finao. At first I wasn’t sure if I wanted to spend a lot of time doing a scavenger hunt as I had a lot of talks and classes in my schedule, but once I commit I rally hard and it was well worth it. Over 3 days we received 12 clues via cell phone text asking us to do crazy things all over Vegas. Between all of our conference activities and talks, and late nights hanging out with the 12,000 photographers gathered in Vegas, we managed to pull in the first place spot in the competition. Here are a few of the tasks and images we created. The link to the video we submitted is at the end.
All four team members must illustrate ‘what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas’:
Find an Elvis impersonator and make a photograph with two members of your team:
Find triple sevens on a slot machine and make a photograph with one team member:
All four team members must be included in a photograph with the famous Welcome to Las Vegas sign:
Have one team member do their best Elton John impersonation:
Have Finao’s own Thunder From Down Under (who we figured out to be the awesome photographer Jerry Ghionis) sign a body part of one team member:
Go to the booth of one of the Finao prize partners and make a photograph with one team member (ultra fabulous rock star photographer team Dave and Quin were serious sports with our crazy idea):
One of my favorites. Go to a wedding chapel, find a couple getting married, put them in the worst wedding pose ever, and make a photo including one team member and the chapel sign. Whew! Um yeah, added bonus was the couple getting married IN a pink Cadillac with Elvis serenading them between vows. It was off the chain folks:
I was behind the lens on the Elvis shot but I loved the idea so much I had to jump in for a shot with him myself:
I had a wonderful time roaming Vegas – sleep deprived and sometimes humiliated – to make all of this happen. Thank you so much Kirsten, Olivia, and Kathryn for all of your great ideas and hard work. Finao, thank you for being such a cool company that you thought of this crazy idea. Last but definitely not least, thank you to all of the people, photographers and vendors whose prizes we were so lucky to have won!!
And here’s the video we submitted to Finao. wicked right?!:
For my very first blog post I thought I’d start on a personal note with the wedding of one of my best friends, Monica. Equally as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside, Monica is one of the most lovely, talented, and giving people I know. Monica spent years teaching children around the world and then came back to Mexico to help start and run the outstanding non-profit organization P.E.A.C.E. On top of that, she supplies all of our friends with her stunning jewelery from her company Lunachia. They pulled their whole wedding together on a very small budget. Monica made all of her decorations and her now-husband Chris, who is an amazing chef, handled the food with a little help from his friends. Doing their photography was very personal to me because all of my friends and family (and my dog pancho!) were there and my best girlie got hitched. These images are my gift to them.
Yours truly doubled over as a pedicurist/bridesmaid and painted those red toenails.
Me on the left with my lovely family.
Everyone getting loco in the photobooth, including me and my doggie Pancho.
