So earlier this week I asked my Facebook fanpage what information posts they’d like to see up in the blog, and we surprisingly got a tie between this and my previous decor post. However, most of the people who wanted to know about the timeline were other photographers. So welcome, photographers! If this can help you organize the day a bit better for your brides, good! I think the general public would very much benefit from people having a more firm grasp and realization of realistic wedding timelines. :)

There are just about a MILLION different ways to organize a wedding timeline. I think just about every wedding we do is slightly different, but two rules consistently apply:

1. You must prepare for a buffer of time for just about every activity on the timeline.

Really. Trust me. One of the first things I ask when helping my brides prepare their timeline is “How generally on time are you?” For instance, I am always notoriously early, and my sister has always been notoriously late (sorry, Laura). But even when brides tell me that they’re always early and on time, their wedding is almost never on time. Why? Because of your wedding party and family. :D Because everyone has that one family member or wedding party member who is always late… and there’s just no getting around it.

Or, you can be ALWAYS on time (like me) and accidentally forget your car keys on the 13th floor of the hotel (like me) and have someone have to run up and get them and suddenly what was on time has turned into twenty minutes late (horray!).

I think we’ve only had two weddings that had a timeline and were actually able to stick to it and be on time. Two. And that’s completely fine… IF you have a buffer of time scheduled around each activity. So that if things do start running behind (and they will), you can end up actually on time instead of late. Or you can use that time to take a breather and relax, or start things early.

2.  Try to take into account the time of day and how it will affect your pictures.

This is not always possible, but I try to make it possible whenever I can. When you have your wedding indoors, this applies less as your photographer can pretty much always find a shady spot to take pictures outside. However, keep in mind that if you want pictures in a large open area that takes in a lot of the background, you might want to wait to take those pictures until the sun goes down a bit.

When you have your wedding outside, time of day REALLY applies because you do NOT want an outdoor wedding at high noon in the middle of an open-area with no shade. How the light falls and when/where it falls it important to pictures. If you must get married in a very bright time of day, it’s important to get married in an area covered in shade for the comfort of you and your guests, and for well-exposed pictures with no high-noon shadows under your eyes. If you have the option to choose when you get married and you’re getting married in a large open area with no shade, it’s going to be best to do it in the early evening.

Also, make sure that you don’t assume evening is 5pm. ;) In June and July, sunset doesn’t come until 9pm, so getting married in a bright, open space still isn’t a good idea and you’ll still need shade. Ask your photographer if you aren’t sure what time the sun sets (or Google for sunset times and look up your city and state) and they’ll be able to guide you into what they think is best depending on the light.

There are also several variances which will affect how you organize your timeline:

1. First look vs. no first look

2. Traveling to venues vs. staying in one place

3. Time of ceremony (coupled with time of day)

4. Whether or not you want bridal party and family pictures beforehand

All of this stuff plays in big time with how you set everything up… and there are so many variables that it’s not possible to list them all out here, but here are a few examples of a typical timeline that we’ve set up.

THE NO-FIRST LOOK // TRADITIONAL BRIDE // TIMELINE OF AWESOME: (**Note: This timeline isn’t revolving around a specific time of day and assumes that the ceremony and reception venues are the same place)

1:00pm – Hair finishes up on the last bridesmaid and photographer arrives

1:20pm – Hair starts on the bride

2:30pm – Bride’s hair appointment wraps up and start of makeup (**Please check with your hair and makeup people for more accurate times)

3:20pm – Bride makeup wrap up // Bride puts on dress // Guys finally throw on their suits and walk out the door

3:30pm – Bride is now completely ready // Bridesmaids and family members find bouquets, gather purses, get their stuff together (**Note: This is usually the time when people start running late because for some reason everyone misplaces their lipstick)

3:45pm – Drive from hotel to ceremony location and stash everything you brought with you somewhere (put away purses, etc) // Guys typically have already arrived

4:00pm – Start pre-ceremony pictures of Bride+Bridesmaids

4:20pm – Pre-ceremony pictures of Groom+Groomsmen (**Now, you may be thinking… “Why would this take twenty minutes?” It takes twenty minutes because you have to bring out the bride who is wearing a giant gown and typically accompanied by 6 girls who keep losing their lipstick and other stuff. You get them out there, take the pictures, then you have to take them all back downstairs until the bride is safely hidden. Then you bring the guys up… take pictures… bring them back down. The pictures themselves never actually take that long, but it’s the wrangling and herding that take for-e-ver and is completely based on how fast your people move and how often they misplace their lipstick).

4:40pm – Ushering begins // Groomsmen usher or hang out // Brides and bridesmaids hang out

5:00pm – Ceremony starts

5:30pm – Ceremony ends and bridal party and family begin walking to picture location

5:45pm – Family pictures start (**This is the second part of the day that invariably leads to epic lateness because family members see other family members that they haven’t seen in a long time and start to talk to them. It’s pretty chaotic. Try to keep your family members focused or put blinders on them if possible. We gave them 15 minutes to get into position because typically someone gets lost or distracted. Once everyone is in place, we tend to do a 15 minute session with immediate family only – parents, grandparents, siblings, bride and groom. If other family members want pictures, we encourage them to wait until the reception when we can do a lot of informal pictures and group pictures). // Cocktail hour starts

6:00pm – Bridal party pictures of everyone together (**Takes about 20 minutes depending on how large your bridal party is and what locations we need to get to)

6:20pm – Newlywed pictures start

6:50pm – Bridal party lines up to enter the reception

7:00pm – Reception starts

11:00pm – Reception ends (**DJ, band, or planner will typically handle the reception timeline)

Now… if you’ll notice, that’s a pretty tight timeline. There’s no room for downtime. We’ve built in a couple of 10-15 minute buffers, but if you’ll notice, we’re assuming that the ceremony and the reception are being held in the same location for this timeline. That’s starting to be the case more often than not because it’s logistically easier. If you play out this scenario minute by minute, you’ll also notice that the cocktail hour is one hour and fifteen minutes long, which is slightly longer than normal… but sometimes that’s required depending on how easily distracted your family is and/or how large of a bridal party you have.

Our biggest intention with this timeline is to leave at least 20-30 minutes for newlywed pictures. We do that because they’re the most important pictures of the day, and that’s the amount of time required to get a variety of locations and quality shots.

THE FIRST LOOK // MODERN BRIDE // TIMELINE OF AWESOME: (**Note: This timeline isn’t revolving around a specific time of day and assumes that the ceremony and reception venues are the same place)

1:00pm – Hair finishes up on the last bridesmaid and photographer arrives

1:20pm – Hair starts on the bride

2:30pm – Bride’s hair appointment wraps up and start of makeup (**Please check with your hair and makeup people for more accurate times)

3:20pm – Bride makeup wrap up // Bride puts on dress // Guys finally throw on their suits and walk out the door

3:35pm – Bride is now completely ready // Bridesmaids and family members find bouquets, gather purses, get their stuff together (**Note: This is usually the time when people start running late because for some reason everyone misplaces their lipstick)

4:o0pm – Wedding party drive and arrive separately to the venue

4:20pm – Bride and groom arrive for first look

4:35pm – Bridal party arrives for bridal party pictures (everyone together + separate portraits of bride+bridesmaids, etc).

5:00pm – Family starts

5:15pm – Bride and groom “newlywed” pictures

5:45pm – Guys start ushering

6:00pm – Ceremony Starts

6:30pm – Ceremony Ends // Reception Starts

11:00pm – Reception ends (**DJ, band, or planner will typically handle the reception timeline)

Notice that this timeline saves much more time than the traditional timeline in a variety of ways:

1. The bridal party takes less time because you’re not having to photograph girls and guys separately because the groom has already seen the bride

2. The bride and groom have more time for pictures alone

3.  There’s more buffer time for lateness

4. There’s a longer reception

5. The fact that there’s a longer reception allow for you to more easily have your wedding at two separate locations (separate ceremony and separate reception)

6. It saves money if you don’t want to have a cocktail hour OR you can actually enjoy your cocktail hour – either way is great.

VARIABLE VARIABLES OF AWESOME THAT EARN YOU SUPER COOL BONUS POINTS WITH YOUR PHOTOGRAPHER:

These are things that you can do that will save you a LOT of time and will also help you get better pictures and less stress for everyone involved. They’re not required to have stellar pictures, but it’ll make things easier on yourself.

1. Having your ceremony and reception in one place (Don’t start throwing a pity party for yourself if your stuff is all over the world. You can still organize it so that it’s logistically sane, it just might take a little more effort and planning…i.e. calculating in the driving and parking time and loading stuff into car time).

2. Getting ready with your future spouse (This is my favorite. No stress. No arriving-at-different-times-through-different-entrances-walkie-talkie-spy-style. Just getting ready with your best friend and therefore having adorable pictures).

3. Having a first look (Seriously, that timeline is soooo much less stressful. But again – don’t throw a pity party for yourself if you choose not to do it).

4. Occupy family members and friends that aren’t in the formal pictures (Make sure that family and friends who aren’t listed to be in the formal pictures are somewhere else. If not, they will make suggestions on posing and they will tell you who should be added to the picture… thus adding on a bajillion minutes and forcing you to have your pictures taken with people you haven’t seen in 20+ years).

As you can see, timeline planning is not easy. :) It’s best to work with and contact your photographer to see how they can help you set it up. It typically takes me a few hours to sort out the knots and kinks that are typically in a timeline that someone hands me to set it up in a way that’s workable and allows for a little extra buffer. Despite this buffer, we have had approximately two weddings who have been on time and stuck to the original timeline. :) Sometimes things end up being on time, but certain portions had to be cut short (bride and groom pictures are unfortunately on most couple’s chopping block first because they don’t want to anger or upset family members or friends).

For those photographers out there wondering why it’s set up in 10 hour increments, Geoff and I do ten hour day weddings. I know some of you do unlimited hours, and some of you do 5 hours, others 8. We decided on ten hours because we feel like that’s a long day with plenty of time to get everything done, but also that’s the max amount that I can physically do a day (carrying around pounds and pounds of equipment and being on your feet all day is pretty hard on your back when you’re small statured). When we did unlimited hours, we had a few people request 16 hour days… and that I just can’t do physically. :)

Thoughts? Questions? Discussions?

Recently I’ve had the honor of becoming part of the Handmade Wedding Blog’s writing team! I do guest blog posts once a month to inform brides about a chosen topic. :) It feels good to spread the knowledge in the wedding world! They’re published on the first Wednesday of each month. I’ve already written one about how to choose your photographer… and this week’s wedding post is about eco-friendly wedding exits (and their non-eco-friendly counterparts to avoid). Check it out!

Hey guys! Long time no blog. ;) We’ve been spending January getting all of our ducks in a row for the oncoming wedding season, but we’re all set now and anxious to blog! I polled some fans on my Facebook fan page this morning (http://www.facebook.com/carolynscottphotography) about what informative post they’d like to see regarding weddings, and it was tied between how to make your wedding more personal and how to organize your timeline. So today we tackle personalizing your wedding, and later this week we’ll deal with the timeline. :)

There is an endless sea of ways to personalize your wedding. Since everyone is different and unique, each wedding subtly reflects the personalities of the couples we meet. But sometimes people don’t know where to start… or aren’t quite sure how to personalize their wedding when so many weddings they see contain the same elements. So I’m here to show you a few different ideas that real couples of mine have used brilliantly in the past and hopefully you can glean some inspiration from them!

SPICING UP YOUR INVITATIONS:

Invitations don’t have to be formal or plain anymore unless you’d prefer it. Here’s some funky stationary we’ve seen as of late that really reflect the personalities of the couple:

Above: (Left) Katie+Blake’s one page program for their wedding ceremony, outlining the evening and thanking family, friends, and vendors

Below: Abby+Grisha’s handmade wedding invitations. The envelopes were made from a book of maps around the world. The envelope shown below was kept by Abby because it was made using the map of their honeymoon destination.

HANGING UP YOUR FAMILY PHOTOS:

Photos of the family are great to have around a wedding. It gives family and friends a talking point and something to look at while they’re milling around. We’ve seen pictures of family members in frames, in scrapbooks, hanging from trees, and on clotheslines. And who doesn’t love a baby picture of the bride and groom? :)

UTILIZING YOUR HOME:

What better, EASIER, and more personal thing to do than utilize your home for your wedding? Weddings at home are the chillest of the chill. Everyone’s in one spot. There’s no driving around to various locations. And usually Fido can be incorporated. Plus, it saves a ton of money. If you already have your venue picked out, why not get ready at home? It usually makes for a much more appealing space for pictures than a hotel room and can frequently have more light. PLUS there are some funky and cool places to take shoe shots and other pictures. :)

Above: Getting ready portraits taken in Morgan’s home allowed for some funky dress and shoe shots, along with portraits of Big Snack the cat.

Below: Melissa+ Chris held their wedding at a friend’s farm that they were living on at the time. Friends helped in the kitchen by preparing all of the food for the feast and the cakes.

Above: Jenna+Josh get married in the backyard and creatively use their carport as a first dance space.

Below: (Left) Kelsey+Adam have an informal reception on their back porch. (Right) Melissa+Chris’s back yard farm reception.

GUEST INTERACTION: HOW TO ACHIEVE IT AND WHY IT’S GOOD

There’s going to be a time during your wedding day when the guests are kind of bored (mostly it’s because we’re taking pictures of you). Cocktail hours are fine and good, but the best weddings I’ve seen with the happiest guests have involved some sort of craft project to keep them entertained during the lulls in the timeline. This gets the guests interacting, interested, and less likely to leave your reception early. Plus you get some incredibly amusing pictures and keepsakes… all while sticking to the theme of creating a personal wedding based around you as a couple.

Above: In lieu of a DJ-spun dance reception, Melanie+Eric opted for a trivia game which was much more up their alley. Their friends hosted it (Right) and the guests wrote down their answers to trivia about Melanie+Eric’s relationship (Left). It caused a lot of laughs and kept the guests entertained.

Below: The guest book at Melanie+Eric’s wedding also kept the guests entertained by having them fill out a form. It was double-sized and created by Melanie on her computer. They printed out the sheets, hole-punched them, put them in a binder, and provided the guests with tons of colored markers to fill in their answers. This simple idea kept the guests constantly entertained… as well as myself, who kept returning to the guest book to check out the new answers (which were always hilarious).

Above: At their Christmas-themed wedding, Gwen+Nick had guests decorate ornaments to put on their Christmas tree. A themed wedding is an INCREDIBLY easy way to add your personality to ANY wedding as well as make it easier to limit your decoration options if you’re too overwhelmed. Ours was Halloween themed. :)

Below: Shannon+Phil made a makeshift Photobooth that kept their guests entertained throughout the night as well as served as a guest book! Providing guests with a Polaroid camera, film, gluesticks, a scrapbook, silly props, and a black curtain, guests went back repeatedly to take goofy pictures and pasted them into the scrapbook with accompanying messages.

Above: Caitlin+Christopher kept their slew of out-of-town guests occupied by providing a world atlas as their guest book, with each guest signing next to their own of travel.

Below: Various games can provide entertainment for a lull in the timeline for guests, as well as provide fun interaction for those guests of yours who don’t enjoy dancing.

ALTER YOUR ALTAR:

Churches, indoor, and outdoor spaces alike can all use some sprucing up sometimes. Just because it’s a plain space now doesn’t mean it has to be for your wedding day. Check out these ideas other couples used to spice up their space in a personal way!

Above: (Left) Married at Marbles, Lindsey+Jonathan were faced with having a background that was literally a giant black projection screen. Trying to figure out how to decorate it, Jonathan came up with the idea of projecting their favorite painting onto the screen, creating a beautiful and personal projection behind them. (Right) A salvaged fireplace mantle and two vintage doors were repainted and reused as a background to an indoor wedding.

Below: (Top Right) Liz+Chris were married with two young trees to mark their altar space. The trees were then taken and planted at their new home, adding a beautiful and personal touch to their wedding. (Bottom Right) Special cloth that had been in the family for generations was used to decorate this huppa adorning the ceremony.

ADDING A PERSONAL TOUCH TO YOUR RECEPTION SPACE:

So you’ve rented a hall… and now you’re not quite sure what to do with it. Ask yourself: if it were your home and you were having a party, how would you decorate it? After all, a wedding is pretty much just a giant (more meaningful) party. :) Consider what the couples below did in order to spruce up their reception in a way that suited their tastes and changed the space for a better (and more personal) way.

Above: (Left) Adding uplighting to any space instantly brings your wedding colors into your reception and creates a club-like vibe. (Right) This school gymnasium was beautifully turned into a stunning reception space simply by adding curtains, uplighting, and classy decoration that highlight the couple’s personalities.

Below: (1) A couple writes their name in chalk on a wall in their reception space. (2) A couple adds lanterns and drapery to the ceiling to create a more intimate space. (3) Another example of uplighting a reception to bring in the wedding colors. (4) A couple uses wildflowers from a local farm to tie in their views of supporting local farmers with their wedding. (5). Colorful lanterns are hung inside a reception tent to liven up the atmosphere.

HEY MR. DJ: I WANT A BAND

I’ve met a few couples that just aren’t into modern or mainstream music. Bringing their own personality to their party instead of partaking in the norm, they chose to hire various bands (ranging from an oldies band to a mountain jugband to an indie-country band) that reflect their tastes.

DISSING THE STANDARD CAKE FOR SOMETHING A LITTLE MORE… THEM:

A few of our couples ::gasp!:: haven’t liked cake. :) A few more of them went to try their wedding cake… and couldn’t choose just one. Instead of squeezing themselves into the model wedding cake idea, they chose to bring to the table what suited them best… and highlighted their personality.

SHOWCASING YOUR PERSONALITY AT YOUR WEDDING: I DID IT MY WAY

Here are some hodgepodge images of things that couples have done to make themselves stand out from the crowd. I tend to attract couples who don’t take themselves incredibly seriously (thankfully!) and tend to highlight that playful nature at their weddings. Their weddings end up fun, relaxed, and just fit the couple to an absolute “t”. Let’s look at things they did that might spark some creativity of your own. :)

Above: Martha+Justin, who both have jobs in the science field, incorporated their jobs into their wedding by using a standard Computation Book and turning it into their guest book, complete with pictures of themselves marked with funny lab notes. :)

Below: Sarah+Jimmy’s centerpieces were double sided on every table: one side included one goal they had set aside for themselves as a couple to accomplish each year, and the flip side was a quote about love that was significant to them.

Above: Continuing with Sarah+Jimmy’s wedding, the couple’s wedding favors were bags of coffee from the breakfast place where they ate the day they were engaged. A perfect way to personalize your wedding favors!

Below: (1) The groom was a fireman, so this personalized fireman’s hat was brought in as unique decor for their wedding. (2) Another vintage door was hand painted using regular paint, chalkboard paint, and chalk and set aside as decor. (3) A mini-replica of the couple’s house was used as a card holder. (4) Sweet tea home-brewed by the couple was given away as a favor at a backyard wedding. (5) Taffy, a candy native to the bride’s New Jersey shore, was the personal favor at this wedding.

Above Six Squares: (1) This nature-loving couple opted for the Unity Volcano instead of a Unity Candle at their offbeat ceremony (yes, with baking soda and vinegar like middle school… it was beyond awesome). (2) Taylor+Chris made their guests mix CDs of their favorite songs packaged in cute initial packaging for their favors. (3) A sword passed down through generations and used to cut many wedding cakes is used at Liz+Chris’s wedding. (4) Rosemary, an herb important to the couple and meant for remembrance is placed on the napkins of all of the guests. (5) In lieu of standard favors, this couple presented their guests with a small plantable succulent. (6) Table numbers were identified in this clever way at the wedding of two math professors.

Above: In addition to creating fun and personal decor, don’t forget to let your own personality shine through. :) Weddings can be stressful, but if you relax and allow yourself to be, well, you (like this bride did), you can turn your regular first look into something hilarious and unforgettable.

Below: Pie was served instead of cake at this wedding. Also, in lieu of having a standard receiving line or greeting guests at their tables, the couple decided to don aprons and scoop ice cream onto the plate of every guest who came through their line. It was an adorable and quirky version of a traditional guest greeting… and was very much in line with their personalities.

Above: These seemingly random items all had meaning for the couple and were gathered over several years. Funny and cute sayings were added using Scrabble tiles (the “Nice Tie” saying was placed at the table facing the bride’s dad… who paid more for his tie than his whole suit, much to the amusement of his family).

Below: The scientists strike again! Using test tubes taken from their lab (they weren’t used!), the couple filled them with M&Ms and tags. Their centerpieces incorporated wildflowers and the groom’s personal collection of books about space and science.

I hope that this blog post was able to strike up some ideas on how to incorporate your personalities into your wedding! Please feel free to list further suggestions (I definitely didn’t cover them all!) or start a discussion based on decor. I love learning about ways to take things that are inexpensive and personal to create an awesome wedding vibe!

…found only in the wild. :) Gobble gobble!

I really dislike ranting and I never do it on my blog, but there seems to be a rash of people who are very angry with photographers as a profession lately, and I’m here to address them.

For those of you who follow me on Facebook, you probably know about my recent encounter with a man in the RDU airport. If you already know this story, skip the next two paragraphs.

For those of you who don’t know this story, gather ’round the fireplace and let me spin you a tail. ;) I was taking my mom to Chicago in January as a Christmas present because she had always wanted to go. Of course (because it was January), our flights were cancelled and we could not go. Before we actually took off to fly all the way to Chicago, circle around, and get stranded in different airports in the midwest, I was at the RDU airport when Southwest started making announcements about the Chicago weather. My fellow passengers struck up a conversation, and a man asked me why I was going to Chicago in January. I told him I’m a wedding photographer, so the winter is the only time of year I have off.

He proceeded to become really (actually visibly) angry. He told me that I’m a criminal, a thief, “as bad as a lawyer” [my apologies to you lawyers out there], and that I should be flying my own private jet to Chicago. He informed me that his daughter is getting married in Raleigh in April and her wedding photographer cost $4,000. “It’s an absolute racket. You people don’t do anything but charge us an arm and a leg because you can because it’s for a wedding.” He said a bunch of other things that I don’t really remember because at one point his phone rang and I used this as my opportunity to get up and leave in tears. I wasn’t able to justify out cost because he wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise, but also because I was too choked up and flustered to explain to him the super complex reason for wedding photographer costs.

There are a million reasons why wedding photographers (and wedding vendors) charge what they do. Trust me: Geoff and I were married in 2010. It’s not a cheap thing to do and I recognize that. But being an “insider” in the industry, I also know the person I am and the people I work with, and I can honestly tell you from the bottom of my heart – we are NOT ripping off people because we can. Most of us are struggling to pay our bills ourselves. Now, I know that doesn’t immediately make sense. Lots of people see my website, see that I charge $x a wedding, calculate that by the number of weekends in a month, and seemingly I’m a millionaire. But that’s not how it works.

I thought and thought and thought about writing a response, but honestly, the list of reasons why we charge what we do is so expansive that it’s hard to even cover. Then someone posted an article in a forum where another photographer had done it already. :) So at the risk of completely plagiarizing this one photographer’s blog post, I’m simply going to link to it. She breaks down, cost by cost, the trust expense of being a wedding photographer… and why charging $3500/wedding doesn’t equate to my own private jet.

Please read her post here: http://blog.nikkimaydayphotography.com/2012/01/26/why-wedding-photographers-prices-are-wack-erie-pa-wedding-photographer-response/

Now – one thing she doesn’t cover in her post is cost of talent. With wedding photography, you typically get what you pay for. If you want an experienced professional with a full time gig as a wedding photographer, it’s going to cost you because of the aforementioned expenses but also that person’s specific talent (which is why they’re charging what they do – if their pictures were as good as your friend’s Uncle, we couldn’t charge for talent). This, in essence, also spells out why there’s a huge difference in wedding photography costs: Professionals have a lot of overhead, but they are also charging fairly for their time (Editing may seem free, but how it is different than anyone else having a 9-5 job at a computer?). They’re also charging for their talent. Amateurs don’t have overhead because they aren’t paying the appropriate business expenses (generally – not as a rule), but they’re probably also not charging fairly for their time, or they may be less because they haven’t reached a competitive level of talent yet.

Another thing – I have the utmost respect for those of you who don’t understand what we charge and ask us. Politely. I love to have conversations with people who are curious and polite. But to blatantly act as this man did in the airport (and as the bride on Craigslist said in her Craigslist ad mentioned in the link above) is completely ridiculous. Contrary to what you believe, we’re not criminals. We’re not thieves. Please do not treat us as such. We’re humans too.

So dear guy in the RDU airport… I hope you read this. And dear photographer who’s shooting the wedding of that guy’s daughter… I wish you the best of luck. Too bad there isn’t a charge listed in that expense list for emotional abuse you’ll take from people like him. :)

And dear all of my clients: I love you. You know I love you. I love that you support us and understand us and think that we are worth what we are charging. You are the reason why I put up with people like that guy in the airport. Because you get it. And I’m sending you all sorts of virtual hugs and high-fives right now.

**NEW EDIT: This is not, absolutely not, a place to complain about or bash certain types of people or clients or weddings or whatever. This is simply a piece written to explain to the people out there that there are reasons behind what we cost and the actual math involved. It’s about how we are actually honest people who run small businesses and aren’t out to “get” the average Joe. I will be deleting all comments that are viewed as off-topic or negative in nature.

Hey folks!

I e-mailed my general client database this morning to inform those which this switch immediately affects, but I’d like to tell the rest of you too… you know, so you’re in the loop and all that. ;) We have officially switched from DVDs to USB drives. Why?

We’re a big fan of Lightscribe. It etches an image into the DVD instead of printing out a picture and adhering it onto a DVD. It’s much more effective and lasts a longer longer. Eventually labels peel off or your disc will become unreadable because of the weight issues with labels stuck onto DVDs. So we Lightscribed all of our stuff… etching in images and names and makin’ them fancy. Unfortunately (and unbeknownst to us), there are some computers (both Mac and PC) that can’t read Lightscribe DVDs. This was brought to our attention by a wonderful (and understanding) client who owned both a Mac and PC… neither of which would read our DVDs. We gave them a regular DVD which it read fine and we realized: Uh oh… perhaps this is happening to a few people who haven’t spoken up but have had to use the computer of relatives and friends to read these DVDs. That scared us. And made us sad. All at the same time. It of course turned out that this was true… and I’ve already received one e-mail back since I announced the switch thanking me because their computer also could not read the DVD. :( Bad news bears.

The second reason we’re switching is because Apple’s new Mac mini does not have a DVD drive. So, uh, how would you see your pictures? A lot of our clients have Macs… and we like to be on top of technology and enable our clients to actually be able to use their pictures… so we’re making the switch. :)

On top of that, USB drives are pretty sweet. They’re small, easy to carry around, and useful. We’d recommend putting the files onto your computer and backing it up just as we would a DVD, and this makes it easier to do. They’re made from eco-friendly bamboo and are inscribed with the CSP logo. Tada!

This lovely client found her way to me by inquiring about real estate photography for one of her clients. I referred her to someone else, and shortly after received another e-mail from her… this time asking me to take her portraits. :) When she told me about her company and products, I was so excited. Stephanie Wetzel is the brains and beauty behind Trading Pounds, a business centered around her recent weight loss (she’s lost over an amazing 170 pounds so far since January 2010!). She’s already written and published one cookbook and is in the process of writing her second. Trading Pounds includes a blog, free e-books, and other personal coaching tools. Stephanie wanted some new photos to show her kick-butt new look and I was more than happy to help. She’s a ridiculously fun girl who has two cats, is a self-described nerd, and whose favorite recipe is pot pie with rosemary. :)

Along with her entourage (manager Elise and best friend Travis), we went into the naturey parts of a local park per her request to photograph Stephanie looking gorgeous. This was my first shoot of 2012… held on one of the coldest days in Raleigh I’ve encountered in a long time… and we all had very limited motion in our extremities by the end of the shoot. :D Thank you for your bravery, Stephanie… and for your awesomeness and help, entourage! 

Every once in a while I meet a person with dogs who says they don’t like cats because cats don’t have any personality. Or they say they only like cats who are nice and friendly. Granted, I am sure there are some not nice/unfriendly cats out there, but every cat I have ever known has had a huge personality… it’s just that they don’t particularly care for many people besides their owners and their closer friends. We are crazy cat people ourselves so I’m quite partial to the feline club, but no matter what your views are – it’s a bit impossible to see these pictures of Logan+Sully and think that cats don’t have personalities.

Logan Lemewski (“Lemmy”) and Sullivan McSkillet (“Sully) are my nephew-cats. They belong to my sister Laura and live with her in Pittsburgh where they win the all-time award for being  the craaaaaziest cats in the entire world (photographic evidence below). She recently referred a wedding to me and wanted to use the referral bucks to get pictures of her furry crew, so I took their portraits before Christmas and documented the crazy: the catnip bubbles, the jumping off of doors, the hopping up on cabinets, the drinking from faucets, the red cat pajamas. They are stinking adorable but also absolutely insane. She’s had many stories over the past few years and it basically boils down to the conclusion that they must be getting their paws on some pretty heavy catnip stored away in some secret stash.

Cat Answer Key: Sully is the black cat, and Lemmy is the grey and white cat.

<3 Love you, Lemmy, Sully, and Laura!

Brandy and Andrew met while she was a server and he was a cook at Johnny Rockets. They didn’t like each other. Brandy thought Andrew was stuck up. Andrew thought Brandy was weird. Eventually they ended up together and have been ever since. It turns out that what Brandy took for stuck up was just Andrew being kind of shy. But it also turns out that Andrew still thinks Brandy is “kind of weird”. :D ;) Bahahaha. But despite their differing views on the Harry Potter movies (Brandy loves them and Andrew politely puts up with them), they are fantastic together and laughed the whole time. They’re sooo sweet, but I already knew this about Brandy. We were in show choir and drama together for 3 years in high school… high-kicking our way to the top in our ridiculously sequined blue dresses. ;) Brandy has a beautiful singing voice. She met Andrew after we graduated (he went to another high school), so I just now have met him… and he’s wonderful! I’m so excited to see them together again on their wedding in June.

Photos taken at Johnny Rockets in Pittsburgh Mills (where they met) and Deer Lakes Park (behind the Mills). Special thanks to the Johnny Rockets crew for letting us shoot there before they opened up, and for the Deer Lakes Park fog for being so awesome and conveniently timed. Here is our wonderful Brandy and Andrew!

P.S. Brandy – you’re a fine girl (you’re a fiiine girl!). What a good wife you would be (such a fiiine girl!).

This was our very last wedding of 2011 held on December 17th. :) The day after, I flew to Pittsburgh to be home with my family for the holidays, and Gwen and Nick were patient and kind enough to be cool with me editing them when I got back in January. We could not have ended the year on a better note. Gwen, as you may recall from her engagement session, was a teaching co-worker of mine when I taught 2nd grade. She still teaches alongside my other teacher co-workers Jen (who was a bridesmaid in the wedding) and Sara (who did Gwen’s lovely makeup). It was so wonderful to see all of them again and to photograph Gwen and Nick’s family and friends on their wedding day. :) They’re such a sweet and loving couple… and December was the perfect month for them to get married as it’s an important month in their faith as well as a time when Gwen gets a little time off from work. ;) They combined adorable Christmas elements into their wedding… and I nearly cracked up when Gwen told me she was having her guests decorate ornaments for a tree while they were getting their pictures taken to occupy them (it was a very teacher-like craft assignment and amazing!).

Gwen looked beautiful and stunning, as always and Nick and his groomsmen looked awesome in their grey suits (I’m a sucker for grey suits and they photograph so well). Their ceremony took place in the church where they met. Their reception had a Cheerwine toast, a cheesecake bar, and a toilet papered getaway car that almost caught fire from their sparkler exit. ;) It was a beautiful day and I was happy to be there with them. Hope the pictures were worth the wait, guys. xo.

First Dance Song: “You and Me” – Lifehouse

Bride’s Occupation: 4th Grade Teacher

Groom’s Occupation: Software Developer

How You Met: Through our Sunday School class at Providence Baptist Church

Interesting Bride Fact: Competed in the NCAA DIII National Championship game in senior year of college

Interesting Groom Fact: Was the state champion in the floor routine as a 12 year old

Honeymoon Destination: Cruise to the Western Caribbean out of Tampa, FL

Date: December 17, 2011

Ceremony Venue: Providence Baptist Church // Raleigh, NC

Reception Venue: Cobblestone Hall // Raleigh, NC

DJ: Uniq Events

Florist: Harris Teeter

Cake: Melody Sawyer (friend)

Cheesecakes: The Twisted Fork

Hair: Kim Braddy

Makeup: Sara Haan // Makeup For Your Day

Coordinator: April Collier

A lot of you know I used to be a teacher. When you’re a teacher, you have a class of about 25-30 kids a year (plus their parents). You have initial meetings with them before the first day of school, then you batten down the hatches and go through the year with occasional consults in between. At the end of the year, you say farewell and hope they’ll stop by your class again as they get older.

Photography is not unlike that. I have about 30 couples (for weddings) a year (plus their parents…haha). I have initial consults with them, and then we batten down the hatches and go through the wedding planning, wedding photographing, wedding editing process. At the end of the year I bid them farewell and hope that I’ll see hear from them again down the road, either for a session or for coffee. :) Then I look at the list of the names on my Class of 2012 and think about all that we’re excited for.

So goodbye, Class of 2011! Each and every one of you were fabulous. We went to some incredible places and photographed some of our loveliest weddings yet. Better still, we made a lot of close friends out of some of our clients this year… which is probably the thing that I treasure most out of this job. We’re sooo excited to see what next year brings. Here are our favorites from the Class of 2011 (one picture from each portrait and wedding session we did).

As an added bonus, we’ve decided to show some outtakes of ourselves from some of our portraits and weddings. We take a lot of pictures. And, let’s face it, these are our weekends and weekdays too… so documenting your shindig is essentially documenting our lives… no matter how disheveled we look. ;) And trust us, we look pretty disheveled in some of these. But typically these are after a 10 hour work day with occasionally no food but lots of caffeine, so I’d say we’re looking pretty okay considering! ;) :P I find the evolution of my hairstyle and Geoff’s beard particularly amusing.

Happy, happy new year everyone…. here’s to a healthy, happy, and safe 2012 for all our families, friends, clients, and blog stalkers!

This is my second-to-last blog post before the end of the year (my last one, coming in a few days, is our best of 2011 post). I don’t post personal stuff terribly frequently, but before the Best Of post I wanted to say Happy Holidays to all of our clients in all different parts of the world and of every religion and non-religion. This is a glimpse into our corner of the world’s holiday cheer which consists of really bizarre family traditions like dressing up the CSP spokescats in t-shirts, taking your sister’s plastic dinosaur and placing it in the tree with a crown on its head while it simultaneously eats a reindeer and plays the saxophone, and feeding a healthy dose of eggnog to your nutcrackers. Happy holidays, ya’ll and yinz guys. ;)

Woooooo!!! We are very very happy and thankful to have one of our weddings highlighted in Luxe Mountain Weddings Magazine! It’s always exciting to have work of yours in print… and I gotta say I’m pretty proud of us. :) … though we couldn’t have done it alone!

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the following people: Debbie from Luxe Mountain Weddings, Sarah and Jimmy – our wonderful couple, all of the amazing wedding vendors from their wedding, and Geoff (husband) who second shot this and every wedding with me… and whose photograph landed the main “Escape to Asheville” page of the magazine!

Buy a copy of Luxe Mountain Weddings Magazine here.

This was a combination engagement and family shoot that took place on one of the coldest mornings I’ve ventured outside in a long time! Wendy and Nelson are engaged to be married in April of next year with Nelson adopting Wendy’s 11-year-old son Ashton. This is a big and exciting moment for all of them, so they wanted Ashton included in the engagement pictures with them. :) Wendy is a recruiter and Nelson is a lighting engineer… which means he gets to design the lighting in major buildings which I thought sounded pretty cool! Ashton is in 5th grade and his favorite subject is science. He plans on becoming a Marine Biologist, and his favorite superhero is a tied position between the Green Lantern and Captain America (he has good taste).

We’re super excited to be working with this loving and beautiful family in the spring!

I first met Dana and Daniel when I photographed their cat Hermine for a benefit I did early last year to raise money for Safe Haven for Cats, a no-kill shelter for cats in Raleigh. Dana was volunteering at Save Haven at the time and decided to have a session done of Hermine at their house. Hermine was really scared around new people and had a particular dislike for the camera, but was a beaaautiful kitty! Then this year I was contacted by Dana again, saying that her and Daniel and Hermine had welcomed in little Midori in June. :) I was so excited to meet her and to see the couple and their feisty cat again! Hermine apparently hasn’t been taking Midori’s entrance all that well… but actually she was quite less skittish this year than last (perhaps she’s gotten used to people coming and going and lots of noises from the baby). She still isn’t quite sure about Midori… and general avoids her, but Midori loves Hermine and is about to get to that crawling-and-tail-pulling age that I’m sure Hermine will appreciate. ;)

Dana and Daniel moved from Germany a while back and have jobs teaching psychology at NC State. They wanted a few pictures of Midori in her baby Santa dress(which is ADORABLE)! I asked if they had their tree up, but in Germany it isn’t custom to put their tree up until the night before Christmas, which I found very interesting! It must be nice to live somewhere where the Christmas decorations don’t start creeping in before Halloween. :P Enjoy the adorableness of this family!

Trying to tie up a bunch of loose ends this week before I head out for the holidays, so forgive my unusual lack of long introductions. ;)  Here’s a quick glimpse into Raleigh’s 2011 Winterfest that I was kindly asked to photograph by my friends at the Downtown Raleigh Alliance. :) It was a beautiful evening! It was sad to see Mayor Meeker light the tree for the last time, but we welcome in Raleigh’s new mayor, Nancy McFarlane, with open arms. :)

See that little pup in the header above us? The one in the green grass? She’s back… and though older, she’s just as adorable and wonderful… as are Renee and Daniel. :) Renee and Daniel are one of my mom’s favorite couples of mine. Is that weird? That my mom has couples whom she’s never met but that she loves just from their pictures in my blog post? She always says, “They seem like such nice people.” And they are! What can I say, my mom’s a good judge of character. :P This is my third time working with them and my second with Khia, the most adorable Australian Shepherd in the world. They were all fabulous models, as usual! We had fun catching up and hiking around, and Daniel had a little too much fun throwing leaves at Renee. I hope you’ll all enjoy this couple’s post as much as I know my mom will. :P

Ashley and Dave both went to the same high school as me, but were four years ahead in my sister’s grade. My sister, who has been graduated from high school for some time (sorry, Laura) coincidentally boarded a plane to LA on a trip to New Zealand a few years ago and happened to sit next to Ashley on the flight from Pittsburgh to LA in another weird, Twilight-Zoney type of thing that happens to me way too much. So when Ashley went on the hunt for a wedding photographer via Facebook, my sister kindly referred me. :)

Ashley and Dave are getting married at Heinz Chapel and PNC Park next year! Geoff is ridiculously excited to shoot at PNC Park… and is convinced (in some sort of fantasy land type of way) that the Pirates will end up in the playoffs and that there will be a playoff game taking place at PNC Park during the wedding and that he’ll somehow be able to take part and witness both. Even if the playoffs don’t happen for the Pirates (and let’s face it…), we’re still both super excited to shoot the wedding for this lovely couple! For their engagement, Ashley wanted “very classy” pictures in front of the Pittsburgh skyline on Mt. Washington at the very end of the day and night, and then a few at a restaurant where her and Dave had dinner reservations. I do believe that this set of pictures is extra classy and extra skyline-y. :) Enjoy!

*P.S. I still love you, Raleigh, but nobody can top this skyline.

*P.P.S. I think I can see my dorm room from here! :P My college is the orange building w/ the flag on top of it in the lower left hand corner of the picture below. I lived in a dorm room on the 17th floor. My dad HATED move-in day. :)

It’s rare to find a day in late November in Pittsburgh when it doesn’t rain, so I’ll take doomy overcast any day! Amanda and Sean are getting married next July up in the ‘Burgh and wanted to shoot their engagement session on the North Shore with a view of the ever-awesome skyline. What is nice about shooting in Pittsburgh (especially on the North Shore) in late November is that no one is there… as opposed to summer months when you can’t ever get a good shot because of the tons and tons of boats in the background. :)

Amanda and Sean met in high school and have been dating for many years. She is a pension analyst and Sean designs software. They are getting married at Stonebridge Farm Nursery and I am sooo excited to shoot there… it’s absolutely lovely! They rocked it out on the North Shore in the epic cloudiness in late November… so I’m looking forward to seeing them in sunshine on a farm in early July!

You know you’ve known someone for a long time when one of your past experiences with them involves going to see Oasis in concert.

Morgan was a few grades older than me, but close friends with my sister. It turns out that she was also close friends with Geoff’s sister at the same time in some weird Twilight Zone-y way. Anyway, I used to see a lot of Morgan until I got to the point where I would stop pestering my sister to hang out with her and her friends. :P They graduated, I graduated, etc (in closer proximity to Morgan’s younger sister Randi), and our relationship turned into Facebook friends, as so many relationships do these days. When she asked me to shoot the wedding of her and her fiance Jim back in Pittsburgh and about 10 minutes away from our hometown, I was very excited… excited to see her and her family again, and excited to meet Jim, because I was pretty sure he’d be pretty cool.

And of course he is (and I welcome another groom who has GREAT hair and excellent music taste), and of course they are, and of course their family and friends are. In fact, it was one of the coolest assemblies of people we’ve met in a long time. There were cats involved, an old family house, Tom’s wedding shoes, alleyways to shoot in that I’d never thought to visit even though I grew up ten minutes away, lots of Hall and Oates and Phil Collins, a videographer who used to be my band teacher, a Glen’s custard visit (a Springdale staple), and… perhaps best of all… a totally decked out Steelers bar who yelled at our newlyweds from across the street: “Hey, yinz guys come over here and we’ll give you a drink!” Of course, the drinks actually were accompanied by the owners and local bar residents blasting The Black Eyed Peas “I Gotta Feeling” while playing along via jugband (i.e. banging whisks against beer bottles) in celebration of Morgan and Jim’s soon-to-be marriage. I’m not sure what could have been better, but upon wading through and editing their pictures later, I’ve determined that nothing could have been better.

First Dance Song: “Something” – The Beatles

Bride’s Occupation: Pricing Coordinator – GNC Corporate Headquarters

Groom’s Occupation: Project Administrator  - Siemens Energy // Soccer Coach

How You Met: Well, we were born in the same hospital 2 days apart and were in the nursery together – our families even visited with one another (her Mom and his Aunt were bffs in high school).  But we don’t really remember that.  25 years later our mutual friends unknowingly reunited/introduced us.

Interesting Bride Fact: 100% certified crazy cat lady, and avid bookworm

Interesting Groom Fact: Has an extremely extensive record collection, shuns most modern technology, and hopes to one day open a used book store so that he can go to work barefoot every day.

Date: November 19, 2011

Ceremony and Reception Venue: Springdale Veterans Association // Springdale, PA

Officiant: District Magistrate Carolyn Bengal

DJ: Craig Brown // DJ Goodtimes

Florist: Springdale Floral

Cake: Oakmont Bakery

Caterer: Patti Luffy // Ranieri Catering

Hair/Makeup: Ashlee Pici Seger // Ashley DeMasi Hair Salon

Videographer: Brian Querry // Querry Music Productions