Wedding Flowers with Gillian Marie Events

One of the greatest things about being in the wedding industry is seeing all of the beautiful, special pieces people put into their big day. Each wedding is different and each has its own pretty parts and pieces that make it just perfect for the couple.

The wedding day flowers are some of the most spectacular aspects of the wedding day. So many different colors, textures, designs, scents, feels, etc. They cover almost every sense (hey, did you know pansies were edible?). The choice of flowers can change the feel of an entire room, the feel of an entire wedding even!

And there are so many considerations too… What does the dress look like? What does the room look like? What season is it? What are your wedding colors? Do you have any allergies? What style are you going for? Where will the flowers be?

My very first job was in a flower shop and I carry a very close fondness for all things flowers. I've gone through many "favorite flowers" too. They used to be daffodils, then pansies, then stargazer lilies, and now gardenias. Oh how I love gardenias! If there's anything in the world that smells more heavenly than gardenias, I haven't found it.

And talking flowers, I want to introduce you to a truly amazing florist I met last month, Gillian Sawyer. She's the owner of Gillian Marie Event Design and she creates absolute masterpieces. She's based out of East Bay and I believe she travels all over the Bay area. I got together with her for a photoshoot this week and I wanted to share some of the images from the day.

So here is just a small sampling of Gillian's awesome work…

Roses and mini cymbidium orchid bouquet


And totally cute matching boutonniere


Gardenia, rose, dendrobium orchid, hydrangea, and tulip bouquet with jewels (and it smelled lovely!)


Rose bouquet with jewels


And the intricate ribbon detailing along the stems


Rose, calla lily, and freesia bouquet


And brightly matching boutonniere


Stunning, huh?

As if this weren't enough, she's totally sweet as can be and it's obvious she loves what she does. Seriously, check her out. Like right now!

Gillian with her beautiful tulip and cala lily bouquet


Thanks, Gillian, I can't wait to work with you again!

And here is a neat wedding flower resource that might be helpful to you future brides:
Bliss Wedding Floral Generator

Flowers always make people better, happier and more helpful; they are sunshine, food and medicine to the soul.
~ Luther Burbank

A Catholic Wedding in Tahoe with Lisa Leigh

I am so excited to bring around one of my first weddings of 2008! I shot this one with the talented Lisa of Lisa Leigh Photography at Queen of the Snows Catholic Church and the PlumpJack Squaw Valley Inn in Tahoe. It was great that the wedding was in March because there was still snow everywhere! It was so neat to make the three hour drive from San Francisco towards Tahoe and see everything change to crisp and white.

The couple was the very beautiful Nicole and Aaron. As usual, I got to go off and photograph the guys while Lisa took care of the girls. Aaron was surrounded by a funny group of guys and a great brother to serve as his best man. Being that we were in Tahoe, I wanted something special to highlight their rings so what's more perfect than a pine cone? And though Aaron is certainly suave, there's not much he could do with his two nieces, Madeline and Sydney who almost took the spotlight of the day as you'll see later.



The girls were just too cute and Sydney loved her grandfather and simply lit up and ran to him whenever she could. With faces like these, how could they not take center stage every once in a while throughout the day?!



And enter Nicole. Totally stunning. Really. Like some exotic mix between Penelope Cruz and Winona Ryder with her fair skin and dark hair. Stunning is the closest I can come to describing her. Her beautiful Vera Wang dress and beautiful mantilla just completed her.



Her maids work cute silk dresses in a variety of styles but all were a luxe jewel-toned purple that carried through the wedding. Each one of these girls could have been a model – they were all beautiful. The girls had snow white bouquets of tulips as Nicole carried white calla lilies. The little ones wore cute purple hair wreaths with little berries. I did feel bad for the girls during a lot of the outside pictures because they were absolutely freezing in their knee-length dresses. They savored being in the sun to try to warm them up a bit and poor Nicole was forced in the shade for most of the pics.



And of course Madeline is just as cute as can be with Nicole, her soon-to-be aunt who just adores them. (FYI, I worked with this image and the one of Nicole above to make it look a little softer and "antique-like". I think it suits the picture perfectly, don't you?)



The church, Queen of the Snows, was spectacular. It was just this little place that we literally passed by a few times because it looks plain and blended in with all the snow on the outside. Once inside, there was an enormous window facing the snow-covered mountains and evergreens. Well, I don't think I need to describe much, see for yourself!



The light was so beautiful and it was all so picture perfect. Unfortunately, everyone in the first row was sweating buckets by the end of the ceremony and Aaron was just soaked for sitting up on the altar in the direct sun in the middle of the day. He apparently took a shower after the ceremony to freshen up!





It was a great ceremony and the happy couple were just in grins the entire time. They were so obviously in love.



Back at PlumJack, the dining area was set up with it's classic candelabras and white gauzy panels on the ceiling. It was so detailed and everything looked amazingly put together. Even the favors of hot chocolate mix and marshmallows (how fitting for wintery Tahoe wedding!) were well attended to with deep purple ribbon.



The toasts by the maid of honor (Nicole's sister), the best man (Aaron's brother), and the father of the bride were heartfelt and funny. Nicole's father thanked his beautiful wife for their lovely lives together and everyone mentioned how Nicole and Aaron completed each other.



They didn't want much fanfare and there was no cake smashing, so Aaron and Nicole quietly cut the wedding cake after dinner. It was a really elegant and simple chocolate cake with purple dendrobium orchids adorning it.



Before heading back to San Francisco that night, we had some fun at the reception and watched Nicole and Aaron share their first dance together. As cute as can be, Madeline showed up and the three of them danced around in circles a few times before the couple finished off their dance together with a kiss.



A flawless day with beautiful surroundings for a great couple. Congrats, Nicole and Aaron!

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the number of moments that take our breath away. (anonymous)

Modeling Session at Baker Beach/Chrissy Field

After scheduling and rescheduling several times due to gross San Francisco weather, I finally photographed Shelly about a week ago at Baker Beach and Chrissy Field. I can't say that the weather was particularly optimal on that day either. We met at Baker Beach in the evening and it was sooo windy! I had never seen it so blustery! I was kind of bummed because we had planned to do a trash-the-dress but there was no way that was happening.

We started off at Battery Chamberlain to help shield us from the gusts. I love shooting back there with the grungy, chipped-paint feel of things. It's a very cool spot. It also has some great lines and stark colors with the iron fixtures.

Shelly came to me for pictures for her modeling portfolio. She is currently a graduate student studying child and family counseling up in Sacramento, but modeling can be a fun extracurricular. And good god, she has the looks to back it up!

After realizing that the beach shots were out, we traveled over to Chrissy Field to continue our fun. We passed by some trees in the Presidio and I just had to pull over to get some of her there. The sun was streaming through them just perfectly and it was so lush and green.

Onwards to Chrissy Field.

We wandered around a bit down to the beach and came across the back of a small, old building. It was just perfect. Again with the chipped paint but this place had cracked windows, whitewashed boards, and was just something I could see as the background in an Anthropologie catalog. All of the colors blended just perfectly. That teal shirt looked amazing on her.

And can you believe that those are her real eyes and not colored contacts!? I mean, come on!

Shelly was just charming and so natural. Not a lot of makeup, not a lot of hair products, and no diva-like attitude.

We did get her wild side once she pulled out her pink Britney Spears sunglasses. She apparently dresses up as Britney on occasion*… She had a hard time giving me a serious sassy face but she definitely pulled it off. Totally badass, huh?

We wrapped up with some bubbles on the field. Somehow they really seemed to fit her – playful, happy, not taking herself too seriously, and just fun.

You just wait, you'll be seeing this face on billboards soon enough!

* Shelly tells me that it was just for a theme party. Riiiight.

I'm about to bring the heat
Lockin' down the industry
All dressed up and glamorous
Red carpet and cameras
-Britney Spears, "Outrageous"

Pictures, or it didn't happen!

Strange? Maybe. Cool? Definitely.

A friend alerted me to a photographer in Brooklyn who is doing a different kind of photography – undercover. According to Daily Candy – New York,

"You are being watched.

No, no! We didn’t mean it in a creepy, Richard Ramirez kind of way. This is a good kind of stalking. The kind you pay for, actually.

It’s MethodIzaz, a new style of undercover portrait photography from young Brooklynite Izaz Rony.

Don’t be shy. Meet with the enthusiastic, unintimidating fellow-with-snapping-fetish, who will tailor his covert photo-taking technique to your specifications. Hand over your weekly schedule (or that of your unsuspecting subject) and go about your business as usual — working, shopping, jaywalking, etc. Rony takes your (or your unsuspecting lover’s) photos on the sly, subject unaware.

The results are candid portraits devoid of artifice. No stupid fake smiles, manufactured poses, unsightly turtle chins, or deliberate crotch shots. Leave that kind of overexposure to the papparazzi."

Really, how cool is that?

I try to shy away from really contrived poses and expressions and this is the ultimate in natural. Anyone up for it in the San Francisco Bay Area? I'm game!

And another similar idea is undercover photography for marriage proposals. Totally genius! The asker hires a photographer to covertly capture the moments before, during, and after he (or she) pops the question. See this New York Times article for more.

Of course it's not for everyone but with a greater and greater emphasis on candid, photojournalistic moments, it's no surprise that people are asking for these private moments captured by professional photographers. This is the real deal. This is authenticity at it's finest. As some in the article mentioned, "Proposal photographs represent the absolute beginning of the marriage story, and for some groom who is influenced by these other forces, this is sort of an obligatory scene to record." The idea that really struck a chord with me was, "You can take pictures with the woman you love all the time, but the smile on her face in that moment is something you can’t recreate."

This is an amazingly exciting time to be a photographer. People are letting me into their lives to experience the tenderest, most meaningful moments of their lives. I already feel incredibly honored when asked to shoot a wedding – this couple is choosing me to document and artistically capture one of the most special days of their lives. But now there's that much more that people want captured. Take these for example: birth photoshoots, "a day in the life", bride getting dressed for her wedding day, and more.

I photograph for Moment By Moment, which is a nonprofit organization that pairs photographers with children who have life-limiting illnesses. Free of charge, the photographer photographs the child and family in the hospital, home, or wherever it is most comfortable for everyone. The family then receives a box of photographs and a CD with all of the images. It's emotional and difficult but the family members are so thankful to have these images and I'm thankful to be able to take them.

Photojournalism isn't just for newspapers anymore. We may not be The Truman Show yet but professional portrait photographers like myself are getting in on the action and sharing some pretty amazing times with people. Being allowed to follow the lives of people is incredible: proposal photography, engagement photography, wedding photography, maternity photography, birth photography, child photography, family photography, high school senior photography… Rinse, and repeat!


If you are looking for someone to covertly photograph your proposal or discreetly capture your true expressions, contact me and we'll let the planning begin!

Smile, you're on Candid Camera!

Photography 101: Kiss My Aspect Ratio

This will be my first installment of Photography 101 and I hope it won't scare you away, but I'm going to talk a bit about aspect ratios. Before I get into that, let's start at the beginning. (cue cheesy flashback transition.)

When you look through your camera, the shape you see is this:

This is the typical ratio of all 35mm cameras out there. Quite specifically, this ratio is 2x3.

So you take loads of pictures and you go to get some of these images printed. 4"x6" is the most popular size and it's a good thing, because they conform to the same 2x3 ratio – so you don't lose any bit of the picture.

But what if you want a 5"x7" or 8"x10" print? This is where things get messy.

You see, if you wanted your entire picture squeezed into an 8x10, it would look something like this:

While this doesn't look so bad on a grizzly bear, people are a little less appreciative of this squishing…

You've ordered pictures online and saw this thing, right?

It's a cropping tool and it forces you to choose what part will be clipped off of your picture.
A 5"x7" picture will need to crop off a little on the long side:

An 8"x10" picture will need to crop off more along the long side:

So if you don't have extra stuff around the subject of your picture, what do you do? Something's gotta go. Sadly, a full 2x3 picture can never be an 8"x10" print. An 8"x12" would be a perfect print size (again, a 2x3 ratio) but the history of photography has given us these "standard" sizes which force us into 8"x10" frames.

In practical terms, these are your options when confronted with a tight squeeze:

1) Ideally, you'd order a frame size that works with your picture. In this case, an 8"x12" frame.

2) Crop one or both sides

3) Minimize the image and leave a border (windowboxing)

Does #3 look familiar? It should if you've ever watched a dvd with both widescreen and normal viewing options. The widescreen mode will show you everything, but it'll be a smaller picture and it will have a bar across the top and bottom. The normal mode will fill up your screen but you'll lose the stuff on the ends.

If your photographer ever tells you that he/she simply can't make that picture into an 8x10 print without chopping off someone's head or feet, I hope it will make a little more sense.

If you'd like to read more about the math behind aspect ratios, I recommend you go here.

[I crop ] for the benefit of the pictures. The world just does not fit conveniently into the format of a 35mm camera. - W. Eugene Smith