The Schmergusons: A Santa Barbara, CA Wedding! Part 1

This wedding was one of the most fun weddings I've ever been to- including ones I was invited to as a guest!  Here are some shots of Kelly Schmandt & Scott Ferguson's (hence "Schmerguson") wedding in beautiful Santa Barbara, California.  Despite the fact that I personally know incredible wedding photographers in Cali that I can highly recommend, I much prefer for West Coasters (can I call them that?) to fly me out for their wedding instead.  :)  I love weddings in Cali and generally find that it's a 99% chance of sun and 70 degrees just about every day.

I know Kelly from college in Nashville and I had never met Scott before- especially since it would be a long distance flight to meet for coffee like I do with most wedding couples.  I was a bit nervous going into it knowing Kelly so well, but having no idea about Scott and his groomsmen.  Maybe it's me, but as a male photographer shooting a wedding I generally find it easy to get comfortable with the bride and bridesmaids, but groomsmen can be hit or miss.  If I had to make a slightly sexist generalized guess, it's that generally women enjoy getting dressed up and going to a wedding, whereas most men generally feel out of sorts with a rented tux and a strange person taking their photo all day- at least until they've had a few beers at the reception.  This wedding was not the case.  Scott was easily the smiley-est person I've ever met.  His groomsmen also fit quite into his personality (you can tell by the hats and bowties).  These guys were a whole lot of fun to photograph!

Now on to some photos of getting ready and the ceremony!

The first look:

I'm telling you, Scott was smiling like this all day:

The ceremony took place in an office building courtyard... but you'd never know it by the fountain, vegetation, and architecture!

The groomsmen rehearsing to sing "All You Need is Love" as the bride came down the aisle:

The people that didn't seem to trust that I knew what I was doing.  ;)

One of the coolest things I've seen at a wedding was having Kelly's yoga instructor have the audience stand and do breathing exercises.

Which included a "laughter" breathing exercise.

This was told to me to be the most difficult, but important photo I needed to take.  It almost took me falling into the pond, but I got it.  :)

"Now put your hand on your hip... no, not you."  :)

'Lil Mac 6 Months

A couple of weeks ago, I was asked to take 6 month photos of Mac Brown.  Aside from his pretty awesome name (I always think of Mike Tyson's Punch Out when I hear "'lil Mac"), he also happens to be a pretty darn cute baby.  I'd say he did a great job being a model while on a cold floor in front of a big flashing light.  Maybe next time I'll bring an electric blanket to put underneath the white seamless paper.  Photographing babies is always a learning process for me.  :)

And for those interested in the white backdrop setup, here it is- though you can't see the big studio light & softbox off the camera left.  Sorry Kacie for including you- I just had to show that "about to freak out" face of Mac's.  :)

A Day in the Park with Lila and June

A few of weekends ago, we had a couple in town with their two daughters, Lila and June.   Aside from the fact that "Lila and June" would be the best name for a Nashville country duo (don't worry, Daddy is helping push them in the musical direction), they also just happen to be two of the sweetest little girls I know.  Sunday afternoon before they went back to Nashville we were able to spend a couple of hours at a nearby park and walk the trails of the old Decatur Water Works.  Though it was a cloudy day, I think we were able to still get a few casual fun shots of the girls.  Apparently while on the way to Atlanta on Friday, June said to Mommy and Daddy, "I don't wanna go to Georgia!"  By the end of Sunday in the park she said "I want to STAY in Georgia!"  :)

Working for Their Wedding | Lindsey & Mario @ Donaldson-Bannister Farm in Dunwoody, GA- Part 2

In case you missed the photos from Friday of Mario and Lindsey's wedding, click here!  Now, check out Part two of their beautiful wedding at Donaldson-Bannister Farm in Dunwoody, GA!  

Homemade cake by a family friend and Dad rehearsing his toast:

One of Mario's brothers' notes for his toast....

...and he was a huge hit.

There are two distinct ways to get a man on the dance floor, as shown here:

Working for Their Wedding | Lindsey & Mario @ Donaldson-Bannister Farm in Dunwoody, GA- Part 1

I shot Lindsey and Mario's wedding in October last year on the same weekend as Rachel & Andy's wedding.  I also recently met with the woman who helped with the venue to put it on, Linda Shulin.  When I initially met Lindsey & Mario and heard they picked a beautiful location that generally doesn't host many events, I didn't think much of it other than "cool!  I new venue to check out!"  During and after the wedding, I came to find out how much work went into just getting the wedding approved there, let alone the WORK they all put into it!

When Keri and I had our wedding, we did it semi-DIY by choosing venues where we could bring all our own stuff versus paying the venue to do it all or contract it out.  We thought that was a challenge at times.  Lindsey and Mario chose a historical home owned by the city of Dunwoody that had never seen a wedding in recent years and was being modestly maintained by volunteers.  Lindsey, Mario, their families, Linda and I'm sure a number of others made it happen through much paperwork, permitting, and heavy duty landscaping!  It helps that Lindsey is a lawyer and Mario is a landscape architect.  :)

I was told a number of hours were put in for many days making the venue as beautiful as it was that fall day.  The most notable of which is that the location where the actual ceremony took place (the grassy area with the hand-made-by-Mario white arbor) was an old swimming pool just 2 days before the wedding!  Mario, friends, and family filled it in and sodded it so they could hold the ceremony there!  I don't know about you, but I've never heard of so much hard work going into a wedding on top of all that jazz about finding a dress, caterer, DJ, and god-awful photographer.  ;)  Check out the photos below from one of the most beautiful DIY weddings I've ever heard of.

This was a POOL a few days prior!

And finally, a groomsmen idea.  :)

Winter Post, Summer Wedding- Adam & Rebecca

Here is the other wedding from last summer that I completely slacked on putting on the blog.  Adam and Rebecca had a beautiful wedding in Marietta with their reception at the Roswell Mill (one of my favorite venues!).  The happened to be on the hottest weekend of the year, but fortunately they planned their wedding indoors.  It was quite a challenge getting any photos outside due to the 100 degree+ heat (as you'll see in one of the photos below).  I made sure to only run outside for a few shots at a time as there is nothing worse than a hot and sweaty wedding party.  A hot and sweaty wedding photographer is a different story... I wore all linen to try and beat the heat but by the time I got to the reception even my pant legs were soaked.  A/C was my good friend that night.  :)

Christmas In Febtober: A January Summer Wedding Post

With the New Year comes reflections on 2012.  Though I have no grand ideas and emotions I'd like to emote, I will say I am launching a few ventures this year to help Alex The Photo Guy keep the business strong in the new year.  I resolve to shoot more projects for myself and hang out with Marc Del Santro taking photos out in the wilderness (I have a few ideas for 2013 on that).  I also resolve to market my wedding business harder, update my website, follow-up on emails quicker, and stay on top of the blog.  With the latter resolution comes two blog posts- both way late, as they were weddings I shot during the summer at the height of the heat wave.  I generally stay on top of blog posts, but with wedding season continuing strong from summer to fall I fell behind on these two on the blog.

The first wedding I'm making up lost ground on was Sallie and Aaron in Asheville, NC.  Sallie is one of my sister's best friends and she had a beautiful wedding at the Biltmore UMC and Doubletree Hotel.  It was a beautiful location wedding, albeit a very hot weekend.  The one thing Sallie told me was "I HAVE to have a mountain view shot."  My trusty second shooter, Curt, accompanied me on the trip and we spent a few hours the day before scouting locations near the church that we could get to and from before the reception.  In the end it turned out, the best shot was in the parking lot of the church.  Few people saw this shot with their naked eye beforehand.  That's because the trained eye of a photographer knows he needs to to lay on the black asphalt with a long lens in order to avoid parking barriers and the rusted chain link fence below the hill.  Plus, it helped that the sun poked its head from behind the clouds for just a moment, parting the way for the mountains.  ;)

 

Andy & Rachel’s Wedding at Park Tavern- Part 2 | Atlanta Wedding Photographer

Here is part two of Andy and Rachel's Park Tavern wedding.  Not surprisingly, Park Tavern knows how to host a good party.  You'll easily see below that this wedding was quite the party.  :)

Did I mention I was the second most talented photographer at the wedding?

Andy & Rachel's Wedding at Park Tavern- Part 1 | Atlanta Wedding Photographer

I've posted before on Facebook that often when sitting at a coffee shop editing wedding photos, I find myself smiling back at Photoshop.  Not because I love the program, my computer, or my coffee.  I smile because for wedding editing, I'm looking through photographs of two people on the best day of their life.  Almost every photo has someone smiling, laughing, dancing, and sometimes crying tears of joy.  Maybe it's the dumb reflex part of my brain wanting to mimic smiling faces I see or perhaps it's that through the hectic 8 hours of photographing a wedding day, I only get to truly reflect on the event when going through the photos days later.

 As a general rule, I'm not often outwardly emotional as my wife (who cries at sad TV commercials) would note.  However, having been married and seeing Keri walk down the aisle in her dress and having family and friends there, I know what it feels like to be overcome these feelings on this occasion.  I say all of this because I smile a lot at coffee shops, but the other day I found myself tearing up.  I'm not particularly close to Andy and Rachel, though I have spend time with them prior to the wedding and think they are a wonderful couple, so it surprised me to feel the saltwater welling up in my eyes.  It was the following two photos in particular that got me.  Maybe it's because I was in that same spot a year ago and wish I looked as sharp as Andy in his tailored suit.   For me, seeing these two photos of Andy as Rachel walked down the aisle really got to me.  You can see the childlike reflex of pulling his hands from his pockets to holding onto his suit like a security blanket.  He was overcome with this inexplicable emotion of seeing Rachel for the first time in that long white wedding dress.  I'm glad I was able to capture this moment on digital film.

These two photos aren't the most photographically impressive photos, but to me they evoke more emotion than most.  These two got me.  I'll post one more that I thought was sweet, then get on to the rest of Part 1.  This next one is pretty self explanatory of the mother-son dance, and to be honest I think explains a lot about the two photos of Andy above.  (p.s.- Andy, I hope this didn't embarrass you too much). 

Alright!  Now onto the fun stuff!  I have to first give a shout out to the vendors as they pulled of a beautiful and fun wedding!  Simply Charming Socials did the day of coordination and lovely decorations, Pink Cupcake Dreams brought delectably decadent cupcakes (I took a few leftovers home to Keri!), and DJ Andrew Wrobleski lit up the dance floor (more of those photos to come in Part 2!).

Braxton is TWO and Brady is three months!

There are few families that have documented the growth of their children as well at the Romeyns.  I'm always happy to get that quarterly text message from Lexi that she needs new photos of her little ones.  Braxton turned two years old in October and Brady just hit her three month milestone.  We had a great time a couple of weeks ago enjoying/destroying all of Krister's piles of raked leaves.  All in the name of good photos, right?

Keri tells me only at this age is it a compliment to call Brady a cute little chunker.  I'll keep that in mind.  :)

My First Published Article: Tips for Child Photography

From time to time I get general solicitations from various photography-related groups.  Usually it's to sign up for a mailing list, join a club, or buy something.  Recently I was contacted by the Society of Professional Mexican Photographers asking if I could write an article on children photography.  After some research found out that the SMFP (they spell photo with an "f"- much easier) seems to be the Mexican version of the Professional Photographers of America- an organization that I am a member of.  Initially I was skeptical due to the broken English email, but I realized that the vast majority of my blog posts are in broken English as well.  I was happy to write the article and send a few pictures along and I just found out it was put in their online newsletter with the potential for me to have additional opportunities for their Latin American distributed print magazine.  I don't fancy myself a writer (see blog entries 1 through 156), but it helped that the limit was 300 words for the article.  Once I was rolling on it, the only hard part was keeping it to 300 words!  I realize I should do more of these when the opportunity presents itself.  You may ask why a Mexican magazine?  My answer is that I have no idea... but I'm not going to complain if it furthers my international exposure.  :)   Here is the article as it appears on their website.  I wrote the article in American English and they translated it to Mexican Spanish.  The full English version is further below.  Enjoy!

Here is the content in the original language.  I tried to avoid $100 words so it would translate a little better.  That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.  :)

"Taking photos of children can be a challenge at times. We’ve all been there when a mother has asked us to photograph an unhappy, shy, or otherwise difficult child. Here are some ways to get the photos you want while helping the child become more comfortable with you and your camera.

The first thing I concentrate on is finding a good location. If the child is very young, it can often be wise to take photos at the family’s home. This way, the child will be more comfortable with his or her surroundings and doesn’t have to venture far to be comfortable. Generally, I like to shoot outdoors with children (except for newborn babies). It gives them the freedom to wander around and explore. Your job is to follow them (on your hands and knees if you have to!) to catch that perfect smile and natural pose.  The idea is to let them have fun on their own and you catch the moments that happen. There will be many disappointing photos, but the good ones are GREAT because they are natural- no posing!

Always make sure to tell the parents to dress the child in comfortable clothes and no busy patterns. Try to avoid the color white if you think the child could get dirty. Ask the parents to bring along rewards for the children in case they get upset. That way you can say, “if you stand over here, mommy will give you some juice!” Just be sure that these rewards (candy, snacks, juice) aren’t messy and could discolor teeth or get on clothes.

I generally shoot in natural light with no flash. This allows the child and I to move around a backyard or playground and give them the space they need. If the child is being good and will sit and pose, I’ll have the parent hold a reflector to supplement lighting if necessary. I typically shoot with the Canon 5d Mark II and a variety of lenses. My most used lens is the 24-70mm because it will give me a good range of close up shots for faces and smiles as well as wide angle to get playground items or helping family members. Depending on the lighting, I generally shoot between ISO 100 and 400. The idea is to shoot what will give you a high enough shutter speed in case the child is fast moving!

The bottom line is to get outside, play around, and have fun! You’re bound to get good photos if you and your subject are having fun!"

Hudson Bassett!

My sister's son, Hudson, just recently reached his 3-month milestone and I had the privilege of photographing him at Mom and Dad's house a few weeks ago.  He has so much personality and is just full of smiles.  I can't wait until he starts walking and talking.  :)

(Gun show)

He LOVED laying in the grass.  At first, he would curl up and close his eyes, unsure of what what poking him.

Then a few moments later he'd open his eyes with a big smile on his face.

Cat Island, Day Two!

Just a quick update from Cat Island!  During the day I took the Gro-Pro out snorkeling on a local island and we kayaked through the mangrove to a secret beach.  Last night was the rehearsal dinner and dancing.  Nicci, the bride, surprised everyone by hiring a local drumline, Junk-a-Noo, to bring a 45 minute conga line (without stopping the music) through the resort!  Then, between beers, I was running back and forth on the beach getting star trail photos.  Having an incredible time at the Fernandez Bay Village!  Here are a few shots from the day:

Cat Island, Bahamas Wedding

The blog will be pretty scarce this weekend as I'm in the Bahamas shooting a wedding.  I know, I know- I work too much.  Don't worry, I'll try to get to the beach this weekend to get a little sun.  :)

No wedding photos just yet, but maybe a teaser to come Sunday.  I just wanted to put something up to let all of my avid readers know I haven't forgotten about you!  When I get back, there will be plenty of photos to update you on.  Coming up, I have two beautiful summer weddings that somehow slipped away from the blog (so sorry!), more fall family portraits (call me soon if you want to book one!  The weather will turn cold soon!) and more real estate related work.  Have a great weekend!  Here are a couple of shots from day 1:

Double-Header + 2 Portrait Session Weekend Teaser!

My friends generally know that I often have busy weekends.  However, this weekend was my first wedding double-header in a while- one Friday and one Saturday.  On top of that I had a maternity/family session on Sunday and a 3-month baby session on Monday.  Needless to say I was a bit nervous about it all week.  My main fear, oddly enough, was that I throw my back out at the Friday wedding and was unable to shoot the Saturday wedding.  That obviously didn't happen, but I did find out for sure that I have begun getting tennis elbow from lifting about 15 pounds of camera, batteries, battery grip, flash, and wireless flash trigger over 1,000 times each day with poor form by my right arm.  Both nights I actually had to ice my elbow!  I'm getting old!

Both weddings went great.  If you were outside at all this weekend you know the weather was some of the best Atlanta has to offer.  Blue skies, warm days, cool evenings- just about everything you could ask for in a wedding- both of which were outdoors!  I'll give more dedicated posts on both weddings once I get through editing the photos, but I will say I had a ton of fun all weekend.  Rachel and Andy had such a fun group of guests and bridal party at Park Tavern that I ended up spending most of my time on the dance floor!

Here are a few photos from Rachel and Andy's wedding:

Lindsey and Mario had a beautiful wedding at Donaldson Bannister Farm in Dunwoody- actually the very first one that the venue has seen!  I initially thought they "just" planned the wedding (note: the word "just" is in quotations), but after the ceremony Mario told me the ceremony site- a beautiful grassy garden area on the property- was a swimming pool just about a month ago!  He laid all of the sod and did the landscaping himself!  Here are a few from their wedding:

Now here are a couple from the Sullivan family shoot followed by two from my sister's 3-month old- Hudson.  I know I know- I'm an incredibly efficient blogger!  I say that jokingly- more on these 4 events to come!

The Lewis Family

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of photographing the Lewis family in Piedmont Park.  Boyd works with me at my contract job in real estate and- of all places- his lovely wife, Lynn, works for a rival real estate company.  I didn't see any tension in the family, especially with the calm, cool, and collected Anderson.  I love it when energetic moms bring fun props for photos- especially when we're facing a rainy/cloudy day.  The weather held up just long enough for us to get about an hour of shooting in.  Enjoy!

And now... Anderson the raccoon, hanging out by a trash can (as raccoons do):

Jessica and Jeff | Atlanta Wedding Photography

Jessica and Jeff's wedding was one of the most fun weddings I've been to, including many that I attend as a guest.  The two of them did a superb job of a true DIY wedding.  Take a look at the photos and see at how they turned a grassy field into a beautiful ceremony and an open part-time photography studio  into a warm party palace.  The incredible food was provided by the tastiest food truck I've ever met met- Ibiza Bites (see marshmallow fluff covered sweet potato fires below!).  There was beauty at every turn, be it the weather, the preparations, or simply the bride and groom.  I couldn't have asked for a better wedding to shoot.  Even after the bridal getaway, the DJ  (Andrew Wroblewski, featured below) spun tunes while the bridesmaids packed up the decorations and leftover beer.  I can't say I didn't end up with decorations and beer in my hatchback at the end of the night.  ;)

 

The Romeyn Family

This may be the first time I was reprimanded by someone for not doing a blog post.  Last weekend I was hanging out with the Romeyn family at BBQ that Keri and I hosted.  Lexi Romeyn turned to me and said to me "ya know, I was kind of offended that we never got a blog post for our last portrait shoot."  I apparently forgot to put these photos up!  Sorry about that Lexi!  Now that Lexi is just a few months away from delivering their second child, so she has bigger fish to fry than me.  Nevertheless, here is the Romeyn family from April in Norcross!

...and now for my favorite.  Braxton in a "wife beater" shirt.

Four Families in Four Hours: The Sullivans

Family number two of our Super Sunday Photo Block (sounds like a radio show, right?) was the Sullivans.  We've seen them on the APG blog before but the occasion today was Elena's two-year photos.  She is such a cutie and was definitely taught the word "cheeeeeese" as can be seen in this first photo.  She was saying it even before I started snapping photos, so you could tell Mommy and Daddy prepped her well.

Throwing stones with Mommy.

Holiday and Greeting Cards

Just a fun little reminder that when you have a portrait session with Alex the Photo Guy, you get a nifty online gallery of your photos to share with family and friends.  Along with that gallery you get access to all kinds of exciting gifts, prints, canvas prints, and cards.  The cards are super easy to make online with hundreds of customizable templates.  Here are a few from recent portrait sessions. 

Click on the cards for a larger view.

Happy Holidays from Alex the Photo Guy!