Posts Tagged ‘wedding’

J. Love Photography had the honor of being part of Jeff & Katie’s wedding day this past weekend. The groom is a paratrooper with the Army. He came back from Afghanistan long enough to marry his longtime girlfriend who just graduated from college. They were surrounded by family and friends from all over the country to share in their special day.

The wedding was held at Zion Lutheran Church and the reception was at Barton Hills Country Club. We also made a quick trip to the beautiful University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center to capture images of the bride and groom in the three-story, lush atrium there.

Dorian Deaver was the D.J. for the evening. His selections of music and great effects kept the crowd very happy! Enchanted Florist in Ypsilanti did the gorgeous floral arrangements in burgundy, plum, purple, red, and moss.

 Congratulations, Jeff & Katie! May you have a long and happy life together.

I waited a long time before I agreed to photograph weddings.  Photographing weddings is the most difficult thing we, as photographers, do.  Nothing can be restaged, it is the most important day of a bride and groom’s life, and we go for hours nonstop making sure we don’t miss anything.  The pressure is on!  Finally, the romantic in me gave in and I began photographing weddings year before last.  I’m so glad.   Sharing the moments of such a happy, monumental occasion in the lives of couples with their friends and families is joyful, exhilerating, and makes me feel hopeful and renewed, as silly as that might sound.

Here are a few of my favorite images of Meg and Sean who were wed this summer and held their reception at the University of Michigan Museum of Art.  We began photographing the bride and groom with their families at the bride’s parents’ home in the area. It was a beautiful summer day and their backyard water garden made a perfect backdrop.

We were honored to be part of the very first wedding reception ever held at UMMA.  What an amazing venue.  This sweet couple were so in love and with the backdrops of original art including stained glass made by Tiffany himself, our job was a visual delight from the word go!  The food tasted as wonderful as it looked and was created by Food Art, out of Ann Arbor.  The color theme of fushia and lime were enhanced by fresh flowers from Tom Thompson Flowers in Ann Arbor. 

It was a beautiful summer night in Ann Arbor.  When we were finished, we chattered all the way home about what a great event it was and how fabulous the images were going to be! We hope you think so too.

I just finished Christmas cards for the family and the wedding album is almost done. I will post more soon.

I did my first bridal show Sunday in preparaton for the 2011 bridal season.  A few years ago, a professional photographer friend asked me to assist them at a wedding they were going to photograph.  I hadn’t done weddings for a lot of reasons; I had only recently gotten into portraiture, after being involved in commercial and fine art photography for a long time.  I knew that weddings required stamina and skill and tied up weekends.  It takes a great deal of moxie and preparedness to take on the responsibility of photographing a bride and groom’s very important day!  It also takes a unique set of camera equipment that is expensive and requires skill to use properly. The most important quality of a great wedding photographer is passion. Nothing can replace it.  I knew by my second wedding I was hooked.  It was a natural progression… I’ve cried at every wedding I’ve ever been to and I was born with the last name Love and I’m known for the passion I put into anything I do. Need I say more?  Why it took me so long to come to this is beyond me.  But I’m here now! 

There is nothing I can do to change the current trend of paying more for chair covers than a photographer but continue to do what I do best; creative, artistic storytelling through images.  Nothing that is quality craftsmanship is inexpensive… NOTHING.  I attended a seminar yesterday taught by a great wedding photographer out of the Detroit area.  There are still many of us who believe that making the investment in wedding portraiture is something that will pay for itself over and over again so we continue to share ideas and learn new techniques to guarantee our brides amazing images. 

This image is a prime example of the difference a qualified professional can make in your wedding portraits.  It was 6:00 a.m. the morning after her wedding.  She wasn’t happy about being up that early.  We didn’t need her hair done or makeup on.  We knew before we event got on the plane we wanted this image and dragged this fabric all the way there because the bride wasn’t wearing a veil.  In the end, this image from a destination wedding was worth everything it took to create it. Don’t you think?

I love working with people like I do.  When I get together with clients to create portraits for them, they are ‘up’, happy, and excited.  Even when they’re nervous, it’s something we work through very quickly.  New clients often comment on how painless their portrait session is in comparison to what they thought it would be.  So many of my regular clients have become friends. 

As a photographer, I get to be ‘inside’ the most wonderful moments of people’s lives; whether it’s a wedding, an engagement photo session, or parents with their newborn baby.  I LOVE it! 

People talk about retiring.  I can’t imagine.  I am blessed to love what I do enough that if I couldn’t do it for a living, I’d do it for free.  I hope to keep photographing like Ruth Bernhard, until my hands can no longer hold a camera because I’m 92!

We photographed a beautiful wedding recently and my clients sent these flowers with a lovely note that made me cry as well as leaving me a message on my cell phone that I will keep always. 

Thank you to all of you who believe enough in me to let me do what I love and share it with you. 

As far as professional wedding photography goes, the attention is in the details.  We look for the light.  We look for the perfect moment.  We love it when we’re working with artists from other professions such as culinary artists, floral artists, and even makeup artists. 

It isn’t just about any one thing that creates a perfect wedding.  It’s the ambience, the teamwork, the attention to detail… let’s face it, it’s hard work to create the perfect wedding!  Our bride last weekend, Julie, is an artist herself.  So she didn’t miss a thing and understood the value of hiring professional artists to help her create her vision.

So when J. Love Photography photographed Julie’s wedding, you can imagine how excited we were when we saw her touches being woven throughout the entire day in a myriad of ways, the artists she hired, and her own lovely work gracing the home where the reception was! A visual cornucopia!

There were candles and flowers everywhere.  Speaking of flowers… Theresa from Dexter Flowers is the most unique, talented floral artist! Her creations everywhere were unique, simple, elegant, and beautiful.

Chefs Matt Swickerath and Stephen Herman came in all the way from Atlanta to prepare the cuisine for this event. I can still smell the grits with bacon and cheese and all of the grilled delectable main dishes like tenderoin, shrimp, and chicken.  It was  fun to watch Matt and Stephen prepare all these dishes right in the center of the reception.  Their artful marriage of foods, flavors, and fun helped make the celebration what it was.

And let’s face it… the star in all of this is the beautiful bride. We spend a lot of time capturing that pretty face. And it’s important that the bride’s face be ready for a long day, with attention paid to every little detail, so 50 years from now she revels at how marvelous and happy she looked!  So Julie hired one of my favorite pros… Rachel, who has been the manager at Macy’s Dior counter forever.  She worked her magic and the bride was a vision of loveliness the entire day!

As I continue to photograph weddings, I learn something from every single one. But I know, that it’s the attention to the details that makes all the difference.  Each one is unique.  In spite of being challenging, it’s a joyful journey I get to share with people on the first day of a new life together.  And as Taylor Swift says, ‘capture it, remember it’, forever.