Modern Photographer
It’s been about two years since I have been able to do a true Best Of Weddings blog post. It feels good to be doing this now. I could have very easily cut this down to a single blog post with fewer photos. But after 2020, screw that, Here are a ton of photos that I love from this year. Part 2 coming soon!
Enjoy!
In quite a hilarious bit of irony, I spent a lot of the winter of 2019 - 2020 making sure I could catch up on my blogging so that I would be ready to keep everything super up to date for 2020. How funny that turned out to be.
I shot my last normal wedding of 2020 in March, then it was a lot of crickets for a lot of months. Christina and Rick were the first of my clients to do a small backyard wedding while waiting or their rescheduled date (which happens to be in a few weeks!)
The whole thing took place in their cozy Red Hook Brooklyn apartment and backyard. 12 guests in total. Many of who I had met before since 6 years ago I shot Christina’s older brother’s wedding. The intimate nature of this wedding was a lot of fun, and being one of my first ventures back into wedding photography after the longest break of my career was amazing.
Enjoy!
Part of what I love about this concept is how unique and personal each image is to the people in it. Jeff & Erin filled out the questionnaire which gave me a lot of insight into them and what we could design.
The things that stood out to me most in Erin’s questionnaire were that one of their favorite movies was “Step Brothers” (a personal favorite as well), that they love going to beer and wine tastings, and that they love Warwick NY.
With all that, I figured that a fancy beer tasting image in Warwick would be the perfect theme, subtly inspired by the Catalina Wine Mixer.
Erin & Jeff were super into the idea, so from there I told them about what I was thinking for wardrobe and style, and I started looking for a location.
Drowned Lands Brewery in Warwick was the perfect location, it had character, it’s unique, and they were so unbelievably accommodating to us.
I really love the way this image came together! below are the photos I used to make the composite. As usual, a composite is 100% the way to go with these. Composites allow me to be really precise and complex with the lighting that gives the image a far more produced, and dynamic look than would be impossible with a single frame.
This is a new project that I’m pretty excited about. For so much of my career, my purpose has been to make 1000 great photos on a wedding day. It’s something I’ve loved doing, but has a few limitations. You can’t spend too much time on one single photo when you have 999 more to be concerned about, that goes for both the creation of the image and the post processing.
The Singular Portrait is the opposite of that. The end goal of this is to make one remarkable photo. This is where I can collaborate with my clients, and we can work together to create a one of a kind piece of art for you & your partner, your family, your business, or yourself.
This idea was born of a few things, first and foremost, my Christmas cards. Over the years, I put a fair bit of work and planning into making a completely unique and exceptionally silly Christmas card. These photos gave me a chance to focus on concept, lighting, costume, and processing. It was like I was doing a commercial shoot for myself. It tends to be the most popular thing I do all year, and friends of mine have told me they just leave the card on their wall or fridge all year.
I realized that there is absolutely something to that, and this kind of more in depth portraiture is something that is missing from the photography market.
This will be a different experience from start to finish. I have made a questionnaire that will give me some insight in your interests, your sense of humor, and your preferred visual aesthetic. Together we will create a concept completely unique to you. Once our concept is solidified we will move onto the logistics, figuring out time frame, location, necessary props & costumes, and hair & makeup if needed.
The shoot itself will only take a few hours, but will most likely be done differently than you’re used to seeing. Since I can spend more time crafting the image, I can use multiple frames and composite them together. This means I can shoot everyone (or pet) individually, that helps me achieve perfect light as well as the best possible expression for each person.
Once the shoot is complete, you will receive an included 16x20 canvas of your image along with a web optimized digital file perfect for social media.
Follow this link, fill out the questionnaire, and let’s make something singular.
Normally I would be doing a best of the year blog post, consisting of al the best photos from my year of photographing weddings. 2020 obviously threw a wrench in that tradition. Since this year was so different I ‘m also going to do something a little different. Instead of a best of my work of the year post, this is going to be more of a year in review and will contain a lot more words and a lot more personal photos.
2021 is not magically going to make everything all better, but it is a symbolic beginning of a new chapter, and there are seemingly lights at the end of some very long and dark tunnels. So for that, I am hopeful. I hope that a year from now when I’m doing a 2021 retrospect that I have a lot of positive things to say about the year and the way it worked out for our world.
So, let’s get into this!
Started the year with a trip to Vegas for WPPI, a wedding and portrait photography conference, things were progressing as normal, got to hang out with some friends, see the convention and trade show. Skipped most of the parties, went to the Valley of Fire and shot portraits and landscapes. About this time, Covid was starting to be talked about, but it hadn’t really impacted anything yet.
From Vegas, I went to Hawaii for a few days, I figured that since I was most of the way across the country, I might as well go a little farther to one of my favorite places. My Friend Andy Stenz lives in Honolulu and gave me an open invitation to come visit, so I 100% took him up on that. Besides putting me up for days, he also took me up on a helicopter ride for some aerial photography round Oahu, which was both terrifying and magical.
Once I returned from Hawaii, I had two weddings very quickly. By the time the 2nd wedding happened we were just starting to hear about “Social Distancing” Little did I know those would be the last normal weddings I would shoot for a long time! So keep in mind looking at these that masks weren’t even really a thing yet. This is the old times, the way way back..
This is the time where everything shut down. Toilet paper, rubber gloves, and disinfectant were being horded. No one knew what the hell was going on. I spent 9 weeks home alone, my only human contact being zoom/ facetime / phone calls. This was not exactly an easy time for anyone, certainly not me. All my work was being postponed, I couldn’t see family or friends. You were there, you know how hard it was. During that time the only person I really had to photograph was myself. I did some random self portraits. I did a series called “Not how I expected to spend the apocalypse” which consisted of me doing the most mundane things I could think of around my apartment while the world came to a halt.
During the summer, I started to see my family, as they had been in a bubble, and I hadn’t seen anyone in two months. I was also able to start doing some socially distant, very masked engagement shoots. It felt amazing to be around people again. The first hug I received was from my niece and nephew! I also picked up a promo photoshoot for Maryland beach rock band Ballyhoo! with small groups like that it was really easy to keep things distant and safe. Being able to shoot photos of other people again felt absolutely amazing.
Things in NJ and NY quieted down a fair bit and micro-weddings started happening, along with a few engagement shoots. It was incredibly meaningful to be a part of such small, intimate ceremonies. I was getting Covid tests before and after everything I shot, it was the best way that I could be responsible but still do my job. I felt very much like a photographer again, which did a lot for my mental health.
My sister is a teacher, and her school district went back to in person teaching in September, her husband had been back at work in person since August. This left very little time for their new puppy who started having some behavioral & separation issues. I had always bonded with Dresden and certainly had a more dog friendly schedule. So it was decided that it would be better for all parties if Dresden came to live with me full time. I must say, I could not be happier with that decision. He is 100% the Chewy to my Han and he has been fantastic to have during such weird times. But seriously, look how cute he is!!!!!
Mountain biking is one of my biggest passions outside of photography. It’s how I stay in shape, it’s how I spend a lot of my time and money, it’s how I adjust the default arrangement of my skeleton. A few weeks ago to culminate the year, I decided to start photographing it as well. When photographing sports, it’s important to be really knowledgeable about them so you can represent them in an accurate way, it’s why I waited so long to start shooting mountain biking. Shortly before the first snow of December I was in contact with local professionals Laura Slavin & Jeff Lenosky about doing a shoot. Laura invited me along to a snowy jump session with her and Jeff, I brought out some lights, they jumped the shit out of their bikes in a snow storm, Jeff made a youtube video of it that I highly reccomend you check out. And in the end we made some of my favorite photos of the year!
I don’t exactly have a good conclusion for all of this. I truly hope that 2021 is not the dumpster fire that 2020 has been. I am grateful for the positives that came out of all this for me both personally and professionally, but also very sad at the state of the world.
