Real Maine Weddings giveaway planning day 1

Cambridge couple Alyssa and Nick learned they won the Real Maine Weddings magazine Wedding of the Year giveaway earlier this month by a public You Tube voting contest. Last week I accompanied them as they jumped into their wedding planning, visiting local paper house Papier Gourmet to choose their favorite wedding invitations, Hurley Travel Experts to learn more about their Jamaican honeymoon options and lastly, to Cross Jewelers to try on some hardware. With each part of the planning, Alyssa and Nick pick their top three choices and the public votes to choose what wins. Such fun! We wrapped up the day with a cocktail party at Grace, the location of their wedding ceremony which they hadn't seen before! The party's guests were family, friends and all of the participating vendors, everyone eager to visit with the lucky couple.

I have never photographed a wedding come together in this fashion before and it's making me want to start photographing long before the wedding day for our clients all the time! I love being Alyssa and Nick's personal paparazzi and think it's an extra special treat that they'll have this part of their journey documented in addition to their wedding day at Grace in Portland in November. They are (clearly!) an adorable, loving, deserving couple to receive this wedding and I'm excited to share what happened behind-the-scenes as you vote on each week's category (be sure to flag the RMW magazine blog here and check back every Monday to vote!).

Read more about the cocktail party from RMW editor Melanie here and Alyssa's personal account of the day here.

Say what? Alyssa and Nick received a crash course in the different printing techniques and invitation styles at Papier Gourmet. Maine based William Arthur is providing the pretty paper goods.

The ladies of RMW magazine and Sweetest Thing Weddings were on hand every step of the way.

Then it was time to hear from Beth at Hurley Travel about the different Sandals properties in Jamaica Alyssa and Nick get to choose from. A mini palm tree in the conference room had me dreaming of a sandy beach! Bling time! Can you imagine picking out your wedding bands with an entourage? Alyssa and Nick did really well in front of a big (opinionated!) audience!

 

And finally, to Grace! Looks like they like it, eh?

 Whitney captured this sweet moment at the cocktail party.

Next weekend, we shop for the dress and cake! I don't think a day could possibly be any more fun than that!

published: Style Me Pretty

It was a busy little weekend for us on Style Me Pretty, with their Little Black Book and Massachusetts blogs publishing Emily & Tyler's tartan plaid fall wedding at the Abenaqui Country Club with Signature Events photographed by Whitney, and Sara & Brett's stunning Sperry Tents backyard celebrations in Sara's hometown of Ashburnham, Massachusetts, photographed by me and Denise.

Click on the screenshots below to view each feature.

Click here to see Emily & Tyler's original blog post.
Click here to see Sara & Brett's original blog post.

Want us to submit your wedding to Style Me Pretty or another favorite blog? Let us know and we'll happily do so on your behalf.

Anniversary art, year 3

It's been three years since our wedding on St John (pause to insert sigh-I-wish-I-was-there-right-now here). Tho we have wonderful photos to document that memorable weekend, we decided that each year we would purchase a piece of art to mark another year together and reflect on what was as we look forward to what lies ahead.

If you have been to our house, you'll recall we left our living room walls blank for, oh, more than a year after moving in because we just weren't sure what to hang. We shopped at local art houses, and even spoke to an artist about commissioning a landscape. Being realistic, however, about the likelihood of little (sticky!) fingers tracing paint stokes on that special canvas one day, the answer of what to display was clear.

We have a favorite spot that we half-jokingly refer to as our "secret spot." Found by accident, it's a loop around a protected tract of land on a (driveable) island nearby. We often go as a family for part exercise/part inspiration as the setting is just stunning and changes drastically given the season, time of day and where the tide is. It's never the same place twice and we love that. We don't often bring our cameras- we love having photographs of our family but we also love a break from our profession now and again (a constant battle!).

On this particular day last summer, however, I popped on my 35mm and enjoyed the chance to capture a little of this magical bit of earth we've come to love so much. The photos aren't award-winning, but they're very special to us. We enlarged seven for a collage of canvases to hang on our wall. Instead of being in a box, every day we get to gaze at them, a reminder of the beautiful life we've created together and it makes us smile.

Happy 3rd, sweets! Love our little family!

Facebook photo policy

Holy moly. It's here. Wedding season already!! Denise starts us off this weekend with nuptials at Grace Restaurant in Portland, so keep your eyes peeled for those images soon. In the meantime, I wanted to take a quick moment of your online browsing time to let you know about our new Facebook policy we are implementing for the 2012 season.

You love Facebook, we love Facebook, but the process of sharing your images on Facebook can be rather tedious, we acknowledge. This year, if you purchase a disc of high resolution digital images you'll receive a folder on that disc with all of your images correctly sized for the web, ready to upload and with our studio watermark already in place.

Following the example given in the image below you'll see how to properly credit the studio in the caption and we encourage you to link to your blog post for those curious viewers who want to learn more.



As for how many images you upload, that is entirely up to you. Personally I am apt to scroll through a Facebook photo album of 25 images or fewer, maybe 40 if I find myself with an extra few minutes and a really fantastic subject (which of course your wedding images will be). I've seen people upload 1200 wedding images to Facebook, every last one from a wedding weekend, and well, that's just silly. You don't want to be that guy. Not everyone- no, not your network of two thousand plus friends from every walk of life- needs to see everything from this, your most personal day. If they do, send them to your Pictage gallery with a password to see every last detail's glory and keep your Facebook show & tell to a more manageable count. You'll be sure to get more views and more comments that way. And who doesn't love Facebook comments?

Let us know if you have any questions!

Real Maine Wedding giveaway winners announced

April Fools, which happens to be oh yes, my birthday, was shared with our friends at Real Maine Weddings magazine and a press conference to announce the winners of the 2012 Real Maine Wedding of the Year $100,000 giveaway (of which our studio donated a full weekend of wedding coverage for!!) to take place at Grace in Portland in early November. Alyssa and Nick, the darling duo favored to win DID!  It was an emotionally charged scene with all of the finalists' nerves on edge as editor Melanie delivered the news, and then massive celebratory tears (myself included!) once their names were read.

In the months to come the public will be asked to vote on three choices in categories from a theme to flowers to invitations, a dress, honeymoon and more! I'll be along to document that process and will be sure to post here so you can weigh in (a la the popular Today show wedding voting style. Fun!). In the meantime, watch Alyssa and Nick's sweet submission video below and then you'll know exactly why I've been grinning all afternoon long. So happy for them! And us! What fun we will have!