Moving to Denver in 2011 was one of the biggest challenges our company has faced. The storm came and went, and while 2012 and 2013 may not necessarily have shown us the huge pot of gold at the end… the rainbow is glaring me in the face. While it certainly would have been easier to stay in the Northeast comfortably booking 30 weddings a year off referrals, moving and being forced to start over where no one had ever heard of us or our company, has pushed us (in the words of Jeff Newsom) to “Make Better Art,” which for someone like me, is a far greater reward.
I have come out from behind my desk and met with my peers. I have submitted work to receive awards, and won on my first try. Bookings for 2014 are up, and every single one of those brides “gets us” and appreciates the type of work that we’re doing. I have always believed everything happens for a reason, and I am grateful to be able to share some of our favorite images from 2013 that would never have been if not for the storm.
We joined the Fearless Photographers group in winter of 2012 and were blown away by their award collections. The competition is incredibly steep, with the group receiving 13,000 quality submissions from all over the world each round, and we made it our goal for 2013 to win one of their awards. Our first wedding of the year, Ellie and Brian’s Manor House wedding in April, we achieved our goal. Their wedding was also featured in the Knot Magazine, which someday I will finally get a chance to write a post about.
Next up was Jenna and Jason’s Lodge and Spa at Breckenridge wedding. The views from the venue grounds were killer.
Our third wedding of the year was in a location very close to my heart, Cape May, NJ. Thank you to Jim Heine for having us along – this Cape May Conventional Hall Wedding was just perfect!
I’m going to throw in an image from an engagement session here, because it’s just plain one of my favorites.
Finally, June rolled around, and true to form it was one of our busiest months of the year. First up was Chelsi and Andy’s St. Malo’s Chapel Wedding. Best. BM Speech. Ever.
Our first traditional Vietnamese/American Wedding was one for the books (literally, I plan to buy a sample album of it!) This 15-hour day had it all, two ceremonies, two receptions, a trip to a theme park for photos, and an amazing couple, Tina & Hung, to document through it all.
Carissa and Glenn made for one of our most fun, laid back weddings. Their day had a case of the lemony snickets when the FOB was too ill to make it last minute and their epic Cheyenne Mountain Resort ceremony backdrop got rained out… but they wouldn’t let any of it put a damper on their day!
Whitney and Corbin hired us unsure of what they REALLY wanted captured. A simple preview on my camera of this first shot actually became PART of their day when MOB cried upon seeing it saying she didn’t care if I didn’t take another good photo all day because that ONE photo meant so much to her. This wedding took place at Heritage Eagle Bend.
We drove out to Aspen for the first time this year for Angie and Anson’s beautiful T Lazy 7 Ranch Wedding. These shots were candid, but next time I’m there, I have some ideas of what I can do with their huge variety of livestock, haha.
A paragraph is not enough space to say all the awesome things we’d want to about how much we love Christine and Jesse, AND their Inverness wedding. Someday their children will look at their photobook of memories and see a shot of their parent’s wedding cake mid-air falling out of Jesse’s mouth and get a most genuine sense of just how awesome and fun their parents were at the time of their wedding.
Cailey and Kenneth are one of the most romantic couples I’ve had the pleasure to photograph, but they have a fun side too, making their image-set from the Della Terra Chateau one of our favorites from the year.
The cabins at Mt. Princeton Hot Springs along with the couple’s complete cooperation enabled us to create some pretty amazing getting-ready shots. It also didn’t hurt that running a bit behind didn’t cause Trisha and Justin to rush or stress, which is a pretty easy way to ruin these important shots. Way to keep your cool guys!
Early September saw another trip to the Northeast where we shot three more weddings; Andy and Lisa’s Gramercy Mansion Wedding in Baltimore, Katie and Greg’s Appleford Estate Garden Wedding, and finally Linnea and Pete’s Wedding at the Waterworks in Philadelphia… it was a pretty busy weekend.
Our SECOND trip to Aspen this year was for Chris and Laura. This couple’s pictures are entirely the result of photography being their TOP priority. They put themselves out there, took all of our suggestions, and gave us the time we needed, even at the expense of being a little late to their reception at the Roaring Fork Golf Club. Here was the result.
We loved BOTH of our October weddings in PA/NJ. Jen and Sal and Carlyn and Rob had opposite venues, guest personalities, and timelines, but the one thing they had in common is that they are genuinely kind, fun-loving couples, making both of their sets a huge success!
Last wedding of the year was a doozy! Shooting a two-day 17-hour-total Indian Wedding WITH the flu pushed me well beyond what should have been my physical limits, but I persevered. My excitement and determination to get amazing images from my first Indian Wedding at the Sheraton Parsippany, and really deliver for the awesome couple who took that chance on me, pushed me to levels I didn’t think possible. I couldn’t be happier with what we came away with.
So that was our year! Busy, and full of exciting new people, places, cultures and artistic heights. Looking forward to an equally, if not more amazing 2014!