We get a lot of emails from other photographers asking questions about how we do things. Two questions we seem to get a lot are, how do you choose images for the blog and how do you decide on the post production for the images. The first one is easy, its a gut reaction, if it was an image of V and I would I hang it on my lounge wall? The second one is a bit more difficult, it has a lot to do with the feel of the wedding, the decor, the couple, maybe something that stood out for me about the day.

Which brings me to Saturday at Casalinga with Taryn and Chris, which was filled with ice cream trucks, crafty cigs, mr potato head cake toppings (and grandmother’s cake toppings from 1938), white takkies and loads of rock from the 90′s. Tradition and graphic design, rock ‘n roll and humour. Safety first, ice cream second. It was whimsical and quirky and the groom wore a button which said, Keep Calm and Rock On, a retake on the 1939 WWII Keep Calm and Carry On poster (the keep calm movement hasn’t quite hit SA yet), which I think pretty much summed up everything for me.

They both seemed to be having such genuine fun, which was really nice to see. It was also nice to be back at Casalinga.

Things I like about Casalinga:
- the co-ordinators are super efficient, on the ball and friendly to the vendors.
- we’ve had some of the nicest food we’ve ever had at weddings there.
- they lit candles and turned out the lights for earth hour which I thought was cool.

some pics:

in a twist of fate that may be charitably called ironic, about 90 minutes after earth hour, minutes after we arrived home and started our backup process, our suburb was plunged into darkness due to a power failure. Either Eskom wasn’t too sure what to do with all the surplus electricity, or someone at Eskom thought that earth hour was compulsory but couldn’t figure out a clock.

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If we had a prize for the couple that laughed the most at their wedding, and were just general badasses, these two would probably win it. Yep, we were back at Casalinga, for another cool relaxed laid back wedding and if these two look familiar its cause we shot their couples session last year(?) where they laughed just as much and seemed to have just as much fun. Ooh, just before I head on back to Lightroom and another epic editing session, thank you Lee for taking care of us and making sure everything was sorted out – I’m getting you a Koi for your one year anniversary.

I was speaking to a client the other day about the length of time it takes to edit a wedding, and they mentioned that their mom didn’t understand that it wasn’t like it was in her day. You no longer get to drop off your rolls of film at the lab on the Sunday and pick up the proofs on the Monday. We now have to spend a lot of time doing our own post production on the images in photoshop. Yeah … I’m not so sure we’re better off with digital.

We watched Alice in Wonderland the other morning, and Tim Burton has not let us down. Well worth the R130 …

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Just finished this corker of a wedding, 800+ images all finished off by hand, many late nights but it had some real killer bee stuff in there – can’t wait for these guys to see what happens when we get a full hour to do the portrait images.

Lets see, some info about the wedding.
Reception + Ceremony: Casalinga – Incredible food and nice ambience.
Getting Ready: Monte Casino Palazzo Hotel
Dress: Patricia Nascimento

and just about to start editing this one from Longmeadow Piano Lounge:

I’ve been really getting into The no1 Ladies Detective Agency for some unapparent reason, its so not me in any way, but I’m really enjoying it. And its not just because every second episode shows a baobab.

wedding helicopter, 

I’m not really too sure what to say about this one, whenever we shoot a wedding it feels like we catch a glimpse into a couple’s lives, just for a day, and the endorphines and adrenaline are infectious and we smile a lot and laugh and mess about, and we try to take images that capture something about the couple. These two were real sweethearts, very much in love, with killer bee smiles …

… and then there was the fact that they decided to prioritize their portraits and gave us an hour at Monte Casino to shoot the bridal portraits and an hour at the venue … add to that the fact that they love all things baroque … and that I had enough adrenaline in my veins to hotwire a pony after that helicopter ride …

V’s exams are finishing tomorrow, so we should be back to the usual superfast turnaround time on emails by Thursday.

bridal portrait helicopter,