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Congrats to Steve and Rachel! These two were such a fun and happy couple. I have s-o-o-o many images of them laughing!

We started our day right before Rachel’s wedding dress went on. Rachel’s dress that had a large bow and little dots all over it—it was very cool and different. Their wedding ceremony—and the whole day, other than the getting ready—was at the Calgary Zoo. The Calgary Zoo is one of my favourite wedding venues in Calgary. For one thing, it is so different to your usual wedding venue. Plus, the zoo is huge and there are so many different locations just within the zoo itself. There are rainforest areas, outdoor trails—you name it! It’s a dream for a photographer. Their ceremony and reception were both held in the Safari Lodge, which has a great feel to it. Very exotic!

Both their ceremony and reception had many fun and touching moments. At one point during the reception, Rachel’s sisters sung her a comical, semi-biographical song that had everyone laughing. And check out their cake! Isn’t that the coolest cake, ever? We stayed for the beginning of the dancing and got photos of everyone out on the dance floor doing their thing and having fun.

Congrats, guys!

Mountains! Forests! Caves! Dragons! Goats!

And the most important thing: a happy couple in love.

From my very first lengthy and chatty phone call with Ngan, in response to her enquiry email, I knew this was a wedding that I wanted to photograph. I book most of my couples without meeting up first and I’m used to getting right into the swing of things on the wedding day itself, so it’s such a good thing when you can click so well and have such a cool connection right away.

John and Ngan were married at the Juniper Hotel in Banff, which is a stylish, modern-rustic venue away from the main town. The place has an eco-friendly focus and is entirely wind-powered, which is pretty cool. Ngan and John were ably assisted in many things throughout their day by wedding planner Sonia and her assistant from Cornerstone Events. They did a fantastically amazing job and I highly recommend them.

The first event of the day was John and Ngan’s Vietnamese tea ceremony. We’ve photographed a number of Asian tea ceremonies (Vietnamese, Chinese, Cambodian, etc.) and they have to be some of the most challenging things we photograph. So much happens so fast! And it’s all important! Lol! If you’ve never seen one, imagine a western ceremony where the first kiss happens in the blink of an eye every few seconds for half an hour and that will give you some idea of the timing of it all. Of course, there aren’t actual kisses happening constantly in the tea ceremony; they exchange gifts and greetings and have other traditions.

At the end of their tea ceremony they had a surprise for their guests: traditional dragon dancers! That was so cool! There were eight of them and there was so much sound, colour and energy in the dancing! Then John and Ngan snuck off with us for some quick portraits in their traditional Vietnamese dress.

Their western wedding ceremony was outside on the Juniper’s terrace area and, although the weather had been threatening snow, the sun popped out just for their wedding. After that we visited a few locations around Banff for their portraits. They were so easy to take photos of. In fact, their whole wedding party was very easy-going. And John has to be one of the smiliest grooms we’ve ever seen! He basically didn’t stop smiling all day!

Their reception was full of laughs and there was a touching moment when Ngan gave a speech to her family in Vietnamese. I have no idea what she said, but there was so much emotion in the room that I nearly cried, too!

Thanks for having us at your wedding. Here are some of your photos.

Mike and Elva are such a fun couple! I have so many photos of them laughing. I love it when our couples are fun or obviously in love and these guys fit both categories, so it was a blast hanging out with them to take their photos. Although they live in Calgary, their wedding is taking place in Waterton and they asked if they could have contrasting engagement images—something with a more urban feel compared to how their wedding photos will be. So we visited a few locations in the city, often just walking around and taking advantage of whatever presented itself as a good idea. They even danced to a busker’s music in the middle of Stephen Ave! It was a pretty easy-going time.

Thanks for being so fun and up for anything!

I’ve had the pleasure of photographing these guys a couple of times now for their charity calendar. The first time was on St. Patrick’s Day and we did a lot of candid photos as they tuned up. (Does tuning bagpipes make a difference? ) Then we did another photo session with a vintage fire engine on a stormy afternoon. They are a real bunch of characters and were fun to work with. They will be selling a calendar at some point to raise money and it’s a worthy thing to support. Contact the Lethbridge fire station for more info.

We are proud to announce our official accreditation as a “green” photography studio.

What does this mean? Firstly, I’m not going to show up to photograph your wedding in a tie-dye shirt. Well, probably not. Most of the aspects that were investigated in the accreditation process involve things that happen behind the scenes in our business. For example, we are almost entirely paperless and offer a very convenient online contract system as well as other easy electronic processes. Also, our building’s cooling system is very environmentally-friendly—and effective! There is a huge list of things that are involved for us, but I want to focus on the things you’ll see. Really what this means for our clients is simply more options. We have introduced very stylish eco-friendly print and album choices—and of course digital options—and will continue to build upon them as more become available. We have not discontinued any of our other album and print lines, because our goal is to open up more choices to those people who want them.

If anyone would like more info, feel free to contact me.

Dan and Cait and I got together the day after their wedding for this romantic fashion session—or ‘trash the dress’, as it is popularly known, though I much prefer my name for it. Plus, Caitlin would have been understandably reluctant to actually trash her rather nice Lazaro wedding gown. It was good to see them again and we were able to relax and create some portraits without the rush of the wedding day.

We shot mostly around the Liberty Grand again, using some locations that we weren’t able to get to on their wedding day due to weather and a tight wedding schedule. Right near the Liberty is a really cool historic house with a beautiful garden. I love the first few images from there—with the dappled sunlight streaming through the tree branches it just looks so summer-y and secluded, like we were on a farm somewhere. And check out the last photo of Dan with the Toronto skyline—it looks like a Batman poster!

I had a fun engagement session the other day with Ryan and Kendra, just outside of Lethbridge. We started out at their home in Coalhurst and just kinda hung out, with me taking photos of the kinda things they do as hobbies. They had this mostly-finished jigsaw puzzle where all the remaining pieces were almost identical and while I was photographing them they had a burst of inspiration and managed to complete some more. But for the sake of client confidentiality I won’t say who won their foosball match. Your secret is safe with me, Kendra. After a few quick photos of their energetic Jack Russell terrier, we took off down to highway to a place just outside of town for their portraits.

Ryan has a super-cool Harley Davidson bike that we worked into a few of their shots. I had to get him to turn it around a lot for the photos, though. Apparently they’re not light or easy to turn around on small dirt trails. We finished with a sweet, romantic time. Well, they did; I just watched. Wait, that doesn’t sound much better . . .

Here are a handful of their engagement photos.