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Thanks to Leanne and Jordan for having us at your wedding! Jordan is actually an accomplished photographer himself and it is always an honour to be chosen to photograph the wedding of another photographer. Their wedding was in beautiful Banff and they flew up from their home in San Francisco to get married here. Aside from the ceremony itself their wedding was a bit of a break from the more typical, traditional schedule, with a reception lunch right after the ceremony and then a casual dinner in the evening. I think that this is the best of both worlds for a wedding, where you can still have all of those heartfelt moments during the ceremony and reception speeches and then later you can freely mingle with your family and friends and enjoy their company without having to sit through a set list of things to do.

Their wedding ceremony was held in the Banff Park Lodge’s Castle Room, with their reception and evening after-party at the Glacier Salon. Both rooms are very nice, with lots of polished wood in them and a decorative wall of molded glass showing a mountain landscape in the Glacier Salon.

Leanne had the biggest smile ever! She smiled so much, especially during their ceremony. Everyone else smiled too when she slipped up during her vows to her “awful wedded husband”. Poor Jordan. Lol! Jordan and Leanne had asked that I get photos of all of their guests as they entered the reception, so I set up a little area and quickly had them pose as they came through. I always get candid images of people laughing during speeches and that sort of thing as part of the day’s coverage anyway, but this makes sure that there is a professional photo of everyone who was there.

After lunch they had speeches and a slideshow, which alternatively had everyone laughing or wiping tears. Actually, I’m going to interrupt myself a bit and say how much I like weddings where the speeches are after the meal. That way all your guests are happy and relaxed and can pay full attention and you don’t end up with photos of them laughing with food in their mouths. As a matter of fact, although there was definitely a very relaxed and easy-going attitude at the wedding, I have to say that this was also one of the best-scheduled weddings I’ve been to. We never felt like we were rushed for time. From what I heard during the speeches, this was probably due to Jordan’s preternatural spreadsheeting abilities.

For our photo time we visited a few locations around Banff, capturing the gorgeous scenery of the mountains and the river. We also visited the Fairmont Banff Springs, which is an wonderfully elegant location for photography. I love it in there and it was a welcome break from the cold wind outside! After their photos we headed back to Melissa’s Missteak across from the Banff Park Lodge where the two met with their families for an intimate dinner before crossing the road to meet back up with the rest of their guests for the evening. We stayed to catch some candid photography of everyone having a great time there.

Congrats, guys! Here are a few of your images.

(P.S. Thanks to photographer Trent Ernst for assisting me again).

This was such a wonderful wedding, with a really nice couple—and it was in Banff! I love Banff. Actually, the weather forecast had been predicting rain all week, but thankfully, when the wedding day dawned there was beautiful blue sky, with just a few clouds.

The wedding schedule was based at the Rimrock Resort, which is a really incredible place. It is quite large and absolutely filled with beautiful and elegant areas. Plus, it has the best view of any hotel in Banff that I have been to. Chantelle got ready there, while Brandon and the groomsmen got ready at the Fox Hotel. So, I left Sherri and Jessica with the guys and met Chantelle at the Rimrock.

By the way, the cloth over Chantelle’s shoulder that you can see in some of the images is a tartan representing her Scottish heritage. I thought that was very cool. We have a Scottish groom later this year who is wearing a kilt, but it’s not often that you see a bride wearing the tartan.

Their wedding ceremony was held outside—yay for the sun!—at the Rimrock Resort’s Pool Patio. Check out the big smiles as they see each other for the first time that day!

After the ceremony—ok, I have to admit being totally in the dark about the mustache thing!—I was following the bride and groom and all of a sudden the girls break out these fake ‘staches. It was a funny moment.

When it came time to do the portraits I thought about taking them to the Fairmont Banff Springs, but everyone goes there, so instead we chose a location that I have not yet seen anyone else use before. Banff is such a beautiful area with a great range of gorgeous locations available.

After the portrait time we headed back to the Rimrock Resort for their reception in the Wildrose Ballroom. Chantelle and Brandon had a private look at the room before everyone else was allowed in and the decor looked fantastic, thanks to wedding planner Lisa Hanslip from The Wedding Planner, in Calgary.

We finished our evening there with some more portraits in and around the resort. Brandon was particularly keen to get a few shots with Chantelle’s dad’s cool, blue 1969 Dodge Coronet R/T.

I’ve gone way overboard with the number of images I’m posting on the blog for this wedding! Normally I only post about half this many and most of them are from the portraits I take, but I thought that I’d include more candids and details in today’s blog post. We capture more of those photos during a wedding day than anything else, and our clients always have many, many candid photos in their private galleries, so today I wanted to show a few more of those images.

All the best, guys! Enjoy your wedding photography preview.

Congrats to Michelle and Farid, who were married in beautiful Banff last weekend! They were such a great couple to hang out with.    Even our pre-wedding meeting when Michelle and her sister Angela came down to check us out before booking was a blast and I had been looking forward to the wedding since then.

Their wedding ceremony was at the Rundlestone Lodge in Banff and it was a blend of Persian and Canadian traditions, mixing Michelle’s heritage with Farid’s.  The Persian traditions include rubbing a cone of sugar over the heads of the bride and groom to “sweeten” their marriage, which was not nearly as messy as I thought it would be.  Farid’s family had also made some traditional sweets, which we got to sample.    One of the dishes was baklava, which I thought was interesting, because I only knew it as a Greek delicacy.  It’s funny to see different countries share foods and traditions that you think are specific to just one place.

Michelle and I share a similar warped sense of humour and we had been making each other laugh with various quotes from Flight of the Conchords, so there were a few photos I took that captured Michelle’s and Farid’s off-beat humour.  They’d also brought some books from the turn of the previous century, titled Successful Marriage and Sexual Knowledge, to be used in some of the photos.  You should see Farid’s expressions in these images—priceless! 

Michelle also asked for photos in the Banff cemetery.  She explained that sometimes she thinks of the people in cemeteries and wonders about their lives and who is thinking of them now and so she visits to sort of almost reassure those who have passed that someone here is thinking of them. When Michelle told me this I immediately had an idea for an image—something positive, yet with a moody atmosphere to it.  I thought I’d start with one of the images from that session and when I update this blog entry later, after editing more images, I’ll come back with a few others from the other times of their wedding day, including Michelle’s cute pink boots, the handmade Persian tapestry that Farid’s parents had at their wedding, and more.