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Boston Wedding Photography: Lydia and Tom’s backyard pig roast reception! Yeehaw!

I’ve been SO EXCITED for Lydia and Tom’s wedding ever since we met up with Lydia for coffee in Concord a few months ago.  Lydia, bubbly and bursting with energy and excitement about pretty much everything, was planning a backyard wedding (always love) with a pig roast reception.

A pig roast reception. 

Have I mentioned how awesome my job is? HAVE I???

(Fair warning–there are pictures of the pig post-roast included in this post, so to my vegetarian or otherwise sensitive readers, consider yourself warned!)

This was one of my favorite elements from the day: If I understood the story correctly, Lydia and Tom had these wooden farmhouse tables made special for their reception by her uncle.  They were PERFECT to continue the feel of this rustic but elegant backyard wedding.  

 

There was so much booze! 

It’s also worth noting that this was the coolest tent (Sperry Tents) I’ve seen at a wedding–not just a plain white tent, but it had these beautiful star cut outs and really fun flags waving.  The support beams weren’t just metal beams that needed to be covered with fabric to make them pretty, instead they were rich wooden posts that were just beautiful on their own–it made the whole event so special and unique. 

Lydia and Tom–thank you so much for inviting us into your amazing, personal unique wedding.  

My job rules.  

Boston Wedding Photography: Maura and Josh at 319 A Street.

Maura and Josh.  Kablamo.  There’s really nothing else to say about this super awesome, super chic, super fun, super stylish wedding with this super hot couple.

(Snort. Corn Palace.  Awesome)

How much do I love this woman, by the way? Her hair, her make up her dress, her posture; absolutely stunning.  She probably thought I was a weirdo ’cause I kept taking her picture.

 

This wedding was frought with really really really ridiculously good looking people.  Including the lead singer of Groove Authority, a band I have had the pleasure of working with twice now (the other time was at Nate and Sarah’s wedding at Gibbet)  Laya has pipes that made me weak in the knees and shivery in the shoulders.  That compounded with the band’s super funky, very awesome sound made the night so, so so fun.  

 

 

Look, guys! It’s Katie and Manny! 

Giant massive enormo thank you to the above mentioned Katie and Manny for sending Josh and Maura my way! And equally enormo thank you to Maura and Josh for choosing us to be their photographer.  SO FUN. Thanks, guys!

2010 Christensen Midwest Pilgrimage. Holga Stuff.

What some of you may not know is that my back round is actually in black and white, Zone system photography. This is a method of photography developed by Ansel Adams which, to put it simply, allows the artist to achieve as much or as little detail in both shadow and highlight areas of the image by taking specific light meter readings and adjusting your exposure and development according to one’s specific vision.  While roll film can be used, it’s potential is really maximized with large format sheet film.  It sounds wicked complicated, but it’s actually ridiculously simple in practice.  I became obsessed with it during my second year at NESoP and dedicated my graduating portfolio to it.

Because of all of this–I never really bothered with color film after first term “color experience” class.  For me, it just didn’t have the potential for creative control that I craved so desperately in black and white film. 

When I was out to dinner with my good friend Jon a few weeks back, he mentioned that his Holga is one of his favorite photographic instruments because it has gotten him out of so many creative ruts.  The Holga, in extreme contrast to say, a 4×5 camera, affords the artist almost NO control whatsoever.  Really–a holga has one shutter speed and two apertures: “cloudy” and “sunny”.  I’m serious.  While I always loved the idea of Holga, and I loved looking at my peers’ Holga work, and heck I even own a Holga–I never really felt like it was for me.  Just the notion of the lack of control in a Holga made me nervous to think about.  However, as I haven’t done any serious black and white work for a couple of years, and I’ve been craving to just play and have fun and not worry too much–I decided to dust of my Holga (which I had used like, twice before), and load it up with not black and white, but color film (Kodak 400 VC 120).  I was nervous that the images wouldn’t be “right” (whatever that means), or that they would “cool” but in a lazy way (a trap of many Holga users–the images look “cool” because they’re captured with a Holga, but they’re otherwise boring, uninteresting pictures), but I decided that it had been long enough since I’d tried something wholly new and experimental for me–so I went for it.  I figured our annual Midwest road trip would be a perfect place to try out my venture…so try it out I did.  And here’s some of the results:

I think this one is my favorite of the bunch: bean fields on the edge of town in my mother’s hometown of Gowrie, Iowa: 

Boston Wedding Photography: Karthik and Jessica at The Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center!

The pressure was on for Karthik and Jessica’s colorful, spirited wedding on Saturday.  For one–I didn’t actually meet them in person until last Thursday, so that’s always a bit nerve racking.  But secondly–Karthik, the sweet, wonderful and excited groom that he was, told me several times about how freaking pumped he was that I was going to be photographing his wedding, and that he had been sending my blog around to all his friends and bragging about me. 

Oh great.  No pressure or anything!! As if I’m not already nervous enough as it is before ANY wedding–now I’ve really gotta bring it….

This was the second to last picture I took of the night, after which I took a GIANT sigh of RELIEF that I pulled it off 🙂

Thank you, so much, Karthik and Jess, for inviting me into this incredibly awesome, fun, personal, spirited affair!!

Boston Wedding Photography: Jon and Emily on Bailey Island Maine: Part 2

So, I’ve said before that one of the hardest parts of the job of photographer is actually editing: that is, selecting images that best represent your work.  It’s so hard because you are emotionally invested in each and every picture, and you really want your client/viewer to see exactly what you see.

Add to this the fact that you are shooting for a couple of dear friends–and all editing skills go completely out the window.  The result is the most gratuitous few blog entries I’ve done yet.  And you know what? I’m okay with that….

And that, ladies and gentlemen…is that.

Thanks again to Jon and Emily for putting their trust and faith into me to be their wedding photographer.  I really can’t express what that means to me. 

Cool weddings are the coolest.

HC-B

The always observant Mr. Lee was insightful enough to point this out to me:

Heh. Thanks Jon 🙂

Boston Wedding Photography: Jon and Emily on Bailey Island Maine: Part 1

A few months back, Emily left me a sweet message on my Facebook fan page that said something like “Abby! We want you to photograph our wedding!” and I thought Aw that’s nice…but they wouldn’t actually hire me.

Why? Because I’m insecure 🙂 No actually it’s because I know Emily’s husband Jon from NESoP where he totally ruled at everything: Advertising (he actually assisted me on my first studio shoot at Decordova), Fine Art Color and Documentary.  Guy was selected by his class to represent them as their speaker at graduation last year.  Jon teaches photography.  He’s also mind-meltingly smart (with a masters in Psychology) and knows so much about art and photography it makes me want to run and hide.  Jon hire me? Yeah right.

Yeah. Right? Right! I’ve said it a hundred time leading up to this wedding, but the fact that Jon Lee asked me to not only be at his wedding but be his official photographer was…to say the very least, humbling.  It’s ALWAYS flattering when anyone asks me to be their photographer, but when someone like Jon, who I hold in very, very high esteem asks me….well, it’s an incredible feeling.

Even better–this was no ordinary wedding. Oh no–this was a Jon and Emily affair. And by that I mean: incredibly unique, personal, colorful, beautiful, creative and spiritual.  In deciding what kind of wedding Jon and Emily wanted to have, it turned out that many elements of the traditional Korean wedding coincided with their views on marriage, love, family and community.  After doing extensive research (according to Jon, the traditional Korean wedding pre-dates our grandparents’ generation), Jon and Emily crafted this incredibly special wedding, blending Jon’s Korean back round with Emily’s Italian and English back round. Not only was the wedding itself beautiful (on Bailey Island, Maine, no less), but the coming together of two families and a variety of cultures and traditions to not only celebrate Jon and Emily, but to come together as one family–cooking, drinking, laughing, and loving. It was, in the truest sense of the word–a beautiful day.

Look alive for Part 2, probably tomorrow: Korean Barbeque, Jon’s mom throwing chestnuts at Emily (yes, actually), and much much more celebration.

Boston Wedding Photography: Maggie and Kenny in Cambridge!

Oh man you guys.  I admit it: I was wicked nervous for this wedding. There I said it.  I was nervous.  Wedding photographers are not picture machines–we are living, breathing, emotion having anxiety fighting human beings.  And I was nervous for this one…

Why? Really I was mostly nervous because this is my first wedding since November and I was worried I would be rusty.  To fight the nerves, I packed my bags and charged my batteries extra early and made a big checklist so that I wouldn’t forget anything.  For some reason list-making is comforting for me.  I packed my stuff, hopped in the car and we were off.

What I wasn’t nervous about? Working with Maggie.  I met this little peanut last fall for brunch and she was so lovely and gracious and happy and energetic.  She really trusted me and my work, and I cannot tell you how important that is–when a client really trusts me, I feel totally free to do my thing and I feel so much more confident about my process and my work.  I don’t waste time worrying if the bride is going to like my work, I just get to pour all my brain power into getting inspired and being creative.

Funny thing: I just started swimming again after a 9 year hiatus (yes, believe it or not, this beer drinker used to be a competitive athlete).  Damnedest thing: I hadn’t swam a lap in years and I dove in and swam 1200 yards (remember when that used to be our warm up?).  And it felt great.  My body just snapped back into swimmer mode.  My hips were up, my chest was down, I rolled through every stroke–and I just glided (glid?) through the water. My body just remembered what to do and I was just sort of along for the ride.  

Turns out taking a few months of of weddings and jumping back in is pretty much the same thing 🙂

Maggie thank you thank you so much for inviting me into your day, and for your enthusiasm and trust in myself and my team.  You were a freakin’ doll to work with.

Sneak Peek: Beautiful Maggie in the Garden….