Weddings take lots of time and project management as well as a good support staff for each role: wedding coordinator, the make up artists, photographers, musicians, religious ceremony personal, decor staff, hotel hospitality staff and catering staff, to various other vendors involved. Shooting this wedding as a guest photographer was fun, however it proved to be take a lot of effort and passion to create such beautiful memories.
The WaterFront Hilton was beautiful and the concierge helped me contact the brides ready room. In addition, decoration team (Nancy Guan) helped me contact to Karen’s primary support team’s (Karen’s Mom and bridesmaids) cell. Karen’s Mom was amazing and got me the location and info quickly to meet up with bride and wedding coordinator, later during the event she also helped host the family shoot after the wedding.
The make up artists were amazing, when I arrived at 7:10 AM, the two make up artists (MUA) were already working on the bride and maid of honor. The two MUA made beautiful women look even more accented with beauty, especially for photography.
With most productions I needed to rely on the April Cenora’s (wedding coordinator) agenda for a road map and timing. Likewise, I never wanted to be in the primary photographers way or shot. Jeff Yoo’s team was friendly and did many interesting posing and angle shots. I would love to see their work when they post team. Most of my shots were from afar using my flexible EF-S 15-85 mm zoom lens or a 50 mm lens. I tried to get different shots from the primary photographer other than shooting the bride and groom, such as the lovely bridesmaids, maid of honor, wedding details, guests, people, children, and overall ambiance.
I had a chance to talk with Mike Gonzo the music DJ guy, he was pretty cool with the mixers and play lists. I applaud him for playing a nice group Cha-cha dance song during the reception. It really motivated the crowd to start dancing. My kudos to Karen and Ken in finding a very hip religious Father for the wedding ceremony who was able to toss a joke out every so often the made the audience laugh.
I loved the photo booth idea. It gave the guests a take home souvenir as well as a guest list photo book for the event! Very smart and hip! Me and my friends had a blast with that photo booth. Another excellent idea was the chocolate fountain with fresh fruit! Yum!
Talking about food, the food was buffet surf and turf style + sushi. Cooked well and tasted great. Double YUM!
The table details and decorations for the chapel were simple and elegant.
Overall I was really glad I was a guest shooter at Karen’s wedding. It was a 7AM to 7 PM event which for the experience, new found friendships, and overall excitement factor brought everything home to things I enjoy doing. Please enjoy the photos of the support teams, see the gallery below.
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