Tuesday, January 22, 2019

The Lake House Wedding YYC – Courtney & Patrick

Courtney and Patrick’s Lake House Wedding YYC was the first winter wedding I ever photographed. I’m not going to lie, I was a bit nervous – there’s a lot more to consider when photographing in the winter months. The main two being:

1. Light: the sun sets MUCH earlier than in the summer, so I knew I would loose all natural light by 5pm. This actually ended up working out amazingly for our portraits. The ceremony wrapped up around 3:30pm and we had that beautiful sunset glow to work with for all the bridal party portraits. The hour before sunset is always my favourite time to photograph portraits as the light is really soft and has such a nice glow. It’s a very flattering light, and I would photograph ALL portraits at this time of day if that was a possibility. In the summer though, when the sun doesn’t set until 9pm, doing portraits at this time isn’t always an option. It was a really nice treat to be able to photograph the portraits for Courtney and Patrick’s wedding at this time.

The main challenge that the 5pm sunset created was for the reception. All photographers would love to have that soft evening light billowing through the windows for every wedding reception but for this winter wedding, there was no natural light at all. I decided, instead of introducing a flash, which I personally think changes the look and feel of photos quite a lot, I would adjust my camera settings and work with the ambient light to give the photos a more ‘grainy’ film look. I think it suits the feel of a dark winter wedding perfectly!

2. Weather: this was a CALGARY winter wedding, and anyone who knows Calgary, knows it can get VERY cold. As someone who loves being outside, and feels more comfortable photographing in natural spaces, I was worried how the weather, and potential cold, would affect the portraits for Courtney and Patrick’s wedding. Courtney and I had a lot of communication about this before hand, and we decided if the weather cooperated we both definitely preferred to do the portraits outside, but we knew we needed a back up plan just in case. We came up with a couple of indoor options for doing portraits if it came to it. Although we were crossing our fingers we didn’t have to use the back up spaces, it was really important to have that organized so we felt prepared, and didn’t waste any time day of. Luckily, Calgary had one of their infamous ‘chinooks’ and we were blessed with great weather that day! – as you’ll see with Courtney braving bare shoulders through 95% of the portraits!

Photographing this Lake House Wedding YYC in the winter opened my eyes to the beauty of ‘off season’ weddings. I know this kind of weather, and these conditions are quite common for many photographers, but I live in Victoria, BC where we are spoiled with a winter that consists of a little bit of rain and an average temperature of +4 degrees Celsius. I love how the snow, the light -and lack of light- added such a romantic feel to this wedding… and for a couple of Calgarian’s, this weather is their reality for almost half the year, so it’s perfectly representative of their life :).

All this rambling about winter wedding’s aside, it was such an honour to photograph Courtney and Patrick’s Lake House Wedding YYC. I’ve known Courtney since she was about 12 years old, as she is the younger sister to one of my best friends. I spent a lot of nights sleeping over at her house growing up so you can imagine how special it was for me to be right there beside her her whole wedding day. This is honestly the most magical part of my job as a wedding photographer- I get to witness and be immersed in all the emotions of your day. Even if I didn’t know you before hand, within a couple of hours I feel so connected to you, and absolutely blessed that I’m privileged with such an intimate look into your life.

Thank you so much Courtney and Patrick for having me document this amazing day!

I’ve also had the pleasure of photographing a snowy winter engagement session, and would love to photograph more couples in the snow! Get in touch and let’s talk about your engagement and/or wedding 🙂