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ISPWP Image Placement!

I’m thrilled to post the results from my first contest with the ISPWP (International Society of Professional Wedding Photographers)!  Not only am I proud of my involvement with the organization in general, which has very high standards for membership, but that I placed 17th overall (among the 100’s that entered) in their Winter 2009 image contest with 6 of the images I entered placing in it’s given category!

Check out the screen captures of my image placements below, and click on the image to be taken to the contest photo gallery where you can view the rest of the winning images.  There’s some truly inspiring work from all around the world, so you owe it to yourself to take a look around.

Jacqueline and Elliot, Sierra and Steve, Jessica and Justin, Katie and David, Ha and Sy, Julie and Yomei, and all family and friends in the images, it’s truly due to you that these images even exist.  Thank you so much for welcoming me into this important day in your lives!

Ian Mitchell - Nice work man!

Cliff - Thanks Ian!

Kristin + BIlly | Married! – Santa Clara Mission & Hotel Sainte Claire Wedding

This was our last wedding of 2009, and was a great way to finish of the season!  It was quite a day.  There was so much genuine emotion all day long, it was what’s known as a “target rich environment”. :-)   It would have been hard to not get some great images!

We started off at Hotel Sainte Claire for getting ready.  Kristin was a radiant bride!

Billy doing his finishing touches as well.

There were happy tears all day long.

Excellent sequence of the 1st sight:

We did a few in the lobby then left to the Santa Clara Mission for the wedding.

This is Billy’s grandmother.  She was so thrilled to see Billy marrying Kristin, and their interactions were so filled with emotion.  The image says it all.

This image is Malarie’s.  Nice shot wifey!

I loved the architecture of Hotel Sainte Claire.  It was great setting for the reception!

The wedding was dubbed their”Big, Fat, Green Wedding”, a play on Billy’s Greek heritage, and the fact that they took great pains in assuring their wedding was as “green” as possible.  A few of the green details: the placecards were made from handmade paper, which they made themselves!  The rings were made from Fair Trade gold in a custom olive branch design that also reflected the theme of the wedding.  They did an ice cream cake from Bi-Rite Creamery here in SF, which uses local, organic, ingredients.  Also en lieu of favors, they made donations in each of the guests’ names to the Amazon Conservation Association.

In addition, Hilary Mercante from the Hotel Sainte Claire made the day a great pleasure, she was excellent to work with and took good care of us.  Kristin also raved about her which is a good sign. :-)   I also had the opportunity to work with a fantastic videography team, which is something I don’t get to say often!  James from Burkart Video Productions was awesome, and his 2nd shooter on the day just happened to be Andrew Hsu of Studio MSV, an equally talented wedding filmmaker.  These guys are on my VERY short list of videographers in the area.  The highest complement I can give them is that they see like photographers. :-)

It was SO hard to narrow down the toast images!  So many great expressions!

First dance:

Kristin with her Dad.

Billy was on fire on the dance floor!

I’ve never actually seen a groom go for the piggyback ride before.  First time for everything!

They did some Greek dancing which was a blast.  Me being me, I decided the best images would come from inside the circle.  I nearly died, but the images were great!

It was a great joy to be involved in your day Billy and Kristin; thanks for having us!

Cliff

Roy Simms - Cliff, the parents are thrilled with the photos. Great job by you and your team!

Stephanie Byrnes - What beautiful pictures! They truly tell a story- What a memorable day!!!!!

Kristin - These images are so incredible, Cliff. How fun to re-live the day. We are so excited with all the pictures you took - so many favorites!

Claire - Fantastic! I loved this wedding and the photos take me back to the good times!

andrew hsu - beautiful stuff, cliff! cheers! (and thanks for the nice words.)

Cliff - Thanks so much everyone! We really had a great time. Hey Andrew, I think I see you in a few of these. :-)

Kirstie - What a GORGEOUS collection of photographs. You are incredibly skilled at capturing moments beautifully. These are just stunning.

Jan Stewart Thomas - Quite honestly, it's hard to imagine better pictures! Good job capturing the genuine sentiment of the day.

Billy Byrnes - Cliff-THANK YOU! You captured incredible moments and facial expressions of the most important day of our lives. We are so thrilled with the pictures and they do tell a story of our wedding day. We are grateful we got to work with you and Malarie. Thanks for helping us relive the fun and be able to always go back to images of our big fat green wedding!

Cliff - Thanks Billy!!

Jessica + Justin | Married! – SF Fairmont & Cliff House Wedding

A little while ago we were invited to shoot Jessica and Justin’s wedding at the Cliff House at Ocean Beach in SF.  Jessica and Justin already had one of my very favorite engagement sessions of the year, so I knew the wedding was going to be fabulous.  They certainly didn’t disappoint! Jessica is wonderfully expressive, Justin is a dapper fella, and their families were absolutely hilarious!

We started things off at the Fairmont Hotel.  She was already ready for the most part when I was scheduled to arrive, but I got this right after she got in the dress.  Sarah Morris did the hair, and she always does a stellar job.  I highly recommend her!

Love this!

We shot a few in the lobby and then headed over to Huntington Square.

One of my favorite portraits of the season.

Grace Cathedral in the background. A little bit of Paris in San Francisco.

Jessica and her dad walking up to the ceremony.  Masoud the event coordinator for the Cliff House in the background.

Love this first kiss!  Not a bad background for a ceremony eh?

Married!

The details.  Check out those hot shoes!

Some great reactions during the toasts!  To protect the innocent, I won’t mention what was said to get the last 2 reactions from Justin.

Jessica and Justin’s sister.  They already seemed like family.

Jessica’s dad was such a character!

Justin’s dad had a great time too!

Thanks Jessica and Justin for having us along, we had a great time!

Cliff

Ryan - Great coverage man! You've got some really well lit shots in there with some sweet compositions. Nicely done.

Cliff - Thanks Ryan!

Mark - Love the shot of Jessica with Justin's sister. Great moment, nice lighting.

Cliff - Thanks much Mark!

Rebecca + Faisal | Married! – Brazilian Room Wedding

Rebecca and Faisal had a lovely intimate affair a little while back at the Brazilian Room in the Berkeley Hills.  They may look familiar from their engagement session if you’ve been following for a while.  The day was a lot of fun, everyone was very close and many of their friends are musicians and dancers so it was a very lively reception!  I always enjoy being right in the action so I had a great time!

Love all the reactions to Rebecca’s makeup.

We set up a great first sight moment.

I think this was the fastest portrait session I’ve ever had, I think we only ended up with about 5 minutes!  Beautiful backdrop.

The details:

This was the most challenging bridal party portrait I’ve ever done.  The timing for this was after the sun had already gone down, and it was pitch black outside.  In fact, the power for the venue had gone out, so I had to use my battery powered lights just so I could see them at all, and I had to to jump up and down and yell so they knew where the camera was!  To get color in the sky I had Malarie light everyone individually and did a separate long exposure.  This is a combo of several separate frames.  I loved the result, glad it worked! :-)

One of my favorite dancing images ever.

Loved this girl.  She decided it was her duty to carry the dress around the reception.

Lost in thought staring at the fire.  I wonder what he was thinking?

Faisal and his Dad did a performance together, and I snuck out back to get an interesting angle.

The action on the dance floor was so much fun to shoot!

The action was a little much for these guys!

Thanks so much to Rebecca and Faisal for sharing their day with us!

Cliff

rebecca - I love all these photos so much!! I have so many favorites, you have such a great eye. Thank you so much Cliff. I especially like the first look and portrait session, I'm glad we decided to do all those before the actual ceremony.

Published! | Kristin + Peter on Snippet & Ink

One of Kristin and Peter’s images was featured as a “Sunday Edition” image on one of my very favorite wedding blogs, Snippet & Ink! Thanks so much to Kathryn for the feature, and to Kristin for that fantastic reaction!  If you haven’t ever spent time at Snippet & Ink you owe yourself a look!

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