Peak2Peak Wedding, Josh and Paul

Josh and Paul came out to Whistler for their wedding on the Peak2Peak gondola from Australia. Paul had a large group of friends from Dublin Ireland, and Josh's mother came out from Australia.


The wedding inside the Peak2Peak gondola at Whistler. There aren't a lot of places you really need a fisheye lens, but this is one of them.


Paul and his Irish friends serenade Josh as the gondola comes into the Blackcomb station.


Heavy snow on the way to Champaign at Christine's at Blackcomb.




We finished up the wedding at the Nita Lake Lodge. It's a nice spot, and I always like to do some non-alpine shots with these weddings.

Tech Stuff
A big part of planning for a wedding is knowing the equipment you'll need for a certain job. Often I'll pack specialized gear, like the fisheye lens I used in the gondola car, if I know I'll be in a tricky situation.

Cameras: Nikon D2x, Nikon D700
Lens: Nikon 10.5mm DX, AF-S Nikon 17-35mm f/2.8, AF-S Nikon 28-70 f/2.8
Lighting: Nikon SB-800 bounced into a photo umbrella (last photo). Controlled by the SU-800.

Charissa Belle and Nick's Wedding at the Nita Lake Lodge

Charissa and Nick came up to Whistler for a quiet wedding with just the two of them. I knew it was going to a lot of fun when Charissa told me that instead of exchanging rings, they were going to get tattooed instead.

Back in Whistler

Dave and Kathleen, from Scotland
After 2 1/2 months in South Africa, I'm back in Whistler. The first week back, I had a small wedding to photograph, and three commercial commissions. The first was to shoot a beautiful local house (I'd love to show you pics, but the home owner requested that they remain private), and two public spaces.


BonBon anyone? The Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory
This was shot for the contractor who had just done a recent renovation. When I was still in South Africa, I ordered three Alien Bee strobes to replace my old Norman strobe set up (although I did keep the 2000w/sec pack, and a couple of heads, just in case I need some real horsepower). When I got home, they were sitting in my studio ready to go. The Norman's were great, but heavy and awkward to use, and took a small truck to carry on location. Three Alien Bee 640w/sec heads, all the cables, speed rings, and a couple of folded up soft boxes, all go in a full sized LowePro roller case that used to hold my RZ-67 set-up (another great technology sadly gone the way of the buggy whip).



This is the Whistler Museum and Archive. I was hired by Panther Management, the company that did the museum exhibits and design, to do some photos of the newly renovated museum. They called me Thursday afternoon, said they needed pictures ASAP, as they were needed for a bid on another project. I shot the job Friday morning, did the photoshop work after lunch, and had the pics uploaded to Panther's FTP site by late Friday afternoon.

The key to this shoot is that it had to look like a museum, with low key warm lighting, but it can't be so dark that you can't see what's going on. In the large photo, you can see that I have a large light source to light the chairs and front of the scene, and another smaller light to brighten up the exhibit just off to the left of the frame. In the smaller photo, that's what the scene looks like without the extra strobe lighting.

This week coming, I have two more clients with work to be done before the Olympics start.

Alanna and Derek's Wedding at the Nita Lake Lodge

This is my last wedding for 2009, and I couldn't have gotten a more pleasant group of people than Alanna and Derek and their guests and family.  It's also the first time I've done a large sized wedding at the Nita Lake Lodge, and I'm really starting to like this spot as a wedding location.


Alanna's Dad, waiting for the girls at the chapel.






Rough weather for the whole day, but we did get a nice rain free hole just after the ceremony.  It was nearly dark by the time we finished the bridal portraits.






We finished all the posed bridal and family portraits early, so I asked if I could try some locations around the lodge.  Most of the venues I work in at Whistler tend to more 'Mountain Rustic' in their decor, while the Nita Lake is quite modern and cool looking, so it was a good opportunity for me to try something a little different.

Tech Stuff:
I used a wide range of techniques for this wedding.  The first two interior shots are lit with just the available available light.

The guys on the dock needed a touch of on-camera fill flash, because of the generally gloomy and miserable conditions were causing heavy shadows on their faces.

With the bride's maids, I asked one of the groomsmen to hold the flash off to camera left, and then under exposed the sky to get a dramatic look out of it.

The interior shots were all done with a flash bounced into a photo umbrella.  The shot at the bar also had another flash positioned behind the bar to act as a 'kicker'.

Camera:  Nikon D700 (all)
Lenses:  AF-S 17-35mm f/2.8 (first, fourth, fifth, sixth), AF-S 28-70mm f/2.8 (second, seventh, eighth), and the AF-S 70-200mm f/2.8 (third)