Most Wedding Wednesday posts are full of ideas & thoughts that will hopefully get you thinking about various details as you plan your wedding. It is always fun to show a variety of themes & color palettes, wedding fashion for both the guys & girls, hair, makeup, engagement sessions, etc. Pretty much anything to inspire you. Today’s post however, will be a bit about what inspires me as a photographer. During consultations or even while on an engagement or bridal shoot, I am often asked about my style and where I get my ideas on posing, lighting & locations. Ever since I can remember I have looked at fashion magazines. My mom would get frustrated with me because her magazines would end up with missing pages or parts of a page cut out so that I could make a big collage or a book of smaller collages. One day way back when, my dad walked in my room and saw me sitting on the floor with scissors, glue and magazines. He asked what I was doing and why I did it so often. All I could say was that I liked the clothes and that there was something about the eyes in some images. I didn’t understand what I was seeing then, but I now know that what I saw in the eyes was a connection between the photographer & model and when it was done very well, you could almost ‘feel’ that person. Now as for me, I personally was a fashion faux pas. I would mix and match clothes that really didn’t make sense, but to me they did. haha. Hopefully that has changed some as I have gotten older. The other thing about me is that I was never at ease in FRONT of the lens, but I sure took loads of pictures of other people. In college I was known as the girl with the yellow Canon Snappy every single place we went. What I found was that my friends liked seeing the pictures of everyone having fun and just being natural. The fact that I was never totally at ease with having my picture taken, has pushed me to make everyone I shoot feel completely at ease, have fun and most importantly…feel good about themselves at that moment. As we all know, you get amazing pictures if the subject trusts the photographer & has fun.
There are some vintage fashion photographers that I absolutely love even though they are before my time. A few of them are Norman Parkinson, Mark Shaw and Richard Avedon. A very well known Richard Avedon photo is actually the inspiration for my logo. My logo even has a name which is ‘the dancer girl’. This image has been a favorite of mine for years.

So, when I sent this to my logo & web designer in California she said she would use this and other things that describe my style to come up with a logo. After she created the proof, she called me up and said that maybe we better call the Richard Avedon foundation because she felt it resembled it a bit too much. I must say I pitched a fit when they told her we couldn’t use it. However Ellen of Identity Kitchen reassured me that whatever we came up with would be even better. She was right. I still love my logo and hope to for many years to come. The images below are what I consider vintage fashion…not vintage in the sense of country & antique. What I love about these is that they are simple, elegant & timeless.

In addition to looking at vintage fashion photography, I love looking at shoots by Burberry, Vogue, Bazaar & W magazine. I need my monthly glossy fix as I put it. Meaning, I am addicted to magazines. While I love infusing fashion into my shooting style, I also want the images to show real emotions & fun. I want to capture laughs and big beautiful smiles as well as the quiet, soft looks. Most importantly I want my clients to see themselves having fun & expressing real emotions all while looking their absolute very best.

Thank you for stopping by!

~lisa

A vineyard theme wedding is the perfect choice for a wine loving couple and can be loads of fun to plan. When I think of a vineyard the things that come to mind are, beautiful rolling hills of vineyards, rich colors, romance & beauty, flavor-rich cheeses and of course wine. When planning this type of wedding you can go all out and plan the wedding at a vineyard or simply add touches of the theme to your overall day. I have seen receptions that have been outside with the vineyard as a gorgeous backdrop for the tables or inside at the wine cellar. Either one has a beautiful & elegant feel to it.

There are so many creative touches you can add to a vineyard theme wedding: Have small wooden shipping crates filled with wine, use grapevine as wreaths, use large wine barrels as decor or as a small table to place gifts, candles or favors. Use place cards that look like a wine label and prop them with a cork. Have a cheese & grape station. If you do not want to have a sit down dinner, you can set up the reception with cheese, grapes, bread & hearty crackers. Another fun idea is to have a bread & assorted olive oil and seasonings station. Yummy! Offer various juices for your guests that do not drink. Use empty wine bottles to make candles and light at the reception. The options are endless. I have a vineyard theme wedding coming up very soon and I cannot wait to see all the little touches that have been added by my bride & groom to make it their very own.

Happy planning!! Thanks for stopping by.

~lisa