WPPI Las Vegas

First class...

Kevin & Heidi Huston-St. Petersberg, FL Sept. 27th, 2008

First off I just want to say that I’m not sure if we were in St. Pete or Tampa or both or how that all works. Sometimes when I talk about this wedding, I say St. Pete and other times Tampa. I’m sure Taira will clear all of this up for me. My geography is quite bad as I don’t remember learning anything other than States and Capitals in school. It’s funny too b/c I’m a destination wedding photographer. I enjoy every place I visit, I just don’t always know how far I am away from Mexico City or Ireland other than in terms of hours on the plane.
So, I get a phone call in…let’s say Janurary about shooting a wedding in September in Tampa. I’m stoked of course and put it on my calendar, etc. A few months go by and I get an email that says, wedding is off (details). I was pretty bummed for a few obvious reasons and also by that point I have turned away another bride for that date and I had no more. Then on the Tuesday before their saturday wedding date I get a phone call, “hey, uh, I know this is short notice, but uh..” I was stoked to say the least but had to get things in order really fast, I left 2 days later. I know what you’re thinking, what’s the big deal dropping everything and leaving in 2 days. Nothing, except I have a wife and two kids, that makes for a lot of preparations. But Katie was cool and I left. I’ll spare you most of the traveling details, because I had recently gotten my IPhone, the first one, and was very into blogging from it at the time. So you can go back if you’d like.
I had a lot of down time with this wedding which was a nice opportunity to get focused and clear about what, how, and where I was going to shoot. They had their wedding at the botanical gardens which made for some tricky and also cool shadows, with the sun coming down through the leaves. Instead of fighting it (which I recommend never doing) I just went with it (which is what I recommend doing), and ended up with a few of my favorite pics from the entire wedding.
After the wedding we headed to St. Pete cove or that’s what I’m going to call it. I happened to find it after wandering around the day before. It is this big beautiful park next to the ocean with all these huge sail boats. The dock with the sail boats was locked, but I knew I'd get in there somehow. I have this unwavering confidence that I can get into places I'm not really supposed to be. Anyways, once I found an old man who was hesitant but willing, Heidi and I hopped on the dock and just started...shooting. I love the energy when you’re about to take what has to be amazing pictures in a place you’ve never been. The pressure’s on to find the right spot, right lighting, right backdrop, in the right amount of time. You don’t want the bride getting bored, you don’t want the old man to get mad you’re taking too long, so you just have to act fast, and you do it. I think it’s becomes instinct at that point. You really gotta stop thinking and just feel it out. Man, that’s what the entire Paris wedding was, but that’s another story.
Next…Starbucks of course. I mean I think that was almost as important to Kevin and Heidi as getting the sailboat shots. The reception (down the hall), was just a huge party to say the least. I had a lot of fun watching everyone, arms around each other, singing Journey songs into the night.
Overall, it was perfect. The traveling, the hotel, the area. St. Pete is one of my favorite places I have ever been. Plus, I got to have breakfast with my good friend Taira a couple times, which really, was just the bees knees.

ps, yes they're holding their zippers open for me in that 2nd picture =)

El show del wedding un para noche. Grande!

So, the wedding show was a success. I spoke to a lot of brides, moms and a few grooms. There were so many photographers there (15) that you would think there would be all this competition and you’d be lucky to get one or two weddings. However, the thing that I like so much is that I know I’m going to book the brides I want to shoot. Each photographer has their own style, sure it overlaps, but for the most part a bride will have it narrowed down to 3 or so right off the bat. And the brides that want all the posey pictures will get the posey photographers, those that want the cutie bubble gum photography will get that and those that want the art photographers will get them. I’m not docking any other photographers, I’m actually saying it’s pretty cool that we all have our little corners of the market here and it doesn’t feel like this ridiculous competition. No one is out to get anyone as far as competition goes and there’s plenty to go around. I just had this wonderful heartwarming feeling come over me while we were there, that I really hope we all (the photographers) book equal weddings by number. I like that way more than, “what can I do to take over this market (drool and seeth coming from my breath).”
I definatly felt like my photography this year has jumped a level and I’m at a point I feel really confident in. This is due in large part to all the amazing weddings I shot last year, location wise and also energy wise. I had some of my favorite brides I’ve ever had last year. Brides that said, “We trust your eye, we just want some amazing pictures.” And that just frees me up to explore and create based on what I see and not worry about doing what mommy and daddy want.
Also I want to thank Heidi for helping us. It was really nice to have her there. I’m very grateful and a little blown away she wanted to be there saying nice things about me all day. Also we could not have gotten everything done on time without Brad & Kendall Glouser, Mark & Lisa Petersen, Robin Whitmer, Aubrie, Dayci, Sarai, Elise, Ashlea, Derek, Kyle, Aunt Donna, Seth, Nathan from Print-It, Elise (Kaylie's sister) & Nicole (magazine editor).
Wedding shows are nuts…I’m glad it’s over!
*note, I’m not sure if seeth is a word, but I like it so much in that context that I’m declaring as so. I suppose I could look it up, but I like it better this way. FIN

Done!

Holy cow. How do I begin to say how crazy and stressful this wedding
show was to prepare for. I'll just leave it at that.
Met some awesome brides...I'm excited for 09.

Drumroll......brrrrrrr...

...and the losers are...

The Thinker and The Close up.

Thanks for everyone's help. We'll see you next year.

Oh! and I added the Notre Dame Dancing pic...will post later....

Which 6 would you keep?

Here's the pictures we've decided to enlarge for the wedding shows. We're doing 6 probably 2-3feet by 3-4 feet. So out of these 8, which 2 would you toss! it's such a hard decision!!!

Utah Bride and Groom Magazine

Hello, I'm excited to announce KHP was featured on the Utah Bride and Groom website Here. Check it out, it's a pretty nice write up. Not necessary my favorite pics from the wedding, but I do like it when other people rifle through my stuff and fit their taste. It's fun to see what other people are drawn to. We're hoping to go back to Paris this spring. But right now we're really really focused on our wedding shows at the end of Jan/Feb. Really you wouldn't know how much work it takes unless you've done one. I have some hopeful weddings and some weddings booked abroad as of right now in Colorado Springs, Cancun, Lake of the Ozarks (my childhood home) Seattle, Kansas City, ST George, and Park City. But none in April yet! sorry Michelle! don't worry it'll book soon.
If you're not Michelle, she is an amazing photography student from Canada aey who's flying down for a couple weeks to shadow me aey. She's also family aey, that I've never met. So I'm a bit flattered to say the least, and it will be fun....aey.
Back to work!