My life has been a bit crazy lately. I quit my nursing job; my husband and I entertained family for Christmas in New Orleans; and we packed up our whole house into two pods and one car and drove our two cats first to Austin to stay with friends (barely making it in New Years Eve night) and then to Santa Fe to stay with another friend. After about a week of driving across the country and seeing friends, we finally arrived in Colorado, unloaded our pods into my sister’s basement, spent a few nights in her spare room and then packed a couple suitcases to hop on a seemingly endless string of flights down to South America. We traveled around Argentina for an amazing sixteen day adventure (more blogs on that later) and we just got home a couple days ago to a giant snow storm. Yep, that’s been our last month and a half.

For Halloween, I photographed, with the help of my wonderful assistant/husband, Margaret Adler and Walker Saik’s wedding in New Orleans. I finished editing it a while ago, but with the craziness of our lives, I did not get a chance to post it until now.

Let me walk you through my method for approaching coverage of a large wedding. The key is preparation and organization. I met with the bride and groom before the wedding and we settled on a schedule of events and photos. I also visited the ceremony and reception venues ahead of time to plan settings for my lights and locations for portraits.

Without further ado, let’s start with the men getting ready on the day of the wedding. I began by photographing at Walker’s house, where the groomsmen had gathered to tell stories, joke around, relax and oh yea, get dressed.

After saying goodbye to the guys, I headed to Margaret’s to cover the ladies getting ready.

With Margaret fully dressed, it was time for me to race off to the church to get some portraits of the guys. My schedule was planned out to the minute. It is so important to do this when photographing a large wedding. It always makes the day of the wedding far less stressful for everyone involved. When I arrived, the guys had some finishing touches to make.

Once their boutineers were in place, I took a few portraits outside and then Evan helped me quickly set up my new fancy lights (Profoto Cordless lights) in the parlor for more portraits. The lights worked beautifully. I was so happy with the lighting in these portraits.

Next, the ladies arrived and the guys had to scoot out of the way so Walker didn’t see Margaret before the ceremony. I had to keep them inside for their portraits so that no guests would see the bride either, but I was again very pleased with the way my new lights worked.

Finally, I took some bridal portraits, occasionally using the bridesmaids as a sort of backdrop.

And with that, it was time for us all to prepare for the ceremony. They got married in the church attached to the school Margaret went to growing up. It was a very sweet, personal touch. I plugged my lights in to charge them back up a bit during the ceremony (since they are cordless) and began photographing guests arriving and the setting while the wedding party prepared to make their entrance. Evan stayed on the balcony to get some ariel shots for me. It is important to get a variety of shots, from details to overall wide shots. The ceremony is the most stressful part of a wedding for me to shoot, because there are so many key moments that can’t be missed. It was a beautiful ceremony.

After the ceremony, we quickly set up the lights by the altar for portraits of the couple, the couple with their families and the entire wedding party. I was impressed by how well the lights worked for a large group of people. Have I made it clear how much I love these lights? I did not have much time and I had a lot of photos to take, but with some organization and creativity, I tried to take some memorable and well lit photos nonetheless. I put the photos in an order that allowed the older generations to finish first and made the whole process as efficient as possible.

At the conclusion of the portraits, Evan and I packed up our equipment and raced down the street to the Orleans Club for the reception, where I waited for their entrance.

We had gone to the reception hall a few days earlier to test the lights in the space.  We found that putting the power up fairly high on the lights and pointing them to the ceiling provided the most even light for the dance floor. It really worked well from all angles and allowed me to concentrate on catching memorable moments.

After the first dances, we briefly moved the lights outside and we stole the couple for a few private portraits.

Margaret and Walker were then ready for the cutting of the cake. As they mingled and waited for the guests to gather around, the lights were moved next to the cake and I borrowed their rings for the detail shots.

The cake cutting was immediately followed by the bouquet toss. Evan moved the lights back to the dance floor, where they would stay the rest of the night, as I got in position for the bouquet toss. Having cordless lights made all these changes in the position of the lights much easier and quicker.

After that, I used my off camera flash to cover guests in the dining area and details of the unique grilled cheese station. The guests decorated themselves with glow sticks and I used the lights set up by the dance floor for fun crowd shots, posed shots, shots the band (including the bride’s brother-in-law jamming out on stage), and candid moments around the dance floor. I loved a shot I got of one of the guests dancing to Michael Jackson’s Thriller. It was very fitting for a halloween wedding.

After dancing the night away, Margaret and Walker made their exit into the rain- a little good luck sign for their future. Congratulations again, Margaret and Walker, and thank you for trusting me to document your special day. It was truly a pleasure.