On one of our last trips to Vancouver, we got a chance to meet Matt’s fiance, at the time, Ginette! Just like Matt, she comes from an incredibly faithful and loving family. That along with her completing every bit of Matt’s life made us immediately see that they were perfect for each other. Did I mention that Ginette is a chef? And a pretty spectacular one at that too!

Our week in Vancouver went by incredibly fast. We hung out with Matt and Ginette, cousins, visited uncles and aunts and enjoyed all the things we miss about Vancouver from when we used to live there. Our daughter Klementine bonded with the kids of the family… especially with her “twin” cousin Miss. Samara… They were both born on the same day of the same year just an hour apart, it was awesome. Then came time for the wedding…

This was a unique opportunity for us since we were also guests at the wedding. Balancing that can be quite tricky, but we always manage to enjoy the best of both worlds. Lucky for us, Vancouver decided not to rain this time! We had beautiful sun pouring through the stained glass windows in the church.  It also followed us to the beautiful rainforest, hills and waters of the city during the photo session.

Now, we had a really hard time looking clearly through our viewfinders at the reception. See, we learned just how powerful a bond between twins can be when Matt’s brother Andrew took the podium. It is a bond like no other, even different than a parent with their child or a couple. It is so incredibly strong that Andrew had a hard time putting into words just how much he will miss his brother…but yet that he will always be happy and be there by his side wherever they may go. I’m starting to well up just remembering this.

Once the traditional Polish dancers hit the floor, it was time to party…and for us to put our cameras down!

Matt and Ginette, we wish you and your families the most blessings we can wish for. Knowing your families, we have no doubt that you two will have an incredible and fun journey together and we thank you for taking us along for this special day. We hope you enjoy your photos…and don’t forget to click on the link below for the slideshow!

Among the incredible sights of Poland, Berlin, Bavaria and the Czech Republic, we were also guests at Natalia and Felix’s beautiful wedding.

It was a stunning day. The sun came out and the temperature was just right…not too cold and not too hot. We were lucky because the days surrounding the wedding were iffy and had everyone slightly worried. We found beautiful gardens with a long trellis on the grounds of a store called the Villa Harteneck where we took Natalia and Felix for a relaxed portrait session. The reception was held at the ultra modern and sleek Stilwerk building overlooking Berlin from the top floor. The party was complete with Polish vodka, German beer and incredible performances by Felix’s relatives on brass and string instruments… They are a very talented bunch, including Felix’s sister who sang so beautifully at church and at the reception that it gave us goose bumps.

Seeing Natalia get married was quite special for Magda as she has known Natalia since they were very little girls. We had met Felix a few years ago when we flew to Germany and we right away knew why she fell in love.  All it takes is to glance at them together and you can see how in love they really are. Natalia and Felix, we wish you a lifetime of happiness together and we thank both your wonderful families for making us feel at home.

I leave you with a few photos from the day; mainly the portrait session, as we were quite busy partying the other times of the day ;)

Well, I guess that officially kicks off our 2012 wedding season! We are super excited for all our brides and grooms this year and we can’t wait to share our images with you all. Thank you for visiting and enjoy the photos…

After being on the island for a few days already venturing out of the resort to do things like the wedding and surfing on Macao Beach, we started to befriend the awesome people at Macao Surf Camp. So when it came to choosing a spot for Stephy and Stephen’s day after session, we spotted a small cove at the very end of the bend of the beautiful Macao Beach. I asked Rafael (one of the surfing instructors we hung out with) if he knew what was out there. He said, “Aaaaah! That, my friend…is lover’s beach!” Intrigued by this seemingly perfect sounding place for our session, we just had to get there!

Unfortunately for us, that place was on private property. So…we had the choice of walking waist deep in sea water along the cliffside, waves crashing into us with all our gear above our heads. Or, climbing through some rusty fences and attempting to bribe the 24/7 guard that mans the property! We took our chances and chose the latter.

The next day, we were off. Rafael arranged picked us up at the resort and arranged it so that his friend (a local photographer actually!) would come up with us as he had spoken with the guard before for his personal photography needs. Long story short, after a little worry that he wouldn’t let us through…we were lucky that $20 goes a long way in these parts, and we were in.

What we found was something straight out of a movie…a James Bond movie I’d even say. Water as pure and aqua as we had ever seen, golden rock formations, white flour sand, beautiful waves and best of all….privacy, peace and quiet. Stephanie and Steve let loose and we all took in every moment. It was serene! We took our time and explored various corners and types of lighting and came back with the following images.

As a side note to other photographers…when there are big waves out there, that means that there is a lot of wind….salty wind! And cameras and lenses aren’t very fond of that sort of stuff so be weary! Needless to say, we are thrilled to have muscled our way out there…it was totally worth it regardless if our gear suffered a little. Anything to get the shot, right? :)

I can safely say that Stephy and Steve are two of the most enjoyable people to work with! Not only did they take direction beautifully, but they were engaging, giving their own ideas…and best of all, they look stunning. It was one of our highlights of our career so far and we are so happy to finally share it with the newlyweds and now the whole world. We are really blessed to have opportunities like this and we are extremely thankful!

We hope you like them as much as we enjoyed shooting them…enjoy…

This will be a long blog post as we have a lot of images and information to share so please bear with us. With us being away for an entire week in the Dominican, we shot a whole lot of different events for Stephanie and Stephen ranging from surfing lessons, a white themed cocktail, the wedding of course and a super romantic day after session!

Let me start off by inviting you to see Stephanie and Stephen’s pre-wedding photo session we did for them a while back if you haven’t already seen it…by clicking here!

We met these two wonderful people (whom we can now call friends) last summer when they were just in the midst of planning their wedding getaway in Punta Cana. There is an incredible amount of logistics and planning to take care of, but that was no hard task for Stephanie and Stephen with them being very detail oriented! After a crazy number of months of planning…we were on a plane with half of the seventy some guests on our way to the Majestic Colonial resort in the very popular Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. I should also mention that this was immediately right after Christmas and we would all be spending new year’s eve down there too! I have to hand it to the resort staff…they really did a great job making new year’s night a special one!

I’m not sure what it was that made everyone immediately click with each other. Was it the fact that we were away from home – relaxed? Was it the warm sun? Perhaps it’s just that everyone who came down for the wedding was incredibly nice, generous and made the whole group feel like family! Regardless, if you asked anyone who came down, it was incredible.

After a night of getting together during the welcome cocktail, we all spent some time learning how to surf at the Macao Surf Camp. That’s a story that I will save for another post complete with photos of both the bride and groom hanging ten on some killer waves! ;)

The wedding day was to die for. A calm breeze swept through the resort with a beautiful, but not too strong sun shining down on us. After a relaxing morning at the spa Stephanie and her girls went back to their rooms to get ready, while the boys did the same in the other suite. Since the ceremony was a little later in the afternoon, Stephanie and Steve were game to see each other before the big moment, which was a real treat for them because they had a little breather. A moment to relax, fall more in love with each other and have a very comfortable and intimate portrait session too.

We fell in love with Macao Beach while at the surfing lessons. So, instead of doing the ceremony at the beach resort, we all decided it would be an awesome (but crazy!) idea to shuttle everyone down there to have Stephanie and Stephen get married on a raw and local beach! And that’s exactly what happened. A private beach, insane waves, a killer backdrop in every direction, Stephy and Steve exchanged their vows at an even more stunning location than they had imagined. Could you ask for more?

What happened next is something for the books…

Everyone came back to start the night of the reception at the resort. Lot’s of laughs, tears, endless drinks (google “Mama Juana”, and ask for it next time you go to the Dominican…trust us.), a photobooth (yes, we brought a photobooth with us on the plane!), ended with some incredible dancing into the night. There was this round wading kids pool next to the dance floor (coincidence? I think not.) that eventually lured everyone in…and that’s when everything went nuts! Aunts, uncles, cousins, literally everyone jumped in fully clothed and partied like they’ve never partied before. And to top it off, it finally rained during the last dance song of the night…are we joined it sans cameras! Some of the best fun we’ve had in forever. You can imagine both Magda and I loved every minute of it as this made for some awesome photos, so without further ado…please scroll down and enjoy our favourite moments of the day.

Oh, and be sure to check back shortly because we will be posting Stephanie and Stephen’s day after photo session at a completely secluded beach…

Stephanie and Stephen. Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for choosing us to fly down with you to capture your day. It was an honor and we are super happy to have made more friends and memories that will last forever! We wish you two the most incredible, long and happy married life together! :)

Click play below for probably our longest slideshow yet! :)

Firstly, if you haven’t seen Stephanie and Stephens wedding photos, you must click here if you want to follow this story properly! Then, you click here to view the day after session and then come right back here to see these photos! ;)

In short, Stephy and Stephen decided it would be a blast to get everyone at their wedding to learn how to surf. Boy were they right! They found the most beautiful place called Macao Surf Camp at the local Macao Beach in Punta Cana (which , by the way, always gets rave reviews on Trip Advisor and is one of the best things experience). On our way there everyone kind of looked at each other confused as to how on earth they were expected to surf…let alone get up on the board. But after a thorough lesson on land by the amazing staff, we were off to catch some waves.

It was honestly some of the most fun we’ve seen people have. Everyone manage to get right up on their boards and they were surfing! Yep. That’s right. Uncles, aunts, cousins, friends, people young and old with huge grins were riding waves all the way to shore. It was fantastic. Surfing was split up into two days so the first day Magda and I documented the first group and lucky for us…we too got a chance to try it. I have always wanted to try and surf and this was everything I expected!

If that wasn’t enough, during the break, a local man came riding up on a donkey to our group and started serving refreshing coconuts to drink and snack on. Last but not least is Jack the surfing Golden Retriever. He lives there with his owner and surfs all the time…it’s absolutely adorable! He’s even on YouTube!

Alright, that’s enough talk. I’ll let the photos do the rest of the talking.

Cowabunga dudes & dudettes!

As I mentioned in the pre-wedding post, Tin and Bobo are very special people to us. They are genuinely kind and caring people who fell in love with us and our work! They flew us all the way down to Vancouver to be there for their wedding day and capture every moment. We were honoured – thank you. It breaks our heart that just before the wedding Bobo’s father passed away, which made it very tough for both of then, especially Bobo. But strangely, the wedding was very much of a soothing and healing process for her and Tin. Tears of sadness seemed to be replaced with tears of joy while they sang beautiful hymns during the ceremony and eventually exchanged touching vows and finally their wedding bands. Magda and I had to fight back tears while we shot during these moments as it was very hard not to feel connected to everyone. Connecting with people like this is one of the many things that we love about our job… even if it makes it hard to see through the viewfinder sometimes!

The wedding took place at the beautiful Rowena’s Inn on the River at the picturesque Harrison Mills in British Columbia, just south of Vancouver. We have shot a wedding there before so it was a pleasure to be there again but this time for an elaborate Chinese wedding full of games, traditions, colorful dresses and a traditional tea ceremony. Big shout out to Erin and Mac from Hello Tomorrow wedding films who were there to capture everything on video! It’s like we’ve known them forever and it was a real pleasure working along side them. Check out the beautiful work they did for Tin and Bobo here!

Although the day before was sunny, unfortunately we were stuck with a very cold and rainy wedding day. Luckily the gloomy weather didn’t stop Tin and Bobo from ignoring it and just enjoying it..so we still did the photoshoot outside!

Tin and Bobo…we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for inviting us to photograph your wedding weekend getaway! You and your family and friends welcomed us just like family and we had a wonderful time capturing every detail. We know this day brought lots of happiness to your recently tough days and we know you two are strong and will come out with big smiles…just remember Magda and I trying to fit in during rehearsal dinner by trying to pronounce very difficult phrases in Cantonese! ;) We wish you love, happiness and lots of blessings and we hope to one day spend time with you again. Please enjoy our favourite images from your day and remember to click play on the slideshow!!

Hit play below for a (really long!) slideshow, and prepare some kleenex ;)

It’s a very special photoshoot because Bobo and Tin emailed us a very long time ago all the way from Vancouver pouring their hearts out to us. It was a really really touching email which made Magda and I immediately fall in love with them! They told us about their day, their family, themselves, and even sent us super adorable photos of themselves. I will leave the rest for the wedding blog post but we honestly can’t get over how amazing it is to meet and work with people like this. This is what drives us.

Anyways, after flying out to Vancouver we met Bobo and Tin at the gorgeous Rowena’s Inn on the River which sits on the Sand Piper Golf Club. When we got there we came upon Bobo and Tin in the middle of playing games with their bridal party all dressed to match. If the matching striped shirts don’t make you smile then I’m sure the little flower girl will! Oh and to top the day off, we got to spend the evening eating and partying with Bobo and Tin’s family and friends! We didn’t know what to day other than give them big hugs all day long :)

We cannot wait to share the wedding photos but for now, here is what happened the day before…

First let me show you some of the gorgeous things they had in the gardens…

These bananas grew in the courtyard of our building and when they ripened, they were cut down and served for breakfast at the buffet!

The building on the left was one of the restaurants:

This was the lonely flamingo in the pond. What fascinatingly shaped creatures, check out the way the beak opens!

Our building!

The lobby area. For you photographers, I shot this with a 50mm lens @ f16, iso50 exposed for 16seconds, which would explain why anything moving looks ghostly :)

The buffet had these wicked chimney intakes on the left leading up to a jumbo chimney! And did I mention the staff was super awesome?

Carlos! Our ultra-friendly waiter

The main landmark of the hotel was this lighthouse which was right on the beach and conveniently had a bar at the bottom.

And here are some photos from the beach…

Klementine really didn’t mind the salty water getting in her eyes or mouth, she was too pre-occupied with catching the waves. I think I may have a surfer brewing.

She later found an adorable same-aged girl with whom she played with all the time, it was adorable.

I took the Catamaran out pretty much every day which was so much fun. I wish I could continue doing that but the St.Lawrence river here in Montreal is just a tad frozen right now. Oh, and I don’t have a Catamaran.

Pelicans. And a plane.

We took our little underwater camera too (doesn’t compare to our real gear but still cool!)

We took a little trip to the nearby town of La Romana and I snapped a few shots of some interesting textures and stuff:

I leave you with a couple photos I took from the plane

And finally, I don’t usually like sunset photos but this one I like. Thanks for visiting, we appreciate it! :)

Brittany and Chris picked a really classy and beautifully situated golf resort to get married in, Rowena’s Inn on the River at the Sand Piper Golf Club. It was located in Harrison Mills about an hour away from Vancouver and all you had around you was mountains and water. A very cozy and romantic location!

The amazing effort that Brittany put into the day making sure everything and everyone looked their very best really made all the difference. Her little details of type writers, bird cages, boxes, bows were so cute and perfect! She really has a talent for this. And did you know this girl runs her own business and is a hot jewellery designer? Check out her site: www.lovetypeb.com !!! Everyone oozed class and noone was afraid to have as much fun as they could all day long!

And what really struck us was how Brittany and Chris never forgot to remind everyone about their strong faith in God! That was the most important part of their special day…it was really touching.

Thank you all for an amazing time, we enjoyed capturing your wedding! Here are some if our favourites of the day :) 

 The dress…

The boquet…

The bride…

Wow…

Chris looked rather dapper if I do say so myself

Here is Rowena’s Inn. What a beautiful place inside and out.

And this is what I mean when I said Brittany has a talent for this stuff…

Straight out of a magazine these girls were, I swear!

One of Bartek’s favourite shots of the guys:

I have no words for this next one

Brittany got her hair re-done for the reception. Hawt!

Time to paaaaarrrrtay!!!

A moment during one of the touching speeches…

And their first dance!!!

We leave you with even more photos from Brittany and Chris’ wedding if you click play below! :)

I leave you with a little sneak peek from the day! Check back in a bit for the whole shebang :)