vancouver wedding photographer – hyperfocus photography » vancouver wedding photographer, wedding photography as unique as you are

Alecia and Ryan flew in from Chicago to get married specifically at Hatley Castle because, well, do you need to have a reason to get married at a castle by the sea?! 🙂  And also because the X-Men movies were filmed there, and Ryan is clearly a big fan! They had 12 guests who all flew in for their special and intimate wedding ceremony. Their pastor flew in from Texas just to marry them, since he’s known Ryan since he was a boy. Isn’t that thoughtful? It meant so much to Ryan and Alecia to have him marry them, as it’s such a beautiful connection to tie Ryan’s history into their ceremony and future together going forward.

After their cocktail party in the Italian gardens, we took some photos on the castle grounds and then headed off to the Victoria Distillers! Both Alecia and Ryan are keen bourbon drinkers, so they were excited to taste the locally made gins and whisky with a personalized tasting and tour at the distillery. They really went out of their way to give Alecia and Ryan such a lovely and special experience, which we are thankful for.

Victoria is my hometown, it’s also where Justin and I met years ago before we were married (we met underwater while scuba diving at the Breakwater!), so we always enjoy going home to photograph weddings in Victoria. wedding_album_vancouver_photography_01
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I always get really excited when it’s time for our clients to come and pick up their wedding albums! I really, really do! I even consider it a bit of an event. 🙂
It’s so nice to reconnect, catch-up and of course present them with their album that we worked so hard on in our studio to be perfect and beautiful.
Justin and I consider our job completed when our clients have a real physical wedding album in their hands. Nothing beats an awesome art book in your hands of your day! And that collection of beautiful photographs showing the highlights is future proof, always accessible and great to cosy up with a cup of tea or glass of wine on the couch. It’s a great way to relive the day and also share with family and friends.
Here are Maria and Jon enjoying their wedding album when they came to pick it up.
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We received a call from Cameron who was looking to have some undercover photographs to capture him proposing to his girlfriend Sydney, on top of Whistler Mountain’s in the Peak 2 Peak Gondola. Justin loved the idea and was quickly on board helping Cameron to plan the day. Of course, this is a bit of a tricky situation for a professional photographer to be unseen by the subject and stay unseen by Sydney, to not tip her off to something unusual going on! Justin rose to the challenge, made an excellent photo plan and even have several outfit changes to remain undetected by Sydney all afternoon, from the lifts, in the restaurant while they had lunch and up to the Peak to Peak Gondola.

Cameron proposed to Sydney, in what was a perfectly beautiful moment shared by the two of them, all while suspended high in the sky, in their private gondola ride. And……she said YES!!!!

Congratulations to Cameron and Sydney! We’re excited for you that you’ve taken the next step!

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Let us start out with the worst part of working with this couple – we won’t be able to photograph their wedding. 🙁

That’s because these two will be getting married in Hawaii next month and whilst we do travel for weddings we are not currently able to shoot in the USA. So, what they chose to do instead, was to have us do a local engagement session in Lynn Valley Canyon in North Vancouver.

Kim and Cam were absolutely adorable, crazy in love and as a result, a joy to photograph. The two of them are also creatives, like ourselves. They have a graphic design company called Frey Creative here in Vancouver. We love working with creatives because they often understand what we’re doing on a deeper, more conceptual level and can appreciate aspects that some might miss. These two now join the ranks of many creative clients we’ve been fortunate to have over the years, including creative directors, art directors, film makers, photographers, artists and many others. It always feels a little extra special when creatives come to us to create something for them. 🙂

I can’t wait to see some of the amazing wall art that Kim and Cam have ordered from their session, including a gorgeous huge canvas print, some beautiful art prints framed up in reclaimed wood and more. They made some killer choices of what to do with their session images, but then I guess we shouldn’t be that surprised.

We wish them all the best for a fabulous tropical wedding in beautiful Hawaii.

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Angela and Shawn had an elegant, yet relaxed wedding at the Fairmont Pacific Rim. They had the perfect day, except for the fact that Shawn had a broken ring finger from a down hill mountain biking accident only a week before their wedding! Note to Grooms: please avoid all extreme sports in the weeks leading up to your wedding, even if you’re a pro at your sport! (This does come from a place of experience on our end, as Justin was rock climbing just before our wedding and fell 30feet off a rock face, only to be caught inches from the ground at the last second. Geez.) The upside though for Angela and Shawn, was that they did have enough time to get an enlarged ring to quasi fit over his puffy broken finger for the ceremony.

True to their style, they couldn’t have included Shawn’s son Keegan in any more aspects of their wedding day. It was nice to see him so involved. I just love the getting ready photos of Shawn with Keegan and the looks on his face. From fun and silly, to somewhat confused about the traditional wedding stuff. Untraditionally, Keegan, Shawn and the best man has oysters served out to them on the sidewalk only moments before Angela and Shawn had their First Look moments. It was certainly a first for us: oysters and First Looks! But hey, why not?

We had their wedding photo session in Coal Harbour and around the Fairmont Pacific Rim. Their ceremony was indoors in the Star Sapphire ballroom, with a great cocktail party afterwards which was enjoyed by young, old and very old. The speeches by Angela’s younger brothers were particularly good, as they had some great material on Angela….and of course Angela dished some back and had a great speech too. And Shawn had a heartfelt speech at the end as well.

They danced the night away to high energy funk, dance band, The Phonix and not long after, headed to San Francisco on their honeymoon. Great choice!

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