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Martis Camp wedding for Lindsey and Jack

By Monique and Scott

From the minute we met with Lindsey and Jack for their engagement session at Sand Harbor, we knew they were going to be a great couple to work with at their Martis Camp wedding in Truckee. They were so playful with each other and adventurous, scrambling all over the boulders, we knew the wedding was going to provide us with amazing images all day long. Their venue, Martis Camp, provided a secluded, classic Tahoe woods spot for the wedding: getting ready in the spacious, plush mens and ladies lounges, the ceremony overlooking the golf course with the woods and mountains surrounding them, and the clear tented reception on the outdoor patio overlooking the valley. I’d say there were 3 underlying, and very photogenic, themes to this wedding: Abalone, Machine Guns, and Bacon, or I should say swine and meat in general! So to explain these themes, lets start with the abalone: Jack is an abalone diver, so it was on one outing with Lindsey that he came walking out of the freezing cold water holding an abalone shell that he had “found.” It turns out that he had put the ring in the shell and proposed to her there on the beach! For the wedding, Jack was also wearing a gorgeous abalone shell belt buckle. Now for the bacon:  Jack is a chef, so he also wanted the cocktail hour to include some unique hors d’oeuvres. He had several varieties of dried meats and cheeses imported from Italy, including wild boar. And I have heard about some crazy bacon flavored things before, like bacon flavored toothpaste, bacon cookies, etc. Lindsey, knowing Jack’s love of all things bacon, had Martis Camp make them a special grooms cake, a bourbon chocolate bacon cake. And now for the machine guns: Jack really wanted to do some fun photos of him and his groomsmen with some guns, so he brought toy machine guns for some of the portraits. They were also a big hit at the photo booth!

Jack golfing with his groomsmen before the getting ready part of the day.

Jack brought some toy machine guns as props for the photos!

The clear top reception tent, with open sides overlooking Martis Valley.

Brown sugar & salted caramel wedding cake and bourbon chocolate bacon cake, with a garnish of fresh fennel.

Wonder Bread 5 had the whole tent rockin' out all night!

Here are a few of our favorite images from our Crazy Corner Photo Booth:

 

 

 

 

FitzHaven Estate wedding ceremony, reception, details for Ali and Kyle – Part 2

By Monique

The FitzHaven Estate in North Lake Tahoe was the perfect venue for Alison and Kyle’s beautiful September wedding. A few rain drops came and went, and they had an amazing evening filled with a family style dinner created by D’ Lish Catering, toasts, and dancing into the darkness. The couple decided to see each other before the wedding,  and their lake front Tahoe wedding portraits can be seen in Part 1 of the blog post.

Iced tea and Arnold Palmers greeted guests as they arrived at the FitzHaven Estate for the ceremony

A new twist on the sand ceremony, do it with spices instead!

Kyle and Alison gave a toast to all their guests immediately after the ceremony

Alison's family winery provided several types of wine for the reception. I later received a bottle of the Syrah Rosé in the mail, and it was fabulous!

Some of the appetizers from D'Lish catering: shrimp topped polenta and duck corn dog bites

Raindrops fell during the cocktail hour, but the tables were soon covered, then wiped down before dinner was served, and the party continued unhindered.

Kyle and his guests took a moment to savor the rain drops

Introducing the newly married couple

FitzHaven Estate wedding for Alison and Kyle – Part 1

By Monqiue

Alison and Kyle were married at the FitzHaven Estate at Lake Tahoe on one of the most popular dates of the year,  9-10-11. They were a great couple to work with and the day flowed effortlessly from the getting ready candids through the reception, even during that short period of rain! The sky got darker as the day unfolded, but that didn’t put a damper on their moods or their day. The ceremony was beautiful, and the sky waited until the last of the post ceremony portraits were done to open up and give us a drizzle, then a pouring of rain for about a half hour during the cocktail hour. It didn’t really faze anyone, the tables were covered, some guests danced in the rain, others mingled under the tent – next to the bar, it was perfect. Once the thunderstorm passed, as they always do in Tahoe, the tables and chairs were wiped down, introductions were made, and everyone sat down at long wooden tables overlooking the lake for a fabulous family style meal prepared by D’Lish Catering. I am dividing this wedding into 2 posts, I just had sooooo many images I wanted to share. Alison and Kyle decided to see each other for their portrait session with their wedding party down at the lake before the ceremony. So this first post will be a bit of the girls getting ready, the portraits at the lake, and then a few of them back at the FitzHaven. My next post will be the ceremony and reception, including a ton of delicious details. Enjoy!

Part 2: FitzHaven estate wedding ceremony, details and reception.

This is no joke, a few years back I actually photographed a bear who visited the Fitzhaven right before the ceremony!

February 24, 2013 - 9:31 pm

Holly - Do you know who her dress is by? She looks Lovely!

January 9, 2012 - 6:12 pm

Lana heagy - Great venue, wonderful wedding. Thoroughly enjoyed sg
Haring it with friends

December 19, 2011 - 11:20 pm

Carol Martella - I can’t stop looking at these pictures. I would love to relive that day over again, it was so beautiful and so much fun! Ali and Kyle look so in love in these pic’s!

Photo booth images from our Chateau wedding in Incline Village

By Scott

It has been a long while since we have posted any images from our photo booth shoots, so here are some from one of our recent weddings at the Chateau in Incline Village. Our photo booth is not really a photo booth in the traditional sense of the word. There is a great local company called Reno Photo Booth, that will bring the machine you sit in and lots of props and will take care of getting you the small, photo-sequence printouts on the spot. What our photo booth consists of is basically a mini-studio that we set up in a corner of your reception venue, where we have nice, soft studio lighting, a backdrop of your choice and some props. We have done these shoots for a few years now without props, and since I actually man the camera, I manage to get some great shots of people by working with them to get their personalities to shine through. Recently we had a really wild couple hire Monique and I to shoot our package that included the photo booth. They brought loads of props on their own, including several toy machine guns. People had so much fun playing with all this stuff that we decided to add this whole box of props to our photo booth experience. We brought them out to this wedding without really saying anything, just to see how people would take to them and I no sooner had the booth set up than we had a line of people trying on different props. So we have added and expanded the prop box, and now bring it along anytime somebody has our photo booth at their wedding. These images are shot on the same pro camera we use for the wedding photography, so your photos are not available right then and there, but when you do get them along with the rest of your wedding pictures, they are super high quality images that can make great wall prints or anything else you may desire. I like the black and white effect for most of the photo booth images, but the originals are always in color, so you have a choice.

November 14, 2011 - 2:13 pm

Kersten Hammond-Reich - I LOVE THESE PHOTO BOOTH PICTURES!!!! TJ and I did a photo booth at our wedding and the pics were HILARIOUS but I LOVE the props – fantastico!

Trash the dress session at Sand Harbor for Megan and Tim

by Scott and Monique

Monique and I had a great time shooting this late fall trash-the-dress session with Megan and Tim at Sand Harbor in Incline Village. It was starting to get cold as the sun went down, but they really wanted some sunset shots and Megan was game to go into the water with her dress on, so with towels and jackets at the ready we plodded into the water with them (actually Monique did most of the plodding into the water while I stood on shore directing.) Megan and Tim had just come back from what looked like an amazing honeymoon on Bora Bora. One of the pictures they posted to their facebook page (by the way, if you are a client or potential client, click the more info tab at top left and friend Photography by Monique on facebook,) showed their vacation cottage, on stilts in the ocean at night with a swimming hatch right in the front deck and some cool blue lights illuminating the ocean under the building. This gave me the idea for some of the final pictures in the sequence where we actually bagged a flash in a watertight case and hid it in the water behind Megan to try to illuminate the ripples underwater much the way I saw from their vacation pictures. It was a fun shoot and we got some amazing shots out of it. I’m posting the images in a new photo gallery instead of inline, like we have done with all the pictures in our previous posts. Let me know if you like it, hate it, or whatever. Enjoy!

 

November 25, 2011 - 6:29 pm

Jess - Absolutely beautiful! Gorgeous couple, gorgeous scenery, gorgeous photography!

November 11, 2011 - 1:17 pm

John Stubler - Very nice lighting! Good stuff all around!

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