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

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 trade them some big prints for the whole box of props. 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 then we had a line of people trying on different props. So I we have added and expanded the prop box, and now truck it along anytime somebody has our photo booth at their wedding. These images are shot on the same high, quality camera we use for all 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.

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!

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We had a great day photographing Megan and Tim’s PlumpJack wedding at the beginning of September. We love the new ceremony site with the tram face of Squaw Valley ski resort in the background. The late afternoon light during the ceremony was exquisite, glowing and back-lit, with the dark granite mountains behind the altar. It was a perfect location for all of the post ceremony family shots as well. We then took the couple and the wedding party to the valley for some portraits along the wooden fences, with the tall, end-of-summer golden grasses all around them. The reception coverage included our super fun “crazy corner photo booth” where guests had a blast with props, haming it up for the camera. We are looking forward to their trash the dress session coming up this weekend!

Sara and Brad choose Scott to shoot their wedding at the new Winter’s Creek Lodge on the slide side of the Mt. Rose Ski Resort just west of Reno. It was the first time we had shot at this venue and found it to be a great site for a wedding. The venue is pretty isolated from anything else, being at a ski resort at 8200 feet, and offers sweeping views of Washoe Valley. Though the timeline for this particular wedding did not permit it, views at twilight and into night-time show a twinkling sea of lights from Reno down in the valley that would make a great background for pictures done later in the day. If you want lake views in some of your pictures, be prepared to build in about an extra hour of time to drive over the summit, make the photos and get back. The lodge itself is basically a modern box of cool glass walls, so lighting inside is not a problem. The bar, where the dancing and DJ usually set up, has tinted windows looking across to Washoe Valley and Reno and gives a darker, more intimate feel. Winter’s Creek lodge has the added plus, in my opinion, of being run mostly on wind power from 3 large turbines located above the parking lot. For more daring couples, there is a short hiking trail up a small peaklet across the parking lot that offers stellar views 360 degrees, but takes about 15 – 20 minutes to walk up through the trees.