We began our session by meeting in the park near the Merry-go-Round. There was beautiful light coming from over the hill. I just loved how it was hitting the trees, grass, and Nina & Rommel.

Nina and Rommel are so much fun. Without my direction Rommel kept cracking jokes making Nina laugh creating several great moments throughout the day.

After a little while we headed up the Griffith Park Observatory. Being a weekend and an extremely beautiful clear day made it hard to find angles without large crowds of people while shooting there. We did manage to find a few places that worked well.

I love the high-key look on this photo.

While on the roof of the observatory I noticed the shadows the sun was creating hitting the Observatory architecture.

I am really looking forward to Nina & Rommel’s wedding in April. They are such a fun couple and I am thankful they have chosen to me to capture their wedding day.

The image below contains 3 KISS albums, a black 12″ x 12″ leather bound, a white 10″ x 10″ leather bound, and a 8″ x 8″ linen bound album. I offer linen and leather albums in those 3 sizes.

Here is a different view showing their thickness. The black leather album contains 42 pages, the white leather album contains 46 pages, and the red linen album contains 20 pages.

As you can see in the image below the binding is a little different between a linen bound and a leather bound album. The linen bound albums don’t have a board between each print, instead the prints are just glued together back-to-back allowing the pages to flex easily when going through the album. With the leather bound album the prints are glued to the board so the book is much thicker, heavier, and more solid.

Here is another view of a linen bound album.

Both the linen and leather bound albums are offered in the same color. These are my linen swatches.

I have been really happy with the linen and leather albums made by KISS that I have in my studio and the ones I have delivered to my clients. I encourage all my clients to go with a leather bound album if it fits in their wedding photography budget. I like to offer linen bound albums as parent books and guest signature books. I also offer a linen bound wedding album with my lowest package that includes an album. Whether you chose to go with a linen or leather album, I know you will enjoy it for years to come!

Here are some of my favorite 2-page spreads from some of my amazing couples!

Justin & Melisa’s guest signature album. I designed the pages with extra space so wedding guests can leave a note to the happy couple!

A few from Ryan & Lisa’s amazing Stone Manor Malibu wedding.

A few from Brandi & Court’s amazing Vibiana wedding. Their album ended up being 58 pages!

If you want to see more you will have to come into my studio to see the samples in person.

When I first met with Dylan and Christine and they told me their plans to hopefully shoot their engagement session on the Paramount Lot, I knew they were the perfect match for me. Dylan and Christine met while working for CBS. Although they aren’t working on the lot that often anymore they were able to use their connections to line up the shoot. Typically my engagement shoots with my couples last about 2 hours but Dylan, Christine & I were having so much fun and had a great location we ended up shooting and hanging out for 4 hours! I am very thankful for my assistant Natalie Fong for being on the ball the whole evening!

We started their session at Dylan’s house. The house is located about a block south of the main gate for Paramount Studios. Dylan and Christine are huge San Diego Chargers fans, and so is their dog Cappuccino, so we started out the day getting shots of them all enjoying some football.

After some shots indoors we headed outside for a few shots. Christine is so cool for letting Dylan wear his Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 shirt! I wish I had time to play video games still.

After a quick wardrobe change we headed over to New York Street on the Paramount Lot. Here are some of my favorites from NY Street.

We also made sure to get a few shots with the iconic Paramount water tower.

Some fun at Washington Square on NY Street.

One of the balconies on one of the buildings.

As we were heading over to the Paramount Theater we saw the offices for Bad Robot. Since we are all big JJ Abrams fans we decided to take a photo there. JJ if you are reading this I would love to come work for you one day.

Some fun by the Paramount Theater and one of the studio gates

After it got a little darker we headed back to New York Street for a few more photos. A little Film Noir for the first shot.

They were just getting some Christmas lights set up on the trees at Paramount. Here are the last few photos of the night.

Here are some of my favorites from the shoot.

A few from Union Station

A few from a private patio that overlooks City Hall.

Here they are!

Weddings

Engagements

Here are a few of my favorites from their shoot.

I love these next 3!

Here are some of my favorites from the shoot.

Justin & Melisa are new parents with 11 weeks old twins. I had fun talking to them about being a parent and shared the news of our new little one coming in November. Justin, along with being a respected DJ, is an amateur photographer so we had fun chatting about cameras and lenses. I had so much fun, we could have kept shooting long after the sun went down. Justin & Melisa are getting married this coming September in Palos Verdes.

There were so many great shots from our evening together, it was hard to choose what to blog. Here are some of my favorites from the shoot.

I love this next shot as a panoramic.

I also love it in the traditional 35mm ratio.

A few at Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa where Cesar & Natalie will be getting married this fall.

The rest are from Downtown Disney.

“The new documentary film “American Marriage” is looking for couples who want to have their nuptials featured in the movie. One of our main fundraising avenues has been filming weddings. Couples have taken the money they would have paid videographer and donated it to the film’s budget through the International Documentary Association (making their donations tax-deductible), and in exchange we’ve filmed their entire ceremonies and receptions and delivered the wedding video on DVD, just like a normal wedding videographer.

The shoot itself is exactly comparable to a normal wedding videographer shoot. We film the ceremony preparation, the ceremony, and reception on a single 3CCD HD Camera (the JVC 110u, a professional theatrical quality HD camera as opposed to the Prosumer HDV cameras standardly used in the wedding industry). The groom wears a microphone to ensure the highest quality audio of the ceremony. The footage is edited, and assembled with graphics, music, and minimal effects (dissolves, etc). We provide the couple 3 DVDs, authored with chapters and animated menus.

Because we’ll use some of the footage in the finished film, we ask the couple to sign an image release waiver allowing us to do so. We also ask that they make a donation through the I.D.A. and forward us a copy of the Paypal receipt before we arrive to film the event. We also ask couples if they would like to have a short “When Harry Met Sally” style interview that will be included in the movie.

You can view the trailer, which features footage from several weddings who took advantage of this model, below.”

There is no set donation amount. We ask that couples donate what they can afford. If you have a budget for a videographer we hope that, if you choose this opportunity, you would still be willing to use that budget to help the film.  If you would like to take advantage of this opportunity please click on contact in the menu above.

If you chose to make a donation and be in the film I am offering 20% off any of my photography packages. You can view my portfolio on my website.

Here are some links for the film
Official Website
Facebook Fan Page
International Documentary Association Listing
IMDB Listing – I got my first cinematographer credit on this film
Mike Flanagan – the man behind the film