Grass Room DTLA wedding

Grass Room Wedding Photography – DTLA

Destination Wedding Photographer ROCKING the Grass Room DTLA

“New people, new party.. every weekend.”

That’s been my go to when I talk with people and try to briefly sum up my life as a destination wedding photographer for the past 9 or so years. Its easily understood. Especially when waiting for a drink at the bar, with the groomsmen, during a reception. Party time. At that point I’m looking for a pick me up, creative juice… usually in the form of whiskey on the rocks. After 6+ hours of having creative juices flowing, a little pick me up once the party gets going is how I keep my edge and stay in the flow. Tricks of the trade, I guess. In fact, its pretty normal to find me rocking the cam well after I’m technically “off” … good music, fully belly, the energy of the party and a glass of whiskey. There’s no place I’d rather be, especially when the hotel is close by and its not even midnight.

This is my first blog post on the wedding blog in a VERY looooong time… In fact, it bums me out thinking that I have soooooo many freakin cool weddings that we’ve photographed over the last year that I just did’nt get up. I guess I should explain that my “new people, new party” thing is the glam side of it. I’m coming clean. You don’t hear about time spent behind the computer. In reality the “work” begins with sorting the 4,000 photos after the night ends. We typically turn out 100 photos per hour booked… average package 8 hours. So 800-ish photos get 3 levels of editing from there. A base edit [color temps and exposure]. Next a stylized edit [curves/ toning] and lastly a final edit [cropping & light retouching where needed]. Then we put together a gift box and get it to our anxiously awaiting couple. It’s a labor of love though and doing what I’m doing now [blogging] takes a whole lot more time. Time I cut back on in 2017 and took back. I stopped blogging… annnnd dont even bother visiting our facebook, I havent updated in almost a year. Maintaining the dozen of social streams and avenues there are anymore took up time I wasn’t willing to give. I dont tweet, snapchat or bookface.

Tonight, again, I sorted through 800 photos and picked personal favs that tell the story of the day. I came up with over 200 I liked… lol BUT even that number needs to be chopped down in half. These days the average attention is so short I wonder if anyone really makes it to the bottom… or if they are still reading this now. If you are then that leads me to my biggest hurdle on the reason why stuff doesn’t make it up: Pressure to write. I’ve never been one to just dump a bunch of pics up without explanation. Some do, I wish I could, it would be sooo much easier. The inspiration and motivation to write has to be there otherwise there’s no point. It cant be faked and that creates a certain pressure.

Sure, pics tell the story but how lame is it when the words that go with em say something generic like “The day was so perfect, ______ and _______ are so in love, you can see it in the way they look at each other…. This is the most amazing venue and the cutest couple ever” etc. uhhhhhh,, no crap!? I hope they look at each other like that.. they are getting married and this is like the biggest day in their lives together. lol

Gahhhh.. I did it again. I usually start off with a point and go on tangents. I’m okay with that. I skimmed over it again and it feels good cause I know one day I’ll look back and go “DAMN… that was a good time”. Kurt Cobain once said “Punk rock should mean freedom, liking and accepting anything that you like. Playing whatever you want. As sloppy as you want. As long as it’s good and it has passion.” Words to live by. PASSION. Photography, music and writing is that for me. This has gotten sloppy but there is meaning and I am feeling it. That’s why I’m here, at 2am. Again.

I am more inspired than I have been in a long time.

Probably why I dusted off the cobwebs of this old blog and started rambling on. It’s year nine for us in the wedding game and going into 2018 we decided to shake things up. We sold off a ton of “stuff”, rented out our home, traded in suburban life for a year on the road in our RV with the kids. “Navigate by heart” is the motto and we are going where the universe takes us. Pulling over when it feels right. Destinations in mind, it’s good to have a general direction but we’ve learned often the best plan is no plan and to be open to all possibilities. Stop early if it feels right, check a spot out. Be open, who knows. IT’s that “YES man” mentality and it’s great! Jumping into the unknown is freeing and at certain points in life, necessary.

I am writing now from one of the coolest places I have ever been in my life. Monument Valley National Park. It shows you how small you are and how massive earth is. That we are all connected in ways we don’t fully understand… it gets clearer when you take away the distractions in life. Connect the dots. The connection is real. I felt it the whole time I was hanging out with Lauren, Craig and their family the day of… it was there when we first met over a glitchy overseas Facetime. These things can go either way, toss in a bad connection and the potential for awkwardness increases. But it didn’t, ear to ear grins left me with that warm feeling. I knew these were my people.

I have guests and relatives ask me all the time at our weddings “how do you know ______ and _____ ?” … like did we go to school together or something? I tell em “I don’t, really.” We may have done an engagement shoot before and had a few drinks together but other than that I’m a newbie to the crew. When the connection is real you just click. Lauren and Craig are good people, the kind you wanna be around. Educators in Korea vibrating on a high frequency and when you talk to em you get those ear to ear grins that can’t be held back. Yeah, I was looking forward to this one. Hanging with an awesome couple and my favorite wedding coordinator. IT was going to be a good time, no doubt. I flew in from Denver to LA a day early. I walked the city, watched people, saw live music… stoked the fire of inspiration. Big cities do that for me. I’d never want to live in one… but coming in as an outsider and cruising around like a local is so much fun. After a day of being inspired I was ready to go and arrived early.. I think I caught Lauren off guard when I showed up. I couldn’t sit in my room on standby any longer and needed to jump into the flow.

The day started like most any other, however, it was unlike 90% of the days I am a part of. I shouldn’t ramble through giving it all away… you’ll see in the pics. I mean, when a couple gets ready in the same space and even brushes their teeth together on the big day!?! the vibe is sooooo much different. Sometimes couples are so worried about not seeing each other it’s nuts. I facilitate it of course and make sure it goes the way they want it to.. cause that’s what I do. BUT sooo much energy is wasted worrying about seeing each other before, like its some sort of jinx… not today. not with these two. They did things exactly the way they wanted and silly US traditions went right out the window. In fact, this crew was so down they mobbed a mile in heels down avenues and alleyways together.. stopping traffic to hit the art district to go take pics. Made my day <<<+>>> absolutely love being in the mix with such a tight crew of good people.

Quick shout out to the ones who made this happen!!

Thank you Lilian, Angela, and Ivtiy for keeping us all in line, you pulled off another epic night so many cherish. Brides to be [if you are reading this] hiring a kick ass wedding coordinator is worth every flipping penny. They are the buffer that insures that all goes smooth for you on the big day no matter what hurdles appear. It allows the rest of your dream team to do what they do and do it well. So if you don’t have one already, look into it… and when you do hit up Just Merried Events. Lilian is one who will have things so dialed in that your wedding venue could be on fire and you wouldn’t even know it… she is that good. Annnnnnd of course to Lauren and Craig: thanks for having me out and letting me do my thing on your big day. I hope you guys smile looking back at these moments like I did the whole time I was editing them.

I hope you enjoyed scrolling through pics of the Robilly bash at the Grass Room DTLA. Which if you werent aware is brought to you by the same brilliant minds that crafted the Smog Shoppe and the Millwick. They have another wedding venue called Valentine which I am going to be fortunate to be shooting at VERY soon! totally looking forward to it. To go with an epic space though, you need an amazing crew. There is no doubt in my mind it kicked so much ass its because of a tight group of people that LOVE what hey do and came together to throw the best freaking party they could. You want a piece of the dream team you can find them here :