Archive for the ‘bridal’ Category

The first thing that I saw when I walked into Melissa’s Mom’s house at the beginning of the wedding day was this picture of Melissa as the flower girl at her Uncle’s wedding. There’s a bit more to the story, but more on that later……..













Melissa’s father passed away several years ago, and it was her uncle who walked her down the aisle. Her uncle also filled in for her father in the traditional Father-Daughter first dance. The little girl who once walked down the aisle in front of her uncle on his wedding day, was now walking down the aisle WITH her uncle on her own wedding day.
Tags: bride, chicago wedding photographer, chicago wedding photography, groom, Jay Crihfield, Jay Crihfield photography, jay crihfield wedding photographer, jay crihfield wedding photography, location photography, morton arboretum, morton arboretum wedding photography, photographer, Photography, photojournalistic wedding photography, photojournalistic weddings, pink
Posted in 'burb weddings, Wedding, bridal |
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In addition to the teaser image posted here, here are a few more pictures from Stacy & Zach’s wedding this past weekend……







Tags: bridal party, bride, Chicago, chicago wedding photographer, chicago wedding photography, country club, creative wedding photography, creative wedding pictures, fine art photojournalism, fine art wedding photojournalism, first dance, flowers, fox valley country club, golf course wedding, green, groom, image, images, Jay Crihfield, Jay Crihfield photography, party, photographer, photojournalistic wedding photography, purple, reception, rings, spring wedding, Wedding, wedding images, wedding pictures
Posted in 'burb weddings, Wedding, bridal |
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Here are a few of my favorites from Jessica & Robert’s super elegant wedding at the Chicago Hotel Intercontinental this past weekend.








I couldn’t help but laugh at this one….David Rothstein broke out his iPad and used it to cue the band for the next song in the set list
Hotel:
Chicago Intercontinental
505 North Michigan Ave
Chicago, Il. 60611
312-944-4100
www.icchicagohotel.com
Flowers
Scarlet Petal
1637 W. Ferdinand Unit E
Chicago, Il. 60622
773-486-0904
info@scarletpetal.com
www.scarletpetal.com
www.scarletpetal.com/blog.shtml
Music
David Rothstein Music
1948 W. Fletcher St
Chicago, Il. 60657
www.drsmusic.com
david@drsmusic.com
773-244-1239
Tags: bridal, bridal party, bride, bridesmaids, ceremony, Chicago, chicago hotel intercontinental, chicago hotels, chicago images, chicago pictures, chicago wedding, chicago wedding photographer, chicago wedding photographs, chicago wedding photography, chicago wedding pictures, contemporary, creative pictures, creative portraits, family, fine art, fine art photojournalism, fine art wedding photography, fine art wedding pictures, groom, images, jay crihfield fine art photography, jay crihfield fine art photojournalism, Jay Crihfield photography, jewish wedding ceremony and reception, photographs, photojournalistic wedding photography, pictures, red flowers, wedding photojournalism, wedding pictures
Posted in City Weddings, Hotel Intercontinental, Wedding, bridal |
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So here’s a few more pictures from Andrea & Andy’s wedding this past weekend. In my previous “teaser” post I alluded to the fact that there was a good story behind this first image……

….So we were walking back up the fairway at the Silver Lakes Country Club in Orland Park, when Andrea’s maid-of-honor, Maggie noticed a tree with some really curvy branches that might look pretty cool in a picture. So rather than try something with looking up at the couple, with the curvy tree limbs behind them, I wanted to use the tree limbs as part of the foreground of the picture. Only problem I’m not that tall, and getting up high enough to allow the branches to frame the image required climbing up in the tree……

So I did my best squirrel impression and figured out a way to boost myself up into the tree, along with my camera. Only problem was the tree trunk had several flowering branches which also had some pretty mean looking thorns on them. I thought I had avoided them all on the way up, as well as on the way down, but it turns out one of them loosely lodged itself on my pants, only to make its presence felt when I sat down a little later on! It would’ve felt a lot worse if the shot didn’t quite work out.






I love this last picture because while so many couples run a slideshow of pictures at their reception, it’s often very difficult to make a good picture of the couple watching the show. Either the screen is too far away from the bride & groom, or you wind up just seeing the backs of their heads. Luckily the room at Silver Lake Country Club has mirrors on several of the walls, so I was able to frame this one up with the screen in the foreground, and show Andrea and Andy watching the slideshow by using their reflection in the mirror.
Tags: bridal party, bride, ceremony, Chicago, chicago wedding photographer, chicago wedding photography, golf course, groom, orland park, Photography, photojournalism, photojournalistic, reception, redeemer lutheran church hinsdale, silver lake country club, silver lake country club wedding photography, storytelling photography, tree, Wedding, wedding photojournalism, weddings at redeemer lutheran church hinsdale
Posted in 'burb weddings, bridal |
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There WILL be more to follow, but I wanted to throw this one up first from this past weekend’s wedding.

There’s also an interesting story behind this image involving a photographer, a tree, and some thorns, but I’ll wait to fill everyone in on that one!
Tags: bridal, bride, Chicago, contemporary, contemporary wedding photography, fine art photojournalism, golf course, golf course wedding photography, golf course wedding pictures, images, Jay Crihfield, Jay Crihfield photography, jay crihfield wedding photograhy, orland park, photograph, photographer, photographers, photographs, Photography, photojournalism, photojournalistic, pictures, portrait, Portraits, silver lake country club, Wedding, wedding photography, wedding photojournalism
Posted in 'burb weddings, bridal |
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David and Yesenia are both teachers, and figured that Winter break would be a great time to get married at St. Charles’ Pheasant Run Resort. To top it off, they created the theme of their reception around their profession………






I kinda wondered after I took this picture who had the “honor” of sitting at the Detention labeled table….turns out it was Yesenia and David’s fellow teachers!






The funny thing about this picture is David doesn’t play a lick of piano (apparantly “chop-sticks” are even a challenge), but Yesenia is actually pretty good!

4051 East Main Street
St. Charles, Il. 60174
800-474-3272
info@pheasantrun.com
www.pheasantrun.com
Tags: bourbon street, ceremony, Chicago, contemporary, contemporary wedding photojournalism, creative wedding photography, family, fine art photojournalism, images, indoor, Jay Crihfield, Jay Crihfield photography, outdoors, Pheasant Run, photographer, photographers, Photography, photojournalistic, pictures, reception, resort, St. Charles, teachers, Wedding, winter
Posted in 'burb weddings, Wedding, bridal |
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A lot of people ask how much “photoshop” or retouching I apply to an image to achieve the final result. In a perfect world, the pictures would come out of the camera exactly the way I see ‘em. However that’s not always the case, and sometimes even good images need a bit of a push to really maximize the intent of the photograph.
The photograph below from Christine and Greg’s wedding last year is a good example. Christine picked a very urban (grungy) area for her bridal party photographs, and even though everything came together pretty well, the picture that came straight out of the camera was missing something. Looking at the photograph didn’t give me the same feeling that I had when we set it up on their wedding day. Luckily 21st century wedding photography and photographers have a lot of digital tools at their disposal to maximize their vision and intent.


Take a look at the window above, the left side of the screen is the original picture, and the right side is the fully finished photograph. Use the links at the bottom to go back and forth between the original picture from the camera, and the fully finished photograph!
Tags: abandoned, art, bridal, bridal party, bride, bridesmaids, car dealership, Chicago, contemporary, edgy, girls, grungy, images, location, modern, photograph, photographer, photographers, pictures, portrait, Portraits, urban, Wedding
Posted in Portraits, bridal |
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I cracked up when I saw this on their kitchen whiteboard….apparently there’s already been some discussion about when to start a family!


Both of Christie’s Pup’s were ready to roll, although Jack wasn’t so keen on being relegated to the upstairs once everyone was dressed




Every groom says “Oh I’m fine, not nervous at all, just excited and ready for the big day (and they’re all lying!)” It was really refreshing that Charlie admitted “Yeah, I’m a bit freaked out right about now!” Although you wouldn’t know it from this picture….looks pretty cool….


After their ceremony, we hopped across St. Charles’ Fox River and headed to Pottawatomie Park and the timing couldn’t have been better for their wedding and bridal pictures. The cool thing about using Pottawatomie Park for wedding pictures is the large tower and pavilion make it possible to take pictures there even if the weather doesn’t cooperate. Fortunately the weather more than cooperated for Christie and Charlies pictures, and we were lucky to get there just as the sun was setting (which by the way is the beautiful thing about fall weddings….as soon as the sun is gone…it’s time for the cocktail hour to start anyway. So even though you might not have a ton of daylight for your pictures….you’ve got the best light of the day!)





This was awesome. Neither Christie or Charlie are really into wedding cake (or cake in general I guess), so they decided to hire Cold Stone Creamery to provide an ice cream bar instead of serving wedding cake! So there was no cutting of the cake, just a scooping of the first scoop! Kinda cool when the first major decision of your marriage is what type of candy topping to put on your ice cream!……

…..mmmmm, come here caramel goodness….get down with your bad – self on that waffle bowl and vanilla ice cream!
Tags: bridal, bridal party, bridesmaids, Chicago, cold stone, creamery, dogs, fine art, fox river, ice cream, lakefront, Pets, photojournalism, photojoutnalism, pictures, portrait, reception, riverfront, St. Charles, sunset, Wedding, wedding photojournalism
Posted in 'burb weddings, Pets, Wedding, bridal |
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However fast forward a few months and who would’ve thought that sending a drink to a young lady across the bar at Shenanigan’s House of Beer on Division St. would lead to a wedding at Chicago’s Navy Pier Crystal Gardens. Here’s a few pictures from their big day!
This was a bit different, but very cool…..Rob didn’t want to see Katie until the very last minute, so during the procession, he stood with his back to the aisle, only turning around just as Katy and her Mom finished walking up.

They wanted a photograph with the ferris wheel in the background….luckly Olive Park provided this angle!

Rob’s best man absolutely skewered the groom with his toast/speech. Rob, his family and his groomsmen are all from London, so “Whitey” felt the need to “translate” a lot of his speech for the American Yanks in attendance. For those of you who weren’t there, here’s a quick re-cap:
Yanks = Americans
Gents = Mens Bathroom
Cupboard = Closet
Arse = Ass
Pissed = Drunk
“Did a Maths” = “Majored in Mathematics”

Crystal Garden Ballroom-Navy PIer
Phil Stefani Signature Events
700 E. Grand Ave
Chicago, Il. 60611
312-595-5446

Tags: beach, bridal, Chicago, chicago wedding photography, City, Crystal Gardens, ferris wheel, fine art, fine art wedding, lakefront, Navy Pier, olive park, Photography, photojournalistic, skyline, Stefani, Wedding, wedding photojournalism
Posted in City Weddings, Wedding, bridal |
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