I got the best of all worlds with this wedding! Ashley and Bryan have family on both the West and the East side of the state, so theirs was to be a two-part wedding. Part one, formal ceremony in Kalamazoo, MI for her side of the family, and part two, official reception in St Clair, Michigan for his side. Lucky me, I got to do photos for both events (held within a week of one another)! We split an 8 hour collection between two 4 hour dates, and it worked well for both of us!
November, friends! A Michigan wedding in November! It can be risky, but we seriously had two individual gorgeous Saturdays to bless their first moments as husband and wife!
Kalamazoo is my hometown, so Ashley’s “getting ready” location – The Radisson Hotel – was super familiar to me. And whenever a location is familiar, I typically look for how I can stand out! Her black sequined heels needed nothing! This was a stunning choice for shoes in November! And we used the fabulous wrought iron doors of Websters fine dining restaurant (within The Radisson) to showcase her dress. 
Right before we left the hotel… literally while waiting for the elevator, the sun through the sheer curtains caught my attention. These types of natural sun flares are absolutely too good to pass up! For photographers – narrow your aperture down to f11 or so to get the bright “star” like flares. Open your aperture wide if you want the soft, romantic, hazy look. This one was shot quite tight at f16 to make sure I didn’t lose any details. Light has a way of swallowing things like fingertips, and her hands were placed just so delicately – I knew I wanted to keep this particularly sharp. If you’re wondering about the rainbow, that’s typically an atribute of the lens. I’ve noticed my 16-35 f2L II, and my 35 1.4L often have rainbow flares; but when I first began, the universal kit lens I started with just left a patch of green or yellow. Life is definitely more fun with the faster lenses. To play up any rainbow. Photoshop, “control J” will give you a new layer, then change the blend mode to burn, create a mask, “alt I” to invert the mask and paint just directly over the rainbow with white. You will “burn” more color into your flare! 🙂 #worthit 🙂 
The ceremony was at the quaint stone cabin of Thornapple Creek, and we held onto that fabulous sun. Officiated by Terry of Earthbound Weddings. 
Post ceremony, we had just a minute for bridal party and romance photos, which was alright, seeing as how – after the sun slipped into clouds – it was really quite cold. Ashley was a romantic heroine, giving up her gorgeous high heeled shoes so that we could play on the grass! (It is, after all, a golf course!) And Bryan was the perfect gentleman to her sacrifice, picking her up off the grass to rescue her frozen feet and carrying her in from the cold after the pictures were done. You guys. These two are adorable! And in less than twenty minutes, we achieved these wonderful pieces of timeless wedding fine art!
The very next Saturday was even colder. But we were prepared, knowing it was a week deeper into November. There were still some leaves, though! And we found a brilliant red and gold colored tree to shoot through before their reception!
This is the famous Boardwalk on the River (the River St. Clair) where you can look across and see Canada! And the chair… the chair is the property of a local jeweler, who was kind enough to let us visit his nearby home to use it! http://www.coughlinjewelers.com/ 
And on to the party, with cupcakes by Ashley McLeod and a cake from Bryan’s mom! She did a wonderful job! 
This party was hosted by DJ Slimz at Pine Shores Golf Club and Banquet Facilities! http://pineshoresgolf.com/banquet-facilities/
REVIEWS!
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