Welcome to the Wedding Reception!  Am I glad we did a bridal session or what?!  Due to scheduling conflicts [a late ceremony starting time but the kitchen having dinner ready right on schedule] I was completely denied the opportunity to get any portraits of the couple at all!  I think that was a first for me, not even getting 5 minutes!  I cannot tell you how totally happy I am that we did a Bridal Session, but…

I am still going to make a plea for all Brides & Grooms to do a First Glance – where you meet before the ceremony!  This situation has happened many many times in my career.  The kitchen has an order to feed 200 people.  In order to do that, they have to start cooking at a certain time in order for the food to be piping hot and perfectly ready to serve for dinner.  Which means, if the ceremony is late at all, that time is automatically deducted from the photographers time.  Always.  The ceremony starts 15 minutes late?  Doesn’t matter, the photographer still has to be completed by 6:00.  The ceremony is an hour late?  Same thing, photography must be finished by 6:00 or dinner served to guests will be cold, and no one wants that!

This wedding of course was an extreme situation, even when things are horribly late I’ve always been given at least 5 minutes to get a few shots, but this time no, not even a single shot!  So if you are a Bride and are thinking about doing your pictures beforehand, I would absolutely recommend it!  If you and your Groom are completely adverse to seeing each other, then I would strongly suggest that the Bride get portraits with her Bridesmaids and the Groom with his Groomsmen, along with each side of the family, so that after the ceremony all we need are a few family shots with both the bride and groom, a few wedding party portraits, and then of course, time with the Bride and Groom!  Even with just 5 minutes of time there is so much we can do…

As the party rages on down below, Nikki is back in the Bride’s Room changing into her Pakistani clothing with her bridesmaids!

When the women returned, they performed several numbers for the guests.

And after a while, Sohil and the other family members joined in!

This little boy could care less about the beautiful women and the brightly colored clothes, he just wanted cake…

These little boxes are filled with special candies brought all the way from China!  And although I am by no means fluent in Chinese, I’ve done enough weddings that I am 99% certain the stylized character on the front of the box means “Double Happiness”.  Of course I opened a few boxes and found the prettiest wrapped candy that I could for props!

Double Happiness, Double Happiness, Double Happiness everywhere!!!!  Oh crap, I just realized that in the below picture, Double Happiness is upside down!!!  How embarrassing for me…  Well, i did warn you that I’m not fluent in Manderin.  Hopefully for the album we can just flip it around!  Sorry Nikki!!!

As they left, guests showered them with rose petals, it was a perfect exit!

Thank you Nikki & Sohil, I wish you all the happiness in the world!

This entry was posted on Friday, March 5th, 2010 at 3:38 am and is filed under Weddings, Winter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.