Planning Weekend Recap: We Have a Photographer!

Now that I've shared the tastiest part of the weekend, I can share with you another part of the planning that was very important to me - the meeting with the photographer.

You may remember my recent rant about the wedding budget and how we may not be able to afford vendors like a photographer or DJ and my follow-up a few days later about finding my miracle. Well, this past weekend, we met with that miracle.

After coming across a lot of expensive photographers that seemed to all be doing the typical shots:

Let's make shapes with our hands so you can't see our faces in photos! Flickr.com

Everybody jump! - Tsk, tsk. Simon didn't say... Flickr.com

I really want a picture of this so we'll be out of focus, ok? Flickr.com

Now, I'm not saying that these are bad photos or of bad taste, mind you, they're just not my style. That being said, I was getting more upset over the fact that A) I wouldn't be able to afford a photographer for my wedding and B) if I could, I wouldn't be able to afford one or find one whose style I liked. Well, my fairy godmother worked some magic while I was doing my umpteenth Google search for photographers local to the area and I came across someone I hadn't noticed before: Brendan Bush.

As you may, may not know, photography is a hobby of mine. Sadly, I've been less active with it lately, but I still get a few shoots every now and then. Having done some informal shoots, I learned that my preferences for shooting were very similar to my preferences for being shot. My preference is for candid shots you may/may not have known that were even taken. I've never been a fan of the pose-and-hold-it-while-I-take-five-minutes-to-better-position-you, your limbs, and your hair-perfectly-so-that-I-can-get-my-staged-shot mentality. Again, I have nothing against those who prefer that style, it's just not my taste. I feel that not being posed or feeling like you need to be posing helps bring out a lot of truths in the moment that help to really convey what was going on at that time. That is what I want my wedding photos to be. I want them to tell stories, not look like they belong in a magazine spread.

Enter Brendan, a photojournalist who freelances around the area of Roanoke, VA, and happens to do some weddings. His style appeared to be right in line with what I was wanting. Since I was more picky about photography than Douglas, the responsibility of this vendor fell to me (Douglas has been wonderful and handling most of the vendor communications thus far). So I reached out to Brendan and waited with baited breath to see what his pricing was. Upon getting his reply, I nearly fell out of my chair! After getting over my initial excitement (that he was way cheaper than the others I had inquired to and I would be getting more bang for my buck), I quickly perused the Wedding Bee boards to make sure I was getting a good price and not just a better-than-the-others. After satisfying my curiosity that I was, indeed, getting a heck of a deal, I jumped at the chance to set up a meeting with Brendan for our already planned weekend in Roanoke.

Brendan suggested we meet at the downtown location for Mill Mountain Coffee - meaning I could sip Oregon Chai (my fav!) while we chatted. I was almost over the moon! This guy was making it very hard not to jump the gun and hire him on the spot! Of course this meant that I started freaking out. Was this photographer too good to be true? The kicker will be that we won't get along at all and I'll have to keep looking. I was a bundle of nerves walking to the coffee shop.

Lucky for us, Brendan ended up being two people in front of us in line to get drinks and even offered to buy ours (he beat us to the punch of offering to buy his). He was very relaxed and chill. It was like we were meeting a friend of a friend, a little awkward but still comfortable. We spent the meeting just going on about ideas we had for our wedding and some new ideas we had come up with over the weekend. Brendan really got a kick out of everything and told us about his mentality for shooting. It took everything I had to not jump out of my chair and pull one of these:

TotalFilm.com

The final nail in the already sealed deal for me was when I made a joke that the "Care and Feeding" section of his contract made him a Gremlin and he went with it. Major score! Whether he got what we were talking about (comic books, movies, etc.) or not, he just was enjoying the conversation and the ride. He was going to have as much fun at our wedding as anyone else, and when photographers have fun, they take great photos.

Despite the odds at the time, I found my perfect photographer and he totally fit our budget without us compromising anything else. This was a HUGE checkmark on the very short "What I Need for My Wedding" list.