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wedding

Opera Singing Flowers (sneak peek…)

Juilliard trained opera singer and florist, Betany Coffland, often uses music as inspiration in her floral creations. Her business, Chloris Floral exclusively uses local and seasonal flowers grown with organic practices. For our photo shoot, Betany wanted to create photo stories for two special operas. Here is how that happened…

Her email:

The first bouquet will be inspired by “Ah Chloris” by Reynaldo Hahn, the piece that inspired the name Chloris Floral. Completely romantic, rich and full. Here’s me singing the song with guitar:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xw8IN97J1zo

Our result:

paigegreenBetany04122016-027

Her email:

The second bouquet will be inspired by Pierrot Lunaire- it’s piece I’m performing this week. Themes are puppets, commedia dell’arte, moon inspiration. I want to be elegant here and not so literal, but still a bit off kilter. Here’s a link to the crazy music:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KyKdLv2gro

Our result:paigegreenBetany04122016-107

It feels like magic when a group of people come together for the first time, share their talents and create art. We are so in love with the results and we’re ready to do more. Thank you to the incredibly talented team:

Floral Designer/Opera Singer: Betany Coffland of Chloris Floral

Stylist: Alysia Andriola of Grace and Gather

Chloris Model: Vero Kherian of Miss Cheesemonger

Pierrot Model: Alexa Eisner of Babachic

Assistant: Laura Schneider 

And thank you to the local flower farmers who sustainably grew these gorgeous opera singing flowers.

 

I am a film pusher…

In case you don’t know by now… I love film.

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And I am determined to use my film cameras even more this year.

paigegreen-rollei-01720012So I decided I need to ‘Show & Tell’ a little more.

25-AA-22790013Digital photography is an amazing tool.

paigegreen-ja-22740002With the invention of the ultra fast…

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Incredibly versatile…

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And instantaneously gratifying digital cameras…107-paigegreen-kd-58280004 copy You can now have over 5,000 photos of your wedding.

paigegreenHeatherStephenfilm-000086520009Photos that capture every single moment (and pore) flawlessly and beautifully.

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But photographs taken with good old-fashioned…

paigegreen-jenyamatt511-48980005Incredibly slow…

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Frustratingly unpredictable…

paigegreen-vm-film25Most likely grainy and potentially blurry film cameras…paigegreenLisaAndrewFilm-67670006

Will hopefully give you at least one or two photos…

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That you’ll want to hold on to…

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…forever.

es-34500012And no fancy Photoshop actions required.

HelenAdrien-54810009Because photographing with film is about more than just using a tool to document. 

pgreenGDfilm52513-000067680004It is about turning a moment in to art.

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It is about quality…24910008Not quantity.

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And once you fall in love with film…

helenadrien-54810015You just may become a film pusher too.

15-paigegreenkendalljavier-54830008(All of these photos were taken with my medium format film cameras.)

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A Photographer’s Wedding…

Klea and Dave got married at the Westerbeke Ranch in Sonoma on July 23, 2011.

Klea and Dave’s wedding may have been one of the easiest and one of the hardest weddings that I have ever photographed.

It was one of the easiest weddings that I have photographed because Klea is also a photographer so she knew how to create a beautiful wedding… She picked a photogenic location with amazing light and carefully planned all of the details.

It was one of the hardest weddings because Klea is also a photographer so naturally she has high expectations of the photographs of her own wedding. With Klea’s high expectations weighing heavily on my mind, I may have been a bit more nervous than I normally am before I photograph a wedding. But I had to remind myself that she hired me for a reason and that my job was to stay calm and to do what I always do… except with more film. Because like every good photographer, Klea loves film and she wanted me to document each part of the day with my film camera as well as with my digital camera.

So to make sure I had every moment covered, I hired Annika Erickson, another talented photographer, to be the second photographer… and here is our story of Klea and Dave’s wedding...

See if you can tell which photographs are digital and which photographs are film…









Congratulations, Klea and Dave, and thank you for trusting me to document your very photogenic and love-filled day.

To see more photos of Klea and Dave’s wedding and to find out which photos are film click here.

We Have Come A Long Way…

…since Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1963.

But until Theresa and Alia can legally get married then we still have a long way to go.

So this is what I would like to add to the dream speech…

I have a dream that little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin…

…or by who they choose to love…

…but by the content of their character.

Here’s to having a dream.

And here’s to Alia and Theresa.

Love is the only thing that matters…

Dora and Emily got married on July 19th, 2009 in front of all of their friends and family at the Brazil Room in Berkeley. By choosing to get married, Dora’s two children, and Emily’s one child, now have two moms.

I have photographed a lot of weddings, but this was the most amazing wedding I have ever seen. It wasn’t because of the dress, or the shoes, or the flowers, or any of the other details that we easily get lost in. It was because of all the love, the acceptance, and the incredibly beautiful children who saw nothing wrong with two women, of different races, getting married.

Their wedding gave me so much hope for the future. And this week, after hearing Judge Walker’s decision on Proposition 8, the proposition that denied same sex couples the right to marry, I was filled with hope all over again.

I don’t know how anyone can look at this photo and tell me that these people should not have the right to be legally recognized as a family. If only all children were raised in such a loving environment… the world would be a much better place.

Photo of the Day…

I have just started a new “Photo of the Day” gallery on my Paige Green Photography facebook page. It is a quick and easy way for me to share my favorite new photos, without having to make a full blog post. So if you want to see the latest and the greatest… click here.

These are the The Mauritius Island twins, who I met while second shooting a wedding, with my friend Jessamyn Harris, at Kunde Winery in Sonoma. More photos coming soon.

I love these twins.

Congratulations to Katie and Pat…

Thank you for choosing me to photograph you wedding. To quote your best man, “I hope you always remember the love you felt for each other on this amazing day.”

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For all future brides and grooms… if you need a gorgeous place to get married, I highly recommend the Westerbeke Ranch in Sonoma. The cabins are cute, the food is amazing, and as a photographer it was so easy and fun to photograph.

Nothing but love…

Graham and Janet are getting married and I am lucky enough to photograph their wedding this summer.

They wanted to have engagement photos for announcements. Graham, who is an emerging photographer, said that he tried to set the camera up and take their own engagement photos with a remote, but he said it was harder than he thought to get the photos to look natural.

So we made a date in Golden Gate Park, and we did a quick one hour engagement shoot with their new love, Jasmine.

Our mini-photo shoot was just enough time for us to get to know each other a little better, and for them to practice being in front of the camera, and for me to capture natural photos of them being in love, with each other… and with Jasmine.

And then Jasmine had enough of the love…

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