Crane Photography

Like Dreamers Do {Citizens Bank Park Phillies Wedding}

admin — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 23:00:28 +0000

Have you ever dreamed of walking out onto the bright green grass of Citizens Bank park where our beloved Philadelphia Philles play? Or maybe you’ve fantasized about sitting in the dugout or hanging out in the locker room? Well all you have to do is find that special fella or lady and celebrate your wedding reception at the gorgeous Diamond Club at Citizens Bank Park. That’s what diehard Phillies Phans Amy & Bill decided to do to celebrate their special day and it was like no other I have ever seen! Amy & Bill were married at the beautiful St. Rita’s Church on Broad Street in Philadelphia.

After their ceremony, Amy & Bill invited their bridal party, parents and luckily me & Mike (more about him in a bit) onto a traditional open-air trolley for the ride to Citizens Bark Park where the fun really started! While wedding guests were treated to traditional ball park fare at the cocktail hour in the Hall of Fame club, the Phillies wedding coordinator escorted everyone on the trolley down onto the dazzlingly, colossal Citizens Bank Park ball field! To say it was surreal would be an understatement! We were warned to stay off the precisely manicured grass, but we still had the whole warning track to explore and take pictures on. We were also allowed in the stands, on top of the dugout, in the dugout and into the locker room. With the help of the edgy, talented Mike Allebach of Tattooed Brides we took advantage of every photo-op the ball park had to offer. After exploring the field & locker room, we met up with the guests at cocktail hour and were then led into the stunning Diamond Club where the reception was held. What a beautiful space to have a reception! We were even treated to a surprise guest who stayed to dance the night away with all of the excited guests!

Amy – you made such a beautiful bride and your day couldn’t have been more picturesque and perfect! Congratulations to you & Bill! You really “knocked one out of the park” planning that wedding!!

Sure to Fall {South Jersey Wedding Photographer}

admin — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 21:45:54 +0000

I’ll explain my song title choice in a bit but first I have to tell you about Jenn & Kyle. This fun & adorable couple had their wedding at the fabulous new Valenzano Winery’s Winemaker’s Ballroom. I know the groom Kyle as a family friend, so I knew it was going to be a blast to shoot their wedding and I wasn’t disappointed! Jenn chose such awesome & unique colors for her wedding: purple, green & yellow! The green in homage to Kyle’s Irish nationality. The colors of the day mixed with the brand new venue and tons of raucous party people added up to one heck of a beautiful & fun wedding!! Jenn you made such a gorgeous bride! Good luck with that new husband of yours – he’s quite a guy!

I just love it when couple’s choose to do a quick “First Look” before the ceremony! This special little private moment gives the couple a few minutes to see each other right before walking down the isle so we can capture the sweet expressions and authentic tears as the groom first sees his bride.

I Do!

Sadly the rain prevented the ceremony from being held outdoors, but the staff at Valenzano were great at quickly setting up the ceremony area in the ballroom for us! And the wedding party & I braved the rain for a few minutes for some group pictures…with disastrous results…

And then the party really started. Can I tell you just how much I enjoy photographing Drunken Wedding Dancing (DWD)?! It’s what reminds me that I have the best job in the world – and these were some of the best DWDers in the world!

And you gotta love a “double-fisted” bride!

To all aspiring wedding photographers…are you wondering how I get such great expressions and smiles from my wedding parties? It’s easy as 1,2,3!

1. Just shoot in the rain on a slippery surface and take off your shoes for “better traction”

2. Then let gravity do it’s thing and fall on your BUTT in front of everyone. Check out their hilarious expressions!

3. And be sure to have a great 2nd shooter with you who will catch your fall and continue to shoot you instead of help you up. Haha, thanks Rich!

So you see, I meant to do that (blush)…it just shows how “professional” I am as I protected the camera instead of trying to break my fall. I hope you enjoyed Jenn & Kyle’s wedding preview. If you know anyone getting married this fall or in 2012, send them my way – but only if they want a relaxed, fun photographer who keeps them laughing throughout the day and produces killer wedding pictures.

The Inner Light {Mantua, NJ Wedding Photographer}

admin — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 23:25:26 +0000

There’s just something about the bride’s I’m lucky enough to photograph. They always have that “Inner Light” that just radiates out of their images. Kristen was no exception – she absolutely glowed all day long! Kristen & Paul’s wedding at the beautiful Il Villagio in Carlsdadt, NJ felt like home for me: heartfelt hugs, genuine smiles, polka dancing, line dancing, drunk dancing, raunchy Irish singing, and a gorgeous room full of laughter & love! Thanks you for allowing me to be a part of your fabulous day! Here are a few of my favorite images:

Kristen & Paul – Thank you so much for allowing me to be a part of such a beautiful day!

I Saw Her Standing There {Moorestown, NJ Wedding Photographer}

admin — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 20:34:08 +0000

I chose the Beatles song “I Saw Her Standing There” for this blog post because when I saw Melissa standing in the window of the Moorestown Community House I knew that I had to create an image of Timeless Beauty. The image below was a candid capture of the bride just fixing her veil. But I saw a portrait of an dancer on her wedding day. See Melissa is an accomplished ballet dancer and you can see it it the way she holds her arms, hands and long, graceful neck.

This next image I set up by grabbing one of the antique chairs from the corner and posing Melissa as if she were a bride from the early 1900s when this Moorestown Community Center was built. I try to capture a few “Timeless” portraits of my brides that look like they could have been taken decades ago. Here is my Timeless Portrait of Melissa:

And here are a few (okay lots) more favorites from Melissa & Phil’s wedding.

And you’ve gotta love a Double-Synchronized-Worm on the dancefloor!!

There are still a few spots open for Fall & Winter 2011 weddings, so email me soon to discuss your wedding before they’re all booked.

This Boy {Wenonah NJ Newborn Photographer}

admin — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 20:54:56 +0000

This boy was actually born back in the fall but my crazy life prevented me from blogging about him until now. This sweet little guy gave me a run for my money because he did NOT want to fall asleep for me. But after lots of patience, an extra bottle, a new diaper, and about an hour’s worth of swaying he finally closed his little eyes and blessed us with some sleepy smiles! What a cutie! Once he was out, we were able to pose him in lots of fun ways without him minding the least. Without further ado, here’s little Mr. C:

Helter Skelter {Medford NJ Portrait Photographer – not blog expert!}

admin — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 19:50:50 +0000

Ahhhhh! Why do I even try to do these things myself? I am thrilled to be moving away from my old portfolio site that required me to enter the scary sub-basement world of FTP programs and file organization to update my site. You hopefully can see that my blog is quite a bit different than it used to be. I’ve got those nifty Facebook & Twitter thingys now in the upper left corner. Although I apologize if my tweets are just a bunch of cursing and whining about my web-troubles. My tweets are a little less “polished” than my Facebook statuses and Blog posts, but we’ve all got to have a place to kick back and keep it real, right? My new blog also has some cool slideshow and gallery functions that I’m going to show off here in a minute.

But the reason for my Beatles song choice “Helter Skelter” is because I cannot for the life of me ever make a simple site migration or upgrade without lots of stress and premature celebrations followed by public admissions that I broke something. It’s true. I always break something when I mess with stuff like this but that’s why I’m a photographer and not a web designer. So right now if you scroll down to my previous posts. Any images posted before 4/1/11 are not showing up today. Sorry – I’m a goober and I’m trying to figure out the problem, but it may not be fixed until Monday (two days from now). So rather than do the “professional corporate” thing of taking my whole site down and posting one of those “Crane Photography’s site will be down for scheduled maintenance from today until Monday 4/4/11.” Yeah I’ve worked in e-commerce since before Y2K and I know those messages are only ever used for these types of “oh CRAP I broke the site” situations. But I’m leaving my site up and instead using this as an opportunity to catch up on 6 months of no-blogging. The new images I post seem to work. So get ready for a Crane Photography Blog-Post overload. I promise I won’t assault you like this again for a few months. Ya ready to see some new material? Here’s the nifty new slide show feature I mentioned:

Drive My Car {Medford, NJ Wedding Photographer}

admin — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 01:11:49 +0000

This wedding was a bit of a drive for me since it was in WAY North Jersey and I live pretty far into South Jersey, but as the mom of two under 6 a long drive alone is kind of awesome! These two cuties are actually good friends with my buddy Kara Wahlgren from Kiwi Photography. Kara wanted to have fun at their wedding as a guest (read: get tipsy and dance) so she kindly referred them to me. Thank you Kara!! H & D were married on 10/16/10 at the quaint and picturesque http://www.peronafarms.com/ in Andover, NJ. I’m a little behind on my blogging so you might also notice that it occurred during the beautiful fall season and not in this “can’t-wait-for-spring” dampness. Enjoy!

Thanks for visiting!

All You Need Is Love ~ Beloved Portrait Sessions at the NJ Jersey Shore

admin — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 19:00:41 +0000

Whew, it’s been a while since I’ve blogged. My life sort of imploded this past fall and winter and took precedence over my blog. Plus, do you know how difficult it is to come up with a Beatles song to fit every set I images I want to share? Holy over-complicated! Today I sit here still reeling over the explosion of emotions that happened in the wedding & portrait photography community the past few days. My dear friend Jesh De Rox invited over 5000 interested photographers from across the globe to tune into a webinar about his dream – The Beloved Movement. This new form of portrait session is as much about the experience of connecting with your beloved, as it is about the resulting images. I have been studying Beloved Sessions since I first heard about them last year when Jesh unveiled his new offering at WPPI in Las Vegas 2010. Beloved Portrait sessions are meant for couples who have been married for a while and who need a little reminder of why they fell in love in the first place. Why should couples only have fun portrait sessions when the get engaged and on their wedding day? What we put our attention towards expands and grows in our lives. So why not take the attention off of the bills and jobs and instead put a little attention towards the love that was so easy to feel in the early days of a relationship but is harder to feel over the years. These special portrait sessions involve fun, almost interview-like questions where you interact with your beloved to remember that connection – that spark – that intangible, giddy, powerful love you once felt for each other so easily. It’s still there (in most cases) but it’s buried under crazy schedules and money worries and the day-to-day junk that piles up over the years. So take a day to celebrate your marriage with a Beloved Portrait session and I promise you’ll walk away with SO much more than just beautiful, professional portraits of each other.

This special couple experienced one of my first Beloved portrait sessions ever and well I’ll let the images speak for themselves. Can you tell how much they still adore each other after over 30 years of marriage?

These sessions are just SO special! Contact me to find out more about these special Beloved Portrait sessions. The winter is behind us and the time is ripe to celebrate you and your Beloved out in the warm Spring & Summer air. Be the first of your friends to experience a Beloved session – Book your special session before May 1st, 2011 for a special reduced rate!!

The Long and Winding Road {Medford NJ Portrait Photographer}

admin — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 19:26:33 +0000

My baby boy traveled down our long and winding road yesterday on the big yellow bus to kindergarten. How did this day get here so fast? It seems like just yesterday we were bringing him home from the hospital on that sweltering July day. Time sure does fly when you have kids. But all that sad, sentimental stuff aside, we were so proud of our little guy yesterday. He had his new school clothes from “Grandmarb” and his new Scooby Doo backpack and was ready to go.

Getting some manly advice from Daddy

Hurry Up Mommy I heard the bus!

I can barely pick him up anymore

Hurry the bus is here!

After the bus drove away we had to hop in the car to beat the bus to school so we could see our little man get off the bus and go into school. Luckily we weren’t the only embarrassing parents there.

Waiting in line with his new classmates

Good luck in Kindergarten Mr. Man! I know you'll do great!

And a quick note to all of my wonderful clients: I really appreciate your patience these last two weeks as we enjoyed some relaxing time at the shore and then got our little guy ready for school. Now that the big First Day of School has passed we will be back to business as usual and much quicker response and order-delivery times. Thanks for sharing in this exciting day with us! Enjoy these last warm days of late summer/early fall!

Long, Long, Long {Cherry Hill, NJ Wedding Photographer}

admin — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 01:18:12 +0000

…that’s what this post is going to be, so you have been warned. This love story began, well years ago I’m sure, but I became involved in it back in February. J&J called me to have their engagement portraits done in the Boat House Row area of Philadelphia. You might remember them from this session:

J&J were so happy with their engagement portraits that they decided to invite me all the way to Portland, Maine to photograph their 4th of July wedding. I am so happy that I took them up on their offer because J&J’s wedding had the most amazing colors and stunning location! I will begin my post with the only black and white collage that I put together for this post because the colors were just too gorgeous to convert. Please enjoy your trip to Portland, Maine as you take a peek at some of J&J’s wedding images.

This one is going to look gorgeous in their 10x20 panoramic wedding album!

This one was a little nod at their engagement portraits.

As the sun set, the party started to get a little crazier. We became overrun by Supermen! I went for a jog and hopped a fence with J&J to capture the beautiful setting sun. And then we were entertained by a glow-in-the-dark, professional hula-hooper while we waited for the fireworks to begin.

J&J – It was wonderful getting to know you both this past year! I’m looking forward to helping you design your wedding album and then hopefully photographing you guys and maybe some little ones in the future!

Thanks so much to Michele Stapleton, Portland, Maine Wedding Photographer, who helped me as the 2nd shooter and photo booth photographer! More details will be announced soon about how you can have an affordable Photo Booth at your wedding. Thanks for visiting!