WEDDING COLORS

I shot Erika and Porter’s wedding on Friday.  They were married in the Salt Lake LDS Temple.  We were walking around, doing shots of just the two of them when I saw this wedding color palette inspiration.  This post will be a teaser for Porter and Erika and Tuesday Tip all in one!

 Erika and Porter’s wedding colors were sage green and chocolate, which I always love since my brand color is apple green.  However, this grey wall and the yellow leaves just struck me and reminded me of the next hot wedding color-yellow.  Yellow with chocolate or yellow and apple green would be scrumptious.  I’m a big fan of a fabulous pop color with an elegant neutral.

This photo inspired me to do a Wedding Colors tip.  So, here you go!

YELLOW AND GREY

So, sophisticated.  I can see this with monograms for a modern, elegant look.  There’s a scene in the movie, Thorougly Modern Milly, with Julie Andrews (a must see) with a fabulous dancing and singing scene where the room decor and all the outfits are all in some variation of yellow and grey.  More fabulous inspiration!

 Some other totally cool, somewhat unexpected wedding color combos:

CLASSIC RED AND ROBIN’S EGG BLUE

This is a combination you don’t see a lot and I can see it busting onto the scene in the near future.  It’s fresh and would work fabulously with a modern or vintage theme.  Can’t you just see a 50s pinup era theme with this wedding color combo? 

COPPER AND TEAL

This would be a gorgeous, unique color combination for a fall or winter wedding.  You could incorporate peacock feathers and even bring in some robin eggs (faux, of course) to bouquets, centerpieces, and decorations.  This brings to mind English hunting style, plaid Ralph Lauren scarves, and riding boots.  Oh, scrumptious!  It was really hard to find photos of what I described (same thing happened when I was planning my wedding!), but thankfully I found some that have the peacock and teal idea thanks to http://tastefullyentertaining.blogspot.com

All photos besides those from the Tastefully Entertaining blog are from www.marthastewartweddings.com

Your Tuesday Tip is by Melissa Kelsey Photography, a Utah Wedding Photographer.

I loved this wedding from start to finish.  Christina and Jonathan were married in the First Presbyterian Church on South Temple in Salt Lake City (It’s the beautiful church next to the Cathedral of the Madeleine).  What a beautiful interior it has; stained glass, rich red carpeting, gothic arches, yum.  The light through the windows was amazing and made for some gorgeous shots of Christina and Jonathan alone after the wedding ceremony.  The wedding reception was at Canterbury Place in Bountiful www.thecanterburyplace.com and was really lovely.  Christina had a little tea theme with tea blossom favors.  The tea blossoms are sewn in such a way that when you pour hot water over them, they bloom into a flower.  The wedding color was red and the bridesmaids looked totally hot in their little red satin dresses.  Okay, the groomsmen did look pretty cute in their tuxes, too!  Jonathan sang to Christina on his knees in front of everyone at the wedding reception and it was really touching.  For the grand exit there were sparklers, which are always a good choice.  It takes the exit photos from nice to really nice with that extra light. 

Thank you, Jonathan and Christina.  I’ve really enjoyed working with you.  I like seeing how you are together, being silly and loving and fashionable for my photographs!  

I was really excited to get shots of Christina behind her veil with the light from a stained glass window.

Totally fierce bridesmaids.

Christina’s little sisters, the flower girls, were given lockets to wear at the wedding with photos of Jonathan and Christina inside.  Their family is tight and adore those little girls.

How cute and perfect is this?

This is one of those moments that you don’t get everyday and certainly can’t plan.  I was stoked to get this shot.

Christina and her cute dad.

The glorious interior of First Presbyterian Church

Jonathan is so chivalrous, always kissing the women he loves on the hand or head or cheek.  I love that about him.

Again, this window light!

I absolutely love this one.  My shot is the one above, but this one is Leisha’s.  Leisha is my second photographer.  A second photographer at a wedding is so invaluable because they cover what I can’t because I’m only one person and they can bring a completely different perspective than what I have and just get some amazing shots, like this one.  Thank you, Leisha!

Onto the wedding reception at Canterbury Place

Here is one of those tea blossoms I was talking about.  So cool!  I first learned about these when I went to Afternoon Tea at the Grand America.  Everyone should try it, such an affordable, luxurious treat, complete with tea sandwiches and pastries. 

Look at this handsome little man!  Such a cool dude.

Okay, this is one of my favorites.  The hotties in red are Christina’s sisters (not the little sisters I mentioned before, obviously).  This one’s going on the website.  These ladies have such fabulous style.

I love that Christina and Jonathan are silly.  They put a dot of frosting on each others noses during the cake cutting.

There he goes again, kissing his love on the forehead and giving me a fabulous shot.

Christina really needed to pee.

Here are those sparklers I was talkin’ about.  Besides the wonderful light and sparkle, everyone is always so happy and smiley because sparklers are fun to play with!

Hurray for the fisheye lens!

Wedding:  1st Presbyterian Church, Salt Lake City www.fpcslc.org

Reception:  Canterbury Place www.thecanterburyplace.com

Flowers:

Melissa Kelsey is Utah Wedding Photographer based in Salt Lake City and available for travel anywhere.

What better day for randomness than Friday?  The rest of the week, my blog is about wedding and portrait photography.  I’ve decided that Friday’s blog will be about random things that interest me or thing that I’m doing in my personal life that might interest you (or not). 

First Friday Randomness post!

So, here’s what happens when you attempt to do portraits of you, your husband (who is so not into it) and dogs with the self timer on your camera.  You get slightly out of focus, strangely cropped, dogs going crazy (because you didn’t tire them out first) photos.

In case you’re wondering, my husband’s name is Todd.  The big dog is Mia and the smaller one is Sugar.  The dogs are much cuter in person.  They aren’t very photogenic here, especially the first one where Mia is about to jump on me!

Matt, Sarah, and little Sienna met me at Wheeler Farm on a lovely Saturday for their family portraits.  Sarah’s father came along for some nice portraits with the family, too.  As you can see, Sienna is such a little cutie.

Check out more portraits of Families, Babies, Children and more at www.melissakelseyportraits.com!

Jill is a spiritual coach and needed headshots for the website she’s having built for her business, Radiance.  Jill is cute and full of life and great to talk to.

I bit about Jill from her blog, www.radiance4life.blogspot.com:

Jill Jeppesen is a senior coach with Clarity International™ (http://www.getclarity.com/), and founder of Radiance, a coaching practice located in Salt Lake City, UT.

I’ve decided to start posting a super-helpful wedding tip or article every Tuesday to help brides and grooms plan their weddings.  I’ve gleaned a lot of knowledge on little things that will enhance any wedding through all the weddings I’ve photographed as well as planning my own wedding and helping friends plan theirs. 

So, here’s the inaugural Tuesday Tip!

CANDLES!

Lots and lots of inexpensive votive candles EVERYWHERE will make a huge difference in the ambience of your wedding reception as well as the wedding reception photographs.  I love the gorgeous glow of candlelight in a photograph.  It’s just so beautiful.  I took these two photographs with candlelight only.  You can see the gorgeous highlights and warm glow the candles made in the first photograph and the second one speaks for itself.

You can do this REALLY affordably.  At Ikea, you can get a bag of 24 tea lights for only $5.99, so stock up on at least 4 or more bags.  Seriously, the more the better.  Make sure you get little glass holders for them or your reception center won’t let you use them.  You can get a 5 short glass holders for only $1.99 or 3 tall holders for the same price.  This is a small investment that will make a HUGE difference in your wedding photography.

Tuesday Tip by Utah Wedding Photographer, Melissa Kelsey.

Stephen (stef-uhn) and Ani are my good friends and they’re getting married in South Carolina on the beach in June and I get to photograph their wedding!  Stephen and Ani are outdoorsy people, so I thought that the Great Salt Lake would be a lovely spot for their engagement photographs.  We brought along Brandon Orton, my videographer friend (www.ortonfilms.blogspot.com), who filmed me photographing them.  When my website is all revamped, it will feature a video showing how I work.  It’s gonna’ be awesome!  Back to Stephen and Ani now…

I got Stephen and Ani to sit on the super stinky, undoubtedly fly infested chair on the salt flats, which turned out to be one of my favorite photographs.  Stephen and Ani danced and played on the salt flats until sunset for some great action shots and Ani showed off her supercool cowgirl boots.  She has spurs for them, but she didn’t wear them that day.  I’m looking forward to the wedding day on the beach with friends!

This was mine and Steffon’s second shoot together.  The first shoot was for his pre-release edition of his album and this was for the official release.  Steffon is full of energy and silliness, but we portrayed him in a very cool, jazzy, but modern way for the album.  I think you may be hearing more about him in the near future.  You can find out more about Steffon and hear his music at www.myspace.com/steffon2000.

Trent and Eliza rock (and they literally rocked).  I took them to my friends, Chris and Anna’s awesome indie music shop, Slowtrain Music, www.slowtrainmusic.com, where they listened to music on the listening stations.  They also did a little dancing, and…a little kissing.  Muah!  We also found some fresh new graffiti.  It was literally fresh.  I heard a guy talking on his phone to another guy who did the graffiti art and I gathered that it had just been painted.  Not wet, or anything, just new.  So, it was fresh and it was fresh (as in cool). 

As you can tell, I’m in a silly mood with this post.  Why?  Because I just got back from Eliza’s bridal shoot, which was amazing.  Let’s just say there was a snowboard and goggles, darkness, some studio lighting, and a bench involved.  You’ll have to wait to see those until after their wedding in December which will be at the Salt Lake Temple and a reception at Cactus and Tropicals in Draper.  I can’t go letting Trent see Eliza in her dress before the weddding! 

Awesome once a year only, one day only sale at Alta Moda.  Hilary, the co-owner of Alta Moda let me in on this juicy tidbit. 

Alta Moda is known for high end designer gowns and they are having a sample sale!  Get your dream gown from 50% to 80% OFF!  Please be sure to make an appointment to see the dresses because if you don’t, the fabulous folks at Alta Moda won’t be able to give you the attention you deserve.  It’s sure to be a madhouse, so get your appointment soon for the best possible selection.  (And, tell them I sent you!)

*December 6th from 10am – 6 pm
*Appointments HIGHLY preferred
*Couture samples from Monique Lhuillier, Anne Barge, Atelier Aimee, Amy Michelson, Melissa Sweet, Augusta Jones, Alvina Valenta and others.
*Over 40 gowns included
*All sale gowns discounted between 50% and 80%.  (Yes, I am serious.)

Alta MODA Bridal                    www.altamodabridal.com                                                                                                                                            637 E. 500 S.
Located just north of Trolley Square
Salt Lake City, Utah
Appointment Preferred
801-531-1215

And this is one of the actual dresses!  To die for.