After seeing their engagement session pix a few months back, I knew that their wedding day will turn out just as perfectly.  I wasn’t wrong.  The attention to details that Vy & T put into their wedding is astounding.  Nicole Ha provided the beautiful flowers for the wedding.

Enjoy their beautiful wedding

Just wanted to quickly post Kim and Shane’s e-session images up to share with you a great session with a gorgeous couple.  Couples usually have a couple of change of clothes: one casual and one a little formal.  Kim and Shane went REALLY formal but rocked the tux and dress!

Enjoy their pix.

I’m so glad that I’m finding time to show you Kimberly & Will’s engagement session in beautiful San Francisco.  The day was (pun intended) picture perfect.  It’s pretty rare these days with the crazy weather we’ve been having but the stars aligned and we got a perfect day for a shoot.

Fun does not come close to describing these two. Their laughter is infectious.  Their love for each other deep and genuine.  I am truly lucky to have met them and even luckier to have them as friends and clients.

As any Bay Area resident would know, the weather here has been strange of late.  It’s been raining a lot lately and it was bound to rain on a wedding one of these weekends.  Sure enough, Murphy’s Law prevailed and the day of Kris & Gabe’s wedding started overcast and quickly degraded to a full shower by the time of the reception.

Good thing we had their revealing earlier in the day so that we got a chance to take some bridal portraits at Stanford University before heading to the Silver Creek Valley Country Club.

With the weather being so unpredictable, it was decided that they move the ceremony indoors.  The original ceremony site was an outdoor area near the golf club’s waterfall.

Even though they had seen each other prior to the ceremony, Kris couldn’t help but shed some tears when she walked down the isle.  Of course, the bridesmaids seeing their friend cry, started crying too!

After the ceremony, the rain was really coming down hard but not letting the weather affect her wedding day, Kris made the best of it by breaking out her bright purple rain boots!  She asked me if we can go outside to take some pictures with her wearing them.  Being one to not shy away from a challenge, I readily agreed and we set off to find a good spot for the quick shoot.

Not surprisingly, it was quite a challenge to: stay dry, direct, take pictures and smile!  Somehow we pulled it off and we got some of my favorite wedding images ever!

Here are some highlights of one of my favorite weddings.   Enjoy!

(Make sure to start the slideshow at the end of the post)

Yes, the groom’s name is Telemachus. Known as ‘T’ among his group of friends, I was relieved that I didn’t have to butcher his name by trying to pronounce it throughout the e-session. I was curious to the nature of T’s name and found this great entry on Wikipedia. But the Greek reference does not end there! Part of Telemachus’ groomsmen at their July wedding will be his 2 god brothers: Prometheus and Flaminius! I better start brushing up on my Greek mythology!

When I first met Vy and Telemachus, my first impression was that Vy was very outgoing and Telemachus was more reserved but at the engagement session, Telemachus really opened up! Since they were a referral from Bobby and Yen (engagement & wedding from last year) and that Bobby and I have become good friends (and fellow Tough Mudder workout buddies!), Bobby joined us at the engagement session in San Francisco to see how it’s like to be on the other side of the camera for once. He got some great shots and I included a couple below!

Here’s the thing, having referral from past clients is kind of tough on the photographer. I want to give them great pictures but obviously not give them the same shots as their friends’. Although Vy liked my work, she didn’t want the same locations that have been requested from my previous clients. She asked me to do something different. As you know from previous blog posts, I love it when clients challenges me!

Since Telemachus was born and raised in San Francisco, he found some great spots for us to hit. The weather that day was just perfect. A rare things these days in SF! And so, here is their San Francisco e-session pictures. Enjoy!

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Great shot from Bobby's angle

Here's another image from Bobby.

And so here we are in 2011 and I’m back with even MORE exciting news!

With easily over 15 million iPad 1 sold in its first year and a predicted 40 million iPad 2 for 2011, it was very clear that I needed to look at my blog stats again.  Sure enough, I was seeing increase iPad-based traffic in my blog logs.  This this knowledge in hand, I set about to figure out how I can make my blog a great experience for my iPad owners.

While it’s still a work in progress, I just can’t wait any longer to show you the fruit of my late night endeavors. So if you own an iPad, go ahead and launch the Safari web browser and enter my blog URL:

http://thaimaiphotography.com/blog/

You can rotate the iPad in either landscape or portrait orientation and the page will re-format accordingly.  The navigation couldn’t be simpler.  Just swipe on the iPad screen like a book page and you’ll see older post.  A much more intuitive way to navigate then finding a link at the bottom of each page don’t you think?

Tapping on a blog post will open a floating window with the post.  There’s a handy ‘Share’ button that will allow you to share it on Twitter, Facebook or to email to a friend.  I couldn’t be happier with the interface and ease of use.

I have even cooler features to share with you iPad owners so stay tune!  Please let me know what you think by leaving a comment.  Your thoughts and suggestions are always welcomed.

- Thai

What an awesome idea!  I love how camera shy these two were when we started off but within 15 minutes, they were so at ease it’s remarkable.

After the hair & makeup trial with Giao Nguyen, we headed out to beautiful Santa Cruz for the engagement session.   We ended at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk and nearby beach.

Really had a blast with Michelle & Linh on such a rare and beautiful day.

Enjoy!!

I’ve shot a few engagement as well as some wedding day portrait sessions at Stanford throughout the years and always wished I had an opportunity to to shoot a wedding at the church.  Well when I met Lily and Terry for their consultation early last year and they said that their wedding ceremony was at Stanford Memorial Church, I secretly was jumping for joy!

We did their engagement session in San Francisco soon after the consultation and I was just dying for their wedding day to roll around.  With the busy summer wedding months, their day came around quickly enough.

When Giao and I got to the Sheraton hotel in Palo Alto, you would think they were nervous… you know, considering that it’s their wedding day an all but nope.  Everyone was pretty laid back and no one was in much of a rush.  Quite a change from the weddings that I’ve shot lately!

With the makeup done, we had a few minutes (very rare!) to take some bridal portraits of Lily before we headed out to Stanford University.

As my first experience shooting a wedding at Stanford’s beautiful church, I couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful ceremony.  Even with the church’s many rules on where/how/when photographers can go for the entirety of the ceremony, we got some spectacular wedding ceremony pictures.  Having shot e-sesions AROUND Stanford several times before, we had little trouble finding some nice spots to do the portraits of entire bridal party.

Well enough introduction, here’s some pix from their wedding in Palo Alto.

VENDORS:

Hair & Makeup:  Giao Nguyen Hair & Makeup Artistry

Chair covers: Especially Yours Chair Covers

Reception: Sheraton Palo Alto

We started the shoot at Victoria’s home in Saratoga where we got the chance to take a few pix with her mom’s Lotus sports car!!  HOT!

We then headed to San Francisco to do the second half of the engagement session.  Coming along with us was David Ethridge from AVRFilms who was shooting their e-session video.

Here’s some of their e-pix.  Enjoy!

I haven’t been nervous for a shoot in quite a long time but my heart rate was certainly high just before meeting them for their engagement photo shoot.

In our conversations in the days leading to the shoot, Kris and Gabe informed me that they had some vintage bikes that they found… of all places… in Gabe’s parents garage!   And so, they asked that I incorporate the bikes into their e-session!  I’ve been shooting for a while but this is the first time I’ve been asked to incorporate a set of bikes in a shoot.  I LOVE IT!

To add to the excitement, Gabe contacted me (unbeknownst to Kris) right before we headed out to Half Moon Bay and told me that he wanted to surprise Kris with a new engagement band and made sure that I captured the moment.  I LOVE IT!  AGAIN!

So, as you can see, my stress level was rising considerably!   But like I’ve mentioned in the past, when I’m under pressure, that’s when I’m at my best.

Here are some of their e-pix.  Enjoy!