Samantha Warren Weddings: Published here, there and everywhere!

Of the tens of thousands of images I make each year, it's always fun to follow where they find homes after they leave mine. In addition to the nightstands, coffeetables, as well walls they grace, they often make their way onto vendor websites, wedding blogs and into print publications.

I was honored when this hawt (really, there's no other word for it) image from Leah and Darrel's Rhode Island wedding at the Squantum Association in East Providence made it onto the beloved Brenda's Wedding Blog, as part of her weekly Eye Candy series. Better have a dentist on speed dial with all that sweetness! No surprise from the image seen above, the theme was showcasing brides and grooms in natural settings including fields of flowers, green pastures and other open spaces. Though it's nearly two years old, it remains one of my favorites and is featured on my website as well. With daily updates of inspiration and images, tips and trends, Brenda's blog at www.brendasweddingblog.com is a must follow for those in the wedding world. Many thanks!

I often share images with fellow vendors I work with at weddings, either as a result of their asking, or me sending some shots along because I think they best showcase their work.

The image below I took of a stunning Sperry Tent set up seaside at one of my favorite New England wedding venues, the Asticou Inn in Northeast Harbor. It is featured on the Sperry Tents Seacoast website. As you can see, there is no better backdrop than a Sperry, which are made of canvas sailcloth and defined by their signature peaks and pennants.


Another of my favorite venues, The Loon Lodge in Rangeley, uses one of my images from Leslie and David's lakeside wedding as the signature image on the wedding page of their website (and they've used it in print advertisements as well).


Wedding planner extraordinaire Amber Small, of the Bangor-based Sweetest Thing Weddings, orchestrated that western Maine wedding weekend and uploaded some of my images to the new My Kate Parker Wedding planning portal where they both showcase Amber's awesome abilities as a planner, and provide inspiration to couples who are searching for images of real rustic ceremonies and celebrations. Here are two of the ten or so images included:



There are many images from the wedding I adore, so much so that I've made it a featured gallery entitled "Love the Lake in Regal Rangeley" on my website. And when I recently took out an ad in Maine's Little Wedding Book, I made my favorite image from the wedding day the focal point of my very simple ad, which you can see below.


As an aside, I typically don't take out advertisements, relying instead on word of mouth from happy couples, their families and vendors, and my website, blog and other social media outsets like Twitter and Facebook. But when I was approached about advertising in the inaugural edition of Maine's Little Wedding Book, I had to say yes. Not only do I personally use Maine's Little Black Book (a directory of home-related businesses including builders, designers, and decorating) and Maine's Little Green Book (a directory of fine eco and energy conscious businesses in the state), but I also appreciate the quality and creativity of the vendors featured, which are among Maine's finest. Look for this new resource on the shelves of fine venues and vendors around the state, as well as at wedding shows, or scroll through online here. You can see the cover below on the left and the editor's note, which features a favorite of my images from Emily and Liam's wedding at Greystone Manor in Cape Neddick two summers ago, on the right.


Last but not least, several of my images were included in the 2010 publications of Real Maine Weddings Magazine, which I was also featured in for 2008 and for 2009. Perhaps the best Maine-centric resource for images and inspiration, the magazine never disappoints with content that is at once obtainable (not like some real weddings) and stylishly stunning. Apparently, my clients are not just fabulous, but also forward-thinking as well. Both of the images were featured in the "Maine Wedding Trends" section.

An image from Sarah and JT's Sugarloaf wedding was used to illustrate the trend of "grey is the new black." These chic grey dresses complimented by colorFULL orange bouquets certainly makes the case (top left).


And long before Pam and Jim's wedding party so sweetly busted a move, my couples were already onto chorography, though luckily Nikki and Victor waited until after they got back up the aisle to get down with their wedding party (bottom left).


Thank you to all those who admire my work and share it, whether in the picture frame or on the page. On behalf of my couples and myself, it is always an honor.

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What happened in Vegas

Top row (left to right): Joanna, Lisette, me and Shea (we apparently didn't get the memo this was the happy picture, not the crazy one). Bottom row, Cristi and Kara. Absent from photo: Amelia, Trina and Lee Ann.

You know you've got a good group of girlfriends when you can go to Vegas with them, win $1,018 on the penny slots (yes, I was that hysterical person, fanning myself furiously with 20s while simultaneously shrieking in shock "Oh. My. God. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!), and that isn't even the highlight of the trip.

Between a surprise bachelorette soirée complete with limo and list of cheesy challenges (you know that scene in Harry Met Sally, now act it out Strip-side, e.g.); impromptu marriage proposals (if you met her, you'd want to marry Cristi too); discovering we had a benevolent benefactor who dealt in desserts (thanks, Brandon Gresham); a quiet afternoon exploring Red Rocks; my first In-N-Out burger (obviously with fries and chocolate shake); dancing, dancing and more dancing; VIP service at Wolfgang Puck's signature Spago (where my dear high school friend, Kyle, is a chef); and constant conversation (and giggling), there just too many "best thing ever" moments to mention of my recent trip to Sin City with the Alpha Kappa Camera girls (that's Amelia Strauss, Cristi Owen, Kara Purtell, Joanna Garcia, Shea Halliburton, Lee Ann Fuller, Trina Knudsen, Lisette Price, of course me and special guest star, Graham Yelton.)

Given the fun and friendships fast formed we'd had when our ad hoc photography sorority started last summer with a stay seaside in Charleston, South Carolina (you can read all about that trip here), I expected more of the same for our reunion at WPPI, our industry's largest trade show and convention which brought 15,000 plus wedding and portrait photographers to Las Vegas.

It was even better!

Simply put, there was something so special (and surreal) about all nine of us (all professional photographers from around the country from Maine to Michigan, Alabama to Arizona, and California to Clarksville, Tennessee) intentionally being back together, stuffed into two adjoining swank suites at The Signature (about as far from the charms of the sweet, sunny South as you can get in this country), making a concerted commitment to continue the personal and professional network that began 2,283 miles and seven months before. As if meeting up again, here in this place among thousands of other photographers, validated AKC and our sisterhood; it wasn't just a flash-in-the-pan, one time thing, but something meaningful, and lasting. It's even more unbelievable than putting in 75 pennies and walking away with more than 100,000 of them that nine women with such different backgrounds and foregrounds could come together so seamlessly and develop such deep friendships and collaborative partnerships so quickly. Yeah, it's true: we all genuinely adore each other.

While the AKC is all play, we're also a little bit business (and a little bit country and a little bit rock'n'roll too). Luckily, we love what we do, so that combination comes naturally for us. And we've also made a commitment for it to continue. While in South Carolina, much of our greatest learnings as photographers and businesswomen came over coffee or 3 a.m. conversations on our sprawling sun porch, in Vegas we decided to make who we are, and what we would become, official. In between the aforementioned fun, cruising the trade show floor to check out the latest gear and products and attending some seriously motivational and meaningful classes, we managed to come together and hold our first chapter meeting to decide our direction, complete with goals, voting and note taking- though in true AKC style, it was formally informal (or is it informally formal?) with many of us still in our PJs and and a certain beautiful bride-to-be curling her hair for the better part of the agenda.

I share this with you, because many of the conclusions of that conversation will have a clear impact on Samantha Warren Weddings, and my clients. For starters, we have committed to continuing AKC, with an annual summer retreat (locations rotate annually among the members- Maine in 2015!!!) and attendance together at one convention, likely WPPI again. While we are founded on our friendship, we believe that nine up-and-coming photographers from around the country have much to teach each other, and so these annual retreats will have time carved out for group education, with each of us getting the opportunity to teach and learn. This is a decision I am especially excited about, as there is much I admire about each of these women's businesses and I look forward to learning from them. I am equally as eager for this summer's retreat, lakeside in Montana!!!

Of course our learning isn't limited to a week each summer and one in the winter, and will continue with small group work in the times we're not together. It's so nice having a network of like-minded but different-experienced and perspectived women just an email or phone call away who will creatively challenge, coddle and change me as needed, and I know this will help my business and art evolve to better serve my couples and myself.

Part of this includes a promise to support each other as second shooters. With all of us working in different parts of the country, our seasons are quite different which means when my wedding season is slammed in the summer, my sisters sweltering down in Texas and Tennessee will be happy to help shoot seaside here in New England. In the past, I've been skeptical of working with a second shooter, for many reasons but largely because I wouldn't want just a gear gopher and I didn't want to not have 100 percent of my focus on my clients and their families. But given that the AKC women are all accomplished primary photographers in their own right, I can trust they'll provide integral images that will strengthen the day, and the wedding day experience for the couple and their guests. If you are already booked for a 2010 or 2011 wedding and interested in adding a second photographer, please contact me for pricing and details.

We've also begun work on an AKC blog that we'll all be contributing our oh-so-unique voices and vision to and that will be launching soon to provide inspiration and insight for both brides and grooms, and for the photographic community. More on that later! Until then, I just have to share some snaps from the photobooths around Vegas that we violated. With all those photographers, apparently what happens in Vegas doesn't stay there. Can you say, ridiculous!

And for the record, no. It is not a prerequisite that you've got to be gorgeous to be in the AKC (?how the heck do you think I would have gotten in if it was?) but seriously, if you want to get free drinks and club cover waived, this is the group to roll with.











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In Range

If you need a how-to for creating chic candle centerpieces, you'd look no further than Martha Stewart Weddings. If you want to know "his number one secret sex wish," you'd turn to Cosmo (though I'd recommend just asking). And, if you want to learn about the latest lenses, post-processing platforms and the industry's most innovative shooters, you turn to Rangefinder Magazine. Published monthly, it is professional photography's largest trade publication with an subscription list of more than 60,000.

In late 2008, fellow Maine wedding photojournalist Emilie Sommer, of emilie inc., asked me if I'd be willing to write and submit her story for content consideration. I happily agreed, and on a gusty November afternoon, we met in her Congress Street studio for an indepth interview about her evolution from a little girl playing shop to a grown woman now running several of them (her photography studio, a nonprofit that benefits breast cancer research called the Pink Initiative and an annual Roots Workshop photojournalism workshop held on Cape Cod).

Without warning, the article appeared in latest issue of the magazine, which is fittingly focused on the wedding photography industry, and is additionally distributed to the 15,000 or so photographers who I joined last week in Las Vegas for WPPI (much, much, much more on that later). While some details have developed in the 15 months since we submitted the story (Roots Workshop, which I actually attended in 2008, is now in its third year, for example), Emilie's story and vision remains true.

The Rangefinder piece was actually my second published this month. Also last week, the Winter 2010 edition of the Maine Public Relations Journal came out, and an article I wrote on the value of marketing and public relations professionals being involved in nonprofits was featured on the front page. You can read that article here. Far before I found photography, storytelling through words was my true love, and it's always a delight to discover opportunities that allow me to continue to pursue that passion, with pen or picture.

You can see a few screen shots of the five-page spread below, or read the article in its entirety by clicking here. Congratulations, Emilie!




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