Hastings House Wedding on Salt Spring Island // Kim and Chris

Kim and Chris' gorgeous, hazy, outdoor Salt Spring Island Wedding at Hastings House // Victoria Wedding Photographers

As wedding photographers on Vancouver Island, we love the opportunity to island hop to photograph our wonderful couples. We've photographed on Salt Spring Island a few years ago, and just couldn't wait for the opportunity to go back!   When Kim and Chris invited us to photograph their intimate outdoor wedding at Hastings House, we jumped through the ceiling!  

When their day arrived in August, we knew it was going to be a beautiful one. The skies were hazy with forest fire smoke, and glowing with rich orange light.  Anything the sun touched was painted gold and seemed to radiate with warmth. 

With what Kim and Chris had told us about their wedding, we knew it would be a memorable event as well.  Not only do Chris and Kim have amazing chemistry, and the uncanny ability to make each other and others laugh (and laugh often!), they also added many personal touches to make their wedding as intimate and meaningful as possible.  Hastings House happens to be the place where Kim's parents married almost two decades ago.  With Chris' parents coming all the way from Perth, Australia for the wedding, Kim also got Chris' brother to fly in from Hong Kong for the occasion... to surprise Chris a couple days before the wedding. Boom! Excuse us while our hearts explode.  Of course, the wedding wouldn't truly be a "Kim and Chris Wedding" if there weren't a ton of hilarity and quirkiness involved!  From the guys' custom Indochino suits with tropical liners, to Ice-ing their friends at dinner, and Kim Ice-ing Chris during the garter grab, our stomachs hurt from laughing.  We also have to give a very special VIP shout out to Kim's maid of honour, who spotted a bee in Kim's veil as she approached the altar.  Knowing that Kim is allergic to bees, she promptly grabbed the veil and shook out the bee so eagerly that she pulled it clean off her head, saving Kim from a potential epi-pen prick and a trip to the hospital, and effectively breaking the ice for the ceremony by causing an uproar of laughter from everyone! 

We've been so fortunate to photograph so many beautiful weddings of couples who are so deeply connected to each other, the people around them, and have an insatiable lust for life!  We're so grateful when they let it all show on their big day.

Thanks Kim and Chris for having us along to photograph your wedding, and capture all those amazing moments. We hope you love the photos. Here's just a few of our faves!

Tips for Looking and Feeling Awesome in Your Engagement Photos

Some great suggestions on how to look and feel amazing during your engagement photos, from Victoria Wedding Photography team, Pebble and Pine Photography.

Let's start with why we love engagement sessions so much!  We get asked a lot by couples if engagement sessions are a totally necessary part of getting married.  The truth is, they aren't.  You can get married without having engagement sessions and your marriage is still just as legal, haha.  However,  we've found that engagement sessions are so valuable because they are a great way for us to get to know our couples a bit more before the wedding.  It helps us to see how you interact with each other, get to know your dynamic as a couple, and how we can best make you feeling comfortable and confident in front of the lens so the wedding day is effortless and has a smooth natural flow to it.  It's also incredibly helpful and fun for our couples who are preparing for the big day.  It shows you how we work as a photography duo, how you feel being photographed, and help you to get more comfortable in front of our lenses, so that you have less to feel nervous about when your wedding day comes. 

 In our experience of photographing weddings, we've found that many of the couples we work with have not had professional photos done together before working with us.  They often have questions about how they can best prepare for the engagement session, so we've put together a handy little tips list.  That way, you can put your nerves at ease, and feel excited!

First and most importantly to remember; this is not a do-or-die list.  As with all advice, follow it to the degree that you're comfortable with, and that feels right for you!

Ability to move freely. 
Because we’ll be walking around, and getting the two of you interacting with each other, the ability to move around with ease is the best way to feel natural in front of the camera.  You want to make sure that you can wrap your arms around each other comfortably, and also be able to walk and sit down without worrying what your clothes are doing, or feeling restricted by them. We also love taking candid photos of you guys just spending time together, so the less you carry with you (purses, backpacks, etc), the more spontaneous the photos can be.  Some couples like to make sure they can keep their phones close by, or like to bring a small makeup/lip touch-up kit along which is totally fine. In those instances, we will usually just carry those things for you in our camera bags until you need them, so they don’t show through your pockets and clothes.

Wear the clothes, and do the hair and makeup style that make you feel like the most confident, comfortable, and vibrant version of yourself.
Keep in mind that when you look at your photos later, we want you to feel like your photos are a reflection of your true self, not a costumey version of yourself.
Our best advice is to not wear clothes, or get hair and makeup done to an extreme or style that feels unnatural or uncharacteristic of you. The best way to look good on camera is to feel like yourself! 
Brides who are planning to have hair and makeup done at the wedding often opt to have some hair and makeup for the engagement session, to see how it feels to be photographed with it done.  Typically it’s slightly more toned-down, and less formal than it would be on the wedding day.  The best way to look good on camera is to feel like yourself! 

Decide on a location you love and feel comfortable in.
We encourage couples to choose a place of significance to them, and a place they feel comfortable in.  We love engagement sessions to tell some kind of story and have a flow to them, so that you don’t feel like you're just standing in front of the camera posing the whole time. If you're in a place you love and are excited about, you'll feel more at ease in front of the camera.  This way we can get you interacting with each other to really capture your personalities, and your dynamic together.  A lot of couples choose walks on the beach or the woods in areas they like, or decide they want to have a date night, like a wine-and-sunset picnic somewhere.  Other couples choose to have their photos taken doing a hobby they enjoy doing.  We like to chat with our couples about ideas that work best to reflect their life together.

Match your engagement style vibe to the atmosphere and style you’ve planned your wedding. 
Weddings nowadays have become less of a traditional mould, and more of an expression of your relationship.  Chances are, you’ve planned your wedding to reflect your personalities, your style and taste, and of course your eccentricities.  We recommend matching your engagement style to fit amongst the same general style of your wedding, and your own personal style.  Some couples consider themselves more outdoorsy and adventurous. Some couples vibe with boho, whereas others are more modern and edgy, etc.  So to avoid feeling uncomfortable or inauthentic to yourself, we usually recommend couples dress in what Matt refers to as, “casual plus, or better".  It's a spruced up version of your own real, personal style.  For example, a couple we shot last year, during a beach sunset, described their outfit choice this way, “we chose outfits to that we would wear to a beachfront patio, on a night out for dinner and drinks with good friends we hadn’t seen for a long time.”   

Complement each other’s style. 
This is not a suggestion to wear a matchy-matchy couples onesie outfit, though that would be hilarious. We do, however, recommend your clothes complement each other’s style and scale of formality. We’ve found most couples have a similar style anyways, but we just throw this in as a tip.  For example, if one of you is in a suit jacket, the other might not want to wear those oh-so-cozy LuLus and gym top.  Or, if one is in a brightly coloured, patterned summer dress, the other probably wouldn’t be rocking the Johnny Cash all-black-from-head-to-toe look.  You're both individuals, but these photos show how you complement each other as two equal parts of a whole.

Play off the season and location.  
This all goes with the goal of feeling comfortable and natural in your surroundings. We want you to dress and feel awesome for the weather, and location you're in.  Heels aren't always the best shoe choice for snowy mountains or sandy beaches. If you're planning to rock a strapless dress at the top of Cypress in the winter, bring along a cute jacket to wear.  If you're planning a romantic summer sunset on a hot beach, leave that parka at home and wear layers instead. 

I know, I know! This isn't one of Andrea and Eddie's engagement photos. But we love their use of vibrant colour and eccentric prints to show their personal style. Don't be afraid to be bold, friends!

Don't shy away from bright colours or prints, but avoid fluorescent neon materials. 
Bold prints and vibrant colours can be a great way to show your personal style, but be weary of fluorescent and neon.  Think Olivia Newton John in her 80’s aerobic leotards.  While these types of colours are mostly seen in workout and road-worker attire to promote visibility and road safety, they have started to pop up in regular style as well for a visual punch.  Great in real life, but these fluorescent and neon colours are so reflective that they’ll reflect their own colour onto your skin in photographs.  If these colours are on the front of your shirt, they will often cast their colour up onto your face and your partner’s, even on a cloudy day. (We’ll have a photo in the blog to show an example of this effect.)

A good night sleep, proper meals, and lots of water! 
This is just a general rule for day to day life, but it applies to the day of your photoshoot as well.  If you’re nervous the night before, try to hit the hay early to make sure you’re not tired the evening of your session. If you’re busy with hair and makeup on the day of, make sure to allot time for food and water through the day of your the photo session.  It’s the best way to look vibrant, feel refreshed, and stay excited through your photos together. Plus, as we all know, it’s hard to smile and feel lovey when we’re hangry. 

These are some of our prep / attire tips. But again, only follow these to the degree that you’re comfortable with, and don’t feel restricted by.  We usually spend a few minutes at the start of each photo shoot to let you guys know what expect so that you know how to interact with each other and the camera during the photoshoot. We’ll shake out all those nervous, awkward feelings at the start so you guys can feel awesome in the photos! 

Feel free to check out some other blogs here:

Whistler Engagement Session - Kerri and Nik at Green Lake

Kerri and Nik's Wintery Engagement Session at Green Lake in Whistler // Victoria Wedding Photographers

It was a bright and sunny day.  Snow seemed to glow from the tops of Whistler’s Backcomb range, birds sang and darted about through crisp air, cedars towered at the edges of the ice-coated lake, couples smiled at each other as they walked hand in hand, and the magical sounds of Notorious B.I.G echoed out into the world from Nik’s Spotify playlist.  The tone was set for his and Kerri’s engagement session.

With a mid-summer wedding on the calendar, Kerri and Nik were keen to do their engagement photos during winter.  What better place than in Whistler to capture a snowy themed story.  We met on the edge of a lake in Whistler, surrounded by mountainous views, and walkable trails.  When Nik and Kerri first stepped out of their car, they pulled with them a bag full of HBC everything. Hats, mitts, they mentioned they also had scarves, but most wonderful of all was a very delicately folded, vintage Hudson Bay wool blanket.  Nik told us that this blanket meant so much to them; it is one of the very first purchases his grandmother made when she immigrated to Canada.  

We knew right away that our session with Kerri was going to be a delightful dichotomy of sentimentality and hilarity.  We were not disappointed.  We explored the edges of the lake together, taking equal break time to cuddle under their blanket, tumble around in the snow, enjoy a snowball battle, and of course, bust into song and dance when the best songs showed up on their aptly named, Engagement Session Playlist.  

Thanks Kerri and Nik for the laughs, and the stories. We can’t wait for the wedding!

Thank you for stopping by to check out our wedding photography. If you'd like to know more about our lives as Pebble and Pine Photography, Creative Victoria and Vancouver Island Wedding Photographers, you can read About Us

Golden Eagle Golf Course Wedding - Candy and Tim

Candy and Tim's Outdoor Wedding and Helicopter Ride at Golden Eagle Golf Course in Maple Ridge // BC Wedding Photographers

We had the pleasure of photographing a wedding at Golden Eagle Golf Course a couple years ago and really loved the experience.  When Candy and Tim approached us about their wedding this year, we were excited to come back from Victoria to capture it.  They seemed like a couple who was perfect for each other, and it would be so great to spend a day with them at such a neat place. 

We loved all the personal touches that Candy and Tim put into their wedding were really superb and cheeky.  Being pharmacists, Candy and Tim handed out large prescription bottles for their guests to 'fill' at their candy bar.  They also had all their guests fill out a prescription pad with marriage advice for them to read through in the future. 

With all the excitement of the day, it was nice for Candy and Tim to have a few minutes alone together, to step away from all their guests and absorb the day.  They did this by taking a helicopter ride to a remote riverbed in the forest, just the two of them... and Matt. While they were away, their guests enjoyed their time putt'ing around the greens and listening to Candy's sister play beautiful music on the guzheng. 

Upon their return, it was time for the celebrations, with amazing speeches and stories about the couple and their relationship, they finished off their evening with dancing and sparklers.

Thanks Candy and Tim for letting us be part of this special day! We hope you love the photos.

Thank you for stopping by to check out our wedding photography. If you'd like to know more about our lives in BC, or as Pebble and Pine Photography, Creative and Modern Victoria and Vancouver Island wedding photographers, you can read About Us

Cannon Beach Wedding in Oregon - Paula and Cameron

Paula and Cameron's Destination Wedding in Cannon Beach Oregon // Vancouver Island Wedding Photographers

It had been a while since we saw Paula and Cameron: their Sea to Sky Gondola engagement session was way back in March, so their September wedding at Cannon Beach felt like it was going to be eons away!  We were giddy when September rolled around and we were hitting the road from Victoria to Oregon for their wedding. 

We were also excited to visit Oregon again, and specifically a place that holds a lot of emotional value to us as well!  We got engaged at Cannon Beach, so our hearts were a'flutter at the idea of photographing Paula and Cameron exchanging their vows at the same place. 

It was a true event!  For their ceremony, Paula and Cameron picked a secluded area on the northern end of the beach, away from tourists and beach-goers, accessed by a long narrow trail through the beach grass with lead to a clearing of fine sand, surrounded by a circle of beach grass, overlooking blue waters, and cliffy rock formations. What a treat to watch the expression on their guests faces as they stepped out on to the beach to watch Paula and Cameron's ceremony.

After a gorgeous ceremony we wandered the beach with Paula and Cameron, and followed them up to their reception venue, HayStack Gardens at SurfSand Resort.  CC of Roa Luxury Floral Designs happens to be a family member to these two, and created such a gorgeous, airy, beach garden atmosphere for Paula and Cameron's reception.  What a creative and beautiful scene! 

With games, cocktails, dancing, and Pebblebooth fun, we followed the antics into the night, even finding a few minutes to sneak the newlyweds off as the sun set.  When the night crept in, Paula, Cameron and their guests headed down to the beach to round their day off with a midnight bon fire, chatting, and music.

Thank you Paula and Cameron for inviting us along to be part of you wedding day!  We hope you love the photos.

Thank you for stopping by to check out our wedding photography. If you'd like to know more about our lives in BC, or as Pebble and Pine Photography, Creative and Modern Victoria and Vancouver Island wedding photographers, you can read About Us

Wedding at Hart House Restaurant at Deer Lake - Charlene and Josh

Charlene and Josh Get Married in an Outdoor Ceremony at Hart House in Burnaby // Victoria Wedding Photographers

When we headed from Victoria to Burnaby, to photograph Charlene and Josh's wedding, we knew we were going to be in a for a treat.  They had so many great events planned for their day, so we'd have lots of action to cover, and lots of people to meet in the process - from the tea ceremony, to first look, to western ceremony, right up to dinner, and dancing to live music, it was going to be a great day!   We started the day off with a traditional Tea Ceremony with Charlene and Josh's family and close friends, intimate and heartfelt. Char dressed in a stunning red and gold embroidered silk gown,  and was a vision done up in hair and makeup by The Love Team. 

As we arrived at Hart House it was immediately clear how much care and planning went into  planning every detail of Charlene and Josh's day - even doing most of the planning long distance, since Char had spent so much time in Minnesota doing her residency program (big congrats to her!!).  Amanda and her team at DreamGroup Productions helped the couple pull together so many gorgeous details, from their live music by Amanda Wood Music , and their stunning floral creations from The Flower Factory.  With all these incredible details creating a beautiful atmosphere, there was another detail that stood out for us, and it reflects on the type of wonderful people that Charlene and Josh are.  On the folded side of each place card, was a personal note, handwritten to each and every single guest, from the couple.  When we saw all the thoughtfulness and care put into this detail, our jaws just dropped - Char and Josh knew exactly how to let their guests know that the wedding was as much about celebrating with their loved ones, as it was about celebrating the two of them.

Congratulations Charlene and Josh, we're so happy you had us there! We hope you love the photos!

Thank you for stopping by to check out our wedding photography. If you'd like to know more about our lives in BC, or as Pebble and Pine Photography, Creative and Modern Victoria and Vancouver Island wedding photographers, you can read About Us

Sea to Sky Gondola Sunset Engagement in Squamish - Paula and Cameron

Paula and Cameron Adventure Around and Enjoy a Private Sunset During Their Engagement Photos at the Sea to Sky Gondola // BC Wedding Photographers

We've been really excited about Paula and Cameron's engagement session for some time now. When we first started planning for it, we talked about locations in Pemberton, then Vancouver, then finally decided on the glorious Sea to Sky Gondola in Squamish.  We've been dying photograph an engagement or wedding at Sea to Sky Gondola since it opened: and who could be a more perfect fit for this location than well-travelled, outdoorsy, and adventurous Paula and Cameron!

It was so fun to experience the top of the summit with Paula and Cameron who had never been up there before, and gave us a lot of opportunities to capture how much they enjoyed the experience, and the amazing views!

By sunset, most other visitors had departed for the gondola, and we had the whole place to ourselves. As the sun set, fog started to crawl into Howe Sound, and up from the trees below. This all made for a really intimate finale to the fun evening.

Thanks Paula and Cameron for the awesome outing! We hope you love your engagement photos. We can not wait for your wedding! 

Thank you for stopping by to check out our wedding photography. If you'd like to know more about our lives in BC, or as Pebble and Pine Photography, Creative and Modern Victoria and Vancouver Island wedding photographers, you can read About Us