The Knot Best of Weddings 2012!

The results are in...we made The Knot magazine's Best of Weddings for the fifth year!

A very special thank you to all of our wonderful clients who voted for us. We are so blessed to witness and document some the most special moments of our clients' lives.

We relish every event and milestone that you share with us and are truly honored to be a part of your lives. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

Studio News and Travel Updates!

You may have seen our work around town lately. Our images made the cover for Reach Magazine as well as Cincinnati Wedding's Reception Planner special feature. The lucky couples are Christy and Nick and Kara and Nathan. Also, we will be in New Orleans at the Professional Photographers of America (PPA) national convention. We will be out of the office January 14-18th.

Mark and I will each be receiving National Photographer of the Year awards. To receive this honor a photographer must submit four entries and have all four entries be submitted into both the General Exhibit as well as the Loan Collection...not the easiest of challenges. We submitted four client wedding albums and had all four accepted into both exhibits. Shhhhh.....but rumor has it that we have one album that has made it into the Top Ten Best Wedding Albums in the Country. We'll be sure to keep you updated as we learn more.

We are also looking forward to photographing an engagement session in New Orleans. We then be photographing their wedding this June in New York. Lots of fun!

Published! Professional Photographer Magazine

As part of our winning Diamond Level Photographers of the Year for 2011, we were featured in Professional Photographers Magazine. It's a challenge and a thrill to compete each year in the International Print Competition (IPC) with the Professional Photographers of America (PPA).

Out of the thousands of IPC entrants only a dozen achieved the Diamond Level Photographer of the Year award, by having all four of their entries both Merit and Loan. The greatest thrill for us is knowing that it is actual client work that has been judged by our peers. We aren't the type of photographers to go out and photograph sunsets or bowls of fruit. We want to submit work that is literally created in the heat of the moment for our clients.

In the last few years, we've become known for wedding album entries. Instead of being critiqued on a single image from an event, we feel it is important to be judged on the whole body of work or story of a wedding. For us it is the ultimate test, to be creative, professional, consistent and meticulous not just for one shot, but for a whole day or thousands of shots.

It's a thrill to arrive at each of our clients weddings and tell ourselves, "Today is the day. Today we will get our next winning album." We believe that all of our work is a self portrait, and as artists, we want to be remembered for a complete body of work. Entering print competition keeps us constantly striving to be better than we were yesterday, and to never let good enough be good enough.

To see more imagery from the four weddings that were submitted into the Loan Collection. Click on the links below.
Julie and Christian
Abby and Brian
Logan and Jonathan
Amy and Gary

Ryan and Michael Published in The Knot Ohio!

Ryan and Mike's beautiful wedding has been published in The Knot Ohio's fall magazine! Issues are on magazine stands now so be sure to pick up a copy.

Their event was full of unique details, creative twists and vibrant splashes of color. You can view more mages from the their original wedding post by clicking here. You can also check out some of the amazing wedding vendors who helped make their vision a reality.

Congrats to such a wonderful couple! Thank you for sharing your special day with us!

Tres Chic Event Planning, Coutrenay Lambert Floral Design, Prime Time Party Rental, The Envelope, Goodwin Lighting, Elite Catering, Party Pleasers DJ & Classic Confection Cakes

PPA District Judging Results!

The Professional Photographers of America, with nearly 22,000 members in the US and Canada, each year holds it's annual District Judging. We are apart of the Northeast District, which is shown in green on the map above. Two weeks ago, our District Judging was held and we thought we would share the results...

We entered the maximum number of entries, which is four. All four happened to be wedding albums from 2010 and one from 2009. In order to 'merit' a print/album has to score above an 80 on a scale of 0-100. We are very happy to say that all four of our entries merited with scores of 89, 90, 90 & 92.

Of all the entrants to our District competition, only 16 other photographers merited all four entries. Going 'four for four' is extremely coveted because it makes you eligible for two other very coveted and prestigious awards.

First, at the District level, you are eligible to win the Canon Par Excellence Award. With only five Districts, only five photographers in the entire country can win this award each year. Secondly, at the International Print Competition held later this June, you are then eligible to win some level of the Photographer of the Year Award.

We are very honored to say that we did win the Canon Par Excellence Award. We also now have the title of being the only photographers to have won it for the second time in it's five year history. We'll be sure to let you know the results of the International Judging later this summer.

A special 'Thank You' to our clients, who help make these awards possible. we are honored that you chose us to share such a momentous occasion and that you trust us with your memories! Below is a sample spread from each album. You can also click on the links below to see their wedding blog posts.

Julie and Christian

Abby & Brian

Logan and Jonathan

Amy & Gary

Canon Par Excellence Award

Canon just launched a web page featuring their Par Excellence Award Winners. While we won this award in 2008, it's inaugural year, we are still very proud to be one of it's 33 winners. We are also the only winners to have won with just wedding album entries.

To win the Par Excellence Award, the image maker must receive a score of 80 or above on all four photographic entries. District judges will then consider the maker's entire body of work using PPA's (Professional Photographers of America) "Twelve Elements of a Merit Image."

People often ask us why we still compete in photographic competitions and we can readily tell you its because we relish learning and polishing our craft. While photographers can enter any type of image they wish from fine art, landscapes, etc., we thrive on entering our 'everyday' work. Images that we produce for our clients on a daily basis. It keeps us striving to make our work better for not only ourselves, but also our clients...that is what really matters!

PPA Magazine Cover Contest

We have each entered a image from the 2009-2010 wedding season for entry into The Professional Photographer Magazine Contest. Voting ends June 1 so please be sure to vote for one (or both) of our lucky couples! How cool would it be to have your wedding image on the cover of a national magazine!

Each voter is also registered for the chance to win a Canon Powershot G11 camera! Good Luck!

Jennifer's Submission: Abby & Brian

Mark's Submission: Quentin & Moira

Professional Photographer Magazine

This month we were asked to contribute to a business article in The Professional Photographer Magazine. The article, which is compilation of interviews, starts in the magazine and continues online. If you are a PPA member, you can read the article by clicking on this link.

Mark's long time friend, fellow photographer and past PPA President, Dennis Craft had a multiple page article featuring his children's work. He caught us off guard by mentioning Mark as an inspiration to him. Very sweet of him to think of Mark! Hopefully we continue to inspire you just as you have also inspired us over the years. Thanks Dennis!

Top Wedding Album Awards

Last week was the Mid-East States Professional Photographers (MESPPA) Convention and the Professional Photographers of Ohio (PPO) State Convention. We entered four wedding albums (the max number of entries possible) for the print and album judging. PPA (Professional Photographers of America) affiliated judges were flown in from all over the country to judge this competition.

We are happy to say that all four of our entries merited. We were then also lucky enough to receive 2 Kodak Gallery Awards, Outstanding Wedding Album in the Region, Top Special Events Album, the Bill Stockwell Award for Top Album in Ohio, Mid-East States Top Ten Photographers of the Year and Ohio Top Ten Photographers of the Year. These same entries will then be submitted to the International Print Judging held by the PPA in Atlanta in July.

A special thank you to our wonderful clients who really are the ones to make all of this possible. They place so faith in us and allow us to capture their special day. It truly is a collaboration between us and our couples to get such great photographs. We are very thankful and humbled to work with such wonderful couples on such a momentous occasion!

To see more of the images from these weddings, click on their names appearing in the order from top to bottom: Moira and Quentin, Andrea and Patrick, Abby and Wes, Brittany and Josh.

Bride's Choice Award 2010!

We are honored to have received The WeddingWire Bride's Choice Awards ™. The Bride's Choice Awards recognizes the top local wedding professionals from the WeddingWire Network that demonstrate excellence in quality, service, responsiveness, and professionalism. Unlike other awards in which winners are selected by the organization, the Bride's Choice Awards are determined by recent reviews and extensive surveys from over 500,000 newlyweds. This year's winners represent the top five percent of WeddingWire's vendor community, which consists of over 100,000 local wedding professionals nationwide.

WeddingWire is a helpful planning resource for bride's allowing them to shop for vendors, add their own if not listed and then organize all those resources...sort of an online bridal binder. Check them out at weddingwire.com

Voted Best of The Knot 2010!

We wanted to say a BIG Thank you to all those out there who voted us The Knot Best of Weddings for 2010!

It is such a huge honor and it means a lot to us because it is local brides who voted for us. Its aways nice when we win various professional awards for our work, but when the award comes from our brides it means so much more! It is that much sweeter knowing it's our second year in a row....thank you, thank you!

The Knot is the number one most trusted wedding resource and if you haven't already checked them out do so! Jennifer used it exclusively when planning our destination wedding and couldn't have done it without The Knot!

Out and About....

We've been crazy busy the last few weeks and we have gotten a little behind on blog posts. We're trying to get caught up, but it might be awhile. I've been meaning to get this particular post up for a month now, and have just now gotten organized enough to post it.

The Vreeland wedding is featured in the Fall/Winter Knot Ohio, our album company's recent newsletter featured our images, and we have the cover plus a feature article in the Professional Photographer's of Ohio Magazine. A little birdie also told us that we will be in the Professional Photographer's Magazine this December.

Stay tuned for several engagement sessions, albums, and save-the-date ideas. We'll also post the 'Must Order By...' dates to guarantee Christmas delivery on various products. Christmas is only 46 days away (hope I didn't scare anyone)!

Cincinnati Weddings!

A client just brought us the latest issue of Cincinnati Weddings Magazine, where we found Alexis and Stephen's wedding that we photographed last summer. We had an amazing time photographing on her parent's estate and working with such great vendors. To see their original blog post click here....trust me the images look much better than these scans.

Here are the links to all of their amazing vendors, which make all the difference in the world!

I-do Weddings

Ford-Ellington Floral and Event Design

Maribelle Cakery

Jeff Thomas Catering

Amber & Chad featured in The Knot!

We are very happy to have the wonderfully sweet couple, Amber & Chad featured in The Knot's fall/winter issue. They had a lovely wedding at the Aaron Wright House last fall and the article details all of Amber's personal touches. The Knot magazine, as well as theknot.com, offers lots of great planning ideas so be sure to pick up your copy or check them out online!

Good News in Dayton!

We are honored to be a featured business on Good News in Dayton! Good news in Dayton promotes local businesses who are thriving and who are actively involved in making their community better. What an honor!

Thank you to Park National Bank and Grunder Landscaping for sponsoring this worthwhile cause. It's certainly a nice change of pace to hear something positive on the news. Thank you!

Listen for yourself on 1290am or 95.7fm, or just click on the link above.

Best of The Knot 2009!

Yippee! We just got the word that we were voted best of The Knot for 2009! Might sound silly, but that was the one accolade that we had been missing from our resume. It is the award that truly means the most to us since it was awarded by our clients!

A special thank you to all those out there that voted for us! We love what we do and it's always great to be recognized for what you love doing! Not many people get to do such a fun job...we get to be at a party every Saturday, what could be better?

The Best of The Knot Magazine fits shelves this month, which covers Chicago to Nashville. Be sure to pick one up. I feel like Sally Fields when she won her first Oscar, "They like me, they really really like me." Thanks again!

Ohio 'Top Ten' Photographers of the Year

The Professional Photographers of Ohio’s annual convention was a few weeks and our Regional Competition was earlier last month. We entered three wedding albums from the 2008 wedding season and were honored to win two Fuji Masterpiece Awards and Kodak Gallery Award for Best Wedding Album in the State and the Region. We both also placed in the Ohio Photographer Top Ten. Here are the winning albums. Enjoy!

Brittany & Josh

Nikki & Ben

Mark photographed Nikki's mom's wedding too (over twenty+ years ago)...pretty cool, huh?

Amber & Chad...you'll be able to see more of their wedding in this Fall's Issue of The Knot Ohio.

POTY Awards!

No...its not what you think! The POTY Award really is the Photographer of the Year to be correct! (Mark just calls them that for fun.)

You can see us in this month’s issue of Professional Photographer featuring their Diamond Level Photographers of the Year. To become a Diamond, you have to submit four entries into the International Print Competition. Each work has to merit by receiving an 80 or higher score. Once an entry has merited, it is then judged for the Loan Collection.

The Loan Collection is considered to be the ‘best of the best.’ All four competition entries have to merit and all four then have to ‘Loan’ to earn the photographer “Diamond Level Photographer of the Year.”

This is our fifth time earning the ‘Diamond Award,’ and we are very honored to have our work amongst some of best photographic works in the world. It certainly provides a tremendous incentive to keep bettering ourselves and our work continually.