brian dorsey studios – new york wedding photographer – top 10 in the world – destination weddings

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Shabu and Michael met while she was at Barnard and he was at Columbia and in fact, Michael proposed on campus.

It seemed only fitting that we do their engagement portraits at their alma mater…

wait until you see the wedding !

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Category: new york engagement photos , new york weddings

It’s been a crazy busy summer and once again the blog has had to take a backseat to “work work”. As we begin to come up for air, I thought it would be nice to just catch everyone up with a few shots from each of the many events we did in the last few months.

If you had to script a shot to show that classic moment of tension just before the bride goes down the aisle I don’t think you could do much better than this image of Sarah lost in the moment. A mysterious hand adjusting her veil and that’s her father checking his watch in the background.

Ready or not…. here we come.

And what makes these images extra special is the fact that Sarah is the third generation in her family to get married in this church in Manhattan.

Daniella and Adam were high school sweethearts growing up in Livingston, NJ together. It was inevitable that they would tie the knot and have a great time doing it.

Stunning, right?

They really act like best friends. You can see it in their photographs.

But the coolest part? Knishes, Pastrami Reubens, Dr. Brown’s Black Cherry Soda and Egg Creams during cocktails! Awesome. Now either you appreciate this stuff or you don’t. Personally, this is how I get in touch with my roots. And if you’ve never had an egg cream with a pretzel, well – you gotta expand your horizons and make new friends. This is not for tribe members only.

Dinner service was stunning as well.

Lastly, I wanted to share with you some shots from Sayuri and Jeff’s Wedding at The Metropolitan Club in NYC.

Now while Sayuri looked stunning in bridal white …

Check her and her bridesmaids out in their Eastern garb.

Sayuri also wins the annual prize for best calligraphy. Such a wonderful dying art.

Even the cake was designed to match the outfits.

Such a pleasure to work with so many wonderful designers, caterers, artists, stylists – they just give us so much to work with!

So what do you do when you want to get an eyeful of NYC on your wedding day?

First, you get a suite at the Mandarin Oriental so you have a sweet view of Columbus Circle and Central Park South.

Then you bring along your beautiful daughter Kienna (and her rabbit.)

Then you take a subway downtown….

Arrange for a private double decker bus tour for everyone in the wedding.

And then after the ceremony in the Central Park Conservatory Gardens, you arrange for a checker cab to take you to the Rainbow Room for dinner and dancing.

A perfect ending to a perfect day.

Ok, now for the other half… Parents must have equal representation of the offspring!

Miles turned 5 last April.

Ana has been with us since before Cole was born. Ana is a godsend. Everyone should be so lucky as to have an Ana to help with their kids. She’s a friend and a sister to my children and a treasured member of our family.

But again, on the equal representation front – there’s the other child… our “first born” (on the leash), charlie.

I met Nancy and Daniel at an event hosted by New York Magazine last year coinciding with the release of the semi-annual NY Magazine Wedding Issue. They came by 4 times that day to chat with me and discuss the possiblilty of shooting their wedding. They had said they really loved what they saw but I didn’t hear from them for several months so I thought, well – guess they weren’t that impressed. About 5 months after we met, they called and hired me.

Now given Daniel’s busy schedule I didn’t get to do an engagement session with them and so the next time I saw him was when we were about to “introduce” him to Nancy on the day of their wedding. [As an aside - this is a great moment to capture - the bride and groom seeing each other for the first time - dressed on their wedding day. It's always full of emotion and is a really touching moment that we have the privledge of preserving.]

Anyway, back to the story… Daniel was a bit nervous that day and since I had been with Nancy while she was getting ready I hadn’t really had a chance to say hi to him. When he did see me and I reintroduced myself, I could tell that there was so much going on in his head that he didn’t really see me at all… it was a tense time for him. I like to make a connection with people when I start the day but I believe it has to be on their timeline, not mine.

So anyway, I’m doing my thing and a couple of minutes later he turns toward me and and his eyes catch mine and freeze there – like really freeze – and then his expression changes completely. His face relaxes – his eyes soften, his eyebrows unknit and a smile slowly warms his face. “It’s you!”, he says.

I’m not quite sure how to respond (although I’m pretty sure my eyebrows went up to the middle of my forehead)

“Oh, man, It’s you! You!”, Daniel continued. ” I am so happy we got you! Nancy and I love your work and we had to have you!”

Well I was kinda floored. Who knew? Ok, I felt connected now.

The placecard tree. Alphabetized (theoretically).

A moment. (after they signed the Ketubah)

Nancy’s mom took her down the aisle.

And for the creative photographic purists… there are some effects you can get in camera that even Photoshop can’t duplicate…

But I find I have the need to challenge myself at every event I shoot. And sometimes, the event challenges me too. This time for example when during the last song the band leader tells all of the guests to “quickly gather round, turn to the camera and wave” without so much as a hint of a warning for me. There’s nothing quite like setting up for a group shot of 150 people in a dark venue (with a blue ceiling) in about 7.5 seconds….
But it worked – so there.

Thanks, Nancy and Daniel for the honor of joining you on your wedding day. I was glad to have had the opportunity to connect with you both.