Holland Photo Arts Blog – Charlottesville Wedding Photographers

Happy Monday! So we’re hard at work on some great and fun Best Of posts for you all, including a few FAB Finds(!), but first up we wanted to share some info that may be helpful to those of you planning your wedding. A sweet tip, if you will. So take it away, Bill…

Are you thinking you could do bicep curls with your two-inch thick wedding notebook, stuffed to the gills with clippings, notes, and other miscellany? Wondering if you could market this as a new exercise video to newly engaged women? Some of you love the tangible feeling of paper, shifting back and forth and laying out sheets on the floor to view them. (Admittedly, Anne is very much a paper gal while I prefer maintaining things electronically). If you’re tired of the dead tree scene though, and have a smartphone or tablet, there might be an easier way.

We’ve used Evernote for quite some time to store wine labels and notes from tastings with friends, restaurant recommendations, to-do lists, shopping notes, copies of important receipts, ideas for the blog, you name it. It’s handy, always with us (even when away from an internet connection), and easy to find information via sorting or filtering based on tags you create. It even has OCR (optical character recognition) for documents of which you take photos with your smartphone so you can search the document later on.

So it’s natural to think of new ways in which the free (premium available for a fee) service can be used in your wedding planning.  Check out this one bride’s story about how she used Evernote to plan her wedding (includes a link to her shared inspiration notebook), and another about how a cake baker maintained wedding client preferences using the same service. Another wedding planner has incorporated Evernote in her clients notes. And for other photographers out there, while we’ll never replace ShootQ as our primary planning database, Evernote has proven useful in various notes associated with a shoot.

We’d love to hear your experiences if you’ve already used Evernote (or something similar) or feedback if you decide to try it out!

Warmly,
..Bill

Rock on! Thanks to all our fabulous brides who voted! This was such a wonderful surprise to receive this week, and we realize we’re in exceptional company.

We recently shot our very last wedding of 2010, held with twenty or so family and friends two days after Christmas at a small historic church in nearby Waynesboro, followed by relaxed cocktails at beautiful Veritas Vineyards. While the weather was insanely cold that day, it didn’t deter Jessica & Adam at all. Enjoy!

You can also view the complete gallery from their wedding. The password is Jessica’s maiden name.

Don’t you just love this moment? Jessica’s putting a little lip balm on the ring bearer’s lips and the flower girl’s getting in there close to inspect and make sure Jessica does it right.

It was waaaay cold, and oh, so windy. Note Jessica’s veil as she entered the church.

Dear j&a,

There’s a certain elegance to intimate weddings that we love, and yours was one that exhibited all the reasons why a couple might choose one. So many of your family members stepped in to help make the day a special one for you both; neither of you were terribly worried about sticking with a schedule because there really wasn’t one; you were up for anything, including heading outside in the frigid cold because you knew it’d make for some great portraits; and above all, you just sat and enjoyed the moment. That, more than anything, made your wedding so much fun and thoroughly enjoyable for me to document for you.

There was a real intimacy you showed with your family, such as that moment Jessica, between you and your mom after your ceremony that just melted hearts. Thank you so much–it was wonderful spending the afternoon with you.

xoxo,
b (& a)

We hope you’re all enjoying a wonderful Monday and, if you happen to be in the mid-Atlantic region today, that you’re staying warm. Brrrr!

If you find yourself at a local bookstore though, between cups of hot chocolate we recommend you pick up a copy of the latest Bride’s magazine for Washington, DC. In it you’ll find a sincerely sweet couple, Jenny and Andrew. Their early Fall wedding, full of beautiful light, warm love and sweet DIY details, was featured in the current issue, and we couldn’t be more thrilled for them. Enjoy!

Congratulations, j&a!!

xoxo,
…a&b