Classy, vintage, romantic, cinematic - this is how I describe black and white wedding photography. I always include a number of black and white shots for preview. Since I shoot all in color and then process into black and white in the digital darkroom, you will always have the original color shot available to you.

The best black and white images are not just one click, grayscale photographs. Leaving a hint of color (even if you cannot see it) will always make for a more spectacular image. This helps to bring out texture in skies and wedding gowns too. One of my favorite tricks is too add a 1950's style, hollywood-esque glamor glow. You can see in the image below that even though the effect has blown out the detail in her dress that it has taken on the style of early hollywood.

One of my engagement packages, called The Chicago Sessions shows off a lot of different black and white techniques. The image below shows off "blue toning" added along with a fairly intense vignette.

In the shots below, I added "film grain" into the mix and took the digital photographs and gave them more of an analog, film like look. The second image is at a downtown Chicago vinyl record shop so I gave it that old 1970's aged look.

So when we get together to review your images, if something jumps out at you that screams black and white image, don't hesitate to ask. There is never an extra charge for these effects.

If you have one of my business cards, you may have noticed that next to 'photographer' I'm listed as a "retoucher". As a bride and groom, let me explain what this means to you.

Wedding Day is supposed to be (and it will be) a gloriously happy one enjoyed with family old and new. However, we all know the stress and hard work that leads up to this big day. This can lead to all kinds of skin problems and more. When I take your images into the digital darkroom, I'm looking for these kinds of things and I'm going to make these problems go away. This will happen on every single image - period. I'm also looking for things like eyeglass glare, stray hairs from the wind, eyes closed in group shots, etc. I recently took out a bride's bra that she didn't want showing.

If your wedding ends up being in the middle of a summer heat wave and that inevitable oily shine takes over your skin, no need to worry. I won't allow any shiny brides in my collection!! :)

My training as a retoucher and restorer of old photographs has enabled me to do these types of things with relative ease and skill. I'm not going to charge you for this unless it is something very extravagant. I also do many photo collages as part of your wedding book that are also available as prints.

I consider this one of my specialties and not something a lot of photographers can or will do. Usually you have to ask for it, the work gets outsourced and you end up paying a premium for it.

Special effects are also something that I love to do. See this unplanned moment at a ceremony last summer as an example:

I have more on this subject on the About Me page. Oh, this doesn't mean the groom's brother doesn't need to straighten his tie. Sorry dude, you are not off the hook on that one!!