I can’t stress enough how much I LOVE photographing outdoor weddings! Churches are beautiful and ornate and sacred but they are also usually full of dark woods and stone, poorly lit, and hard to photograph in. Nature is where it’s at for us wedding photographers! Gen and Isaac were married Aug 20th 2011 in Swallow Falls State Park in Maryland. This is in the Deep Creek area of Western MD a stones throw from the West Virginia line and the area is amazingly gorgeous!

Gen was raise in the Baha’i faith and so their marriage was a mix of both secular traditions and Baha’i traditions as well as featuring a private vow exchange at the edge of a 50 foot waterfall. The setting was magical, the couple looked beautiful, and their love was shared by all the guests in attendance as well as folks who just happened to be at the park that day and were treated to the unexpected – a couple saying their vows at the edge of the falls.

Gen and Isaac have been together for a long time and while others may have tried to rush them into marriage years ago what we were witnesses to on that sunny day on the edge of a waterfall in Western Maryland was the binding together of two hearts that have experienced this world together, walking the same path for some time, now declaring in front of friends and family that they are finally willing to share with the rest of us their loving commitment to each other so that we can support them in their love and can look to them to support us as friends of not just two people but of one loving couple.

Wedding Photos

Enough of my musing – on to the photos!

Congratulations Gen and Isaac!

The Mon Valley

When my grandmother’s parents first moved to the US from Slovakia they settled first in the Mon Valley where my great grandfather worked in the coal mines while they saved up enough money to move to eastern Ohio where he continued to mine but also bought a farm to work near Barton in Belmont County. Needless to say the Mon Valley has  a special place in my heart even if I don’t make it down that way very often.

Leah & Derek

Leah and Derek were married in a small Christian Church just across the Monongahela River from Donora in Monessen on July 23rd 2011. That was one of if not the hottest day so far this summer. I felt so sorry for Leah – I’ve never worn a wedding dress but in that heat I can imagine how hot she must have been. I was drenched with sweat like everyone else in sight but I had such a great time photographing their wedding that I wouldn’t give it up for anything – even if I did have to drink about a gallon of water to stay hydrated.

Derek is a DJ so the reception was amazing. Despite the heat I’ve never seen that many people on the dance floor! These days most people stay on the sidelines trying to photograph each other – that’s frustrating when you’re the one being paid to get photos of people dancing …

Leah and Derek are an amazing couple and they are clearly devoted to each other. I’ve been doing weddings long enough to be able to tell when a couple of people are building a solid life together with all the right stuff that will carry them together in life and in love. These great kids have it. Good luck to you Leah and Derek and thanks again for having us photograph your wedding!

I enjoy shooting  weddings everywhere but there is just something awesome about Pittsburgh weddings. This Sat. Sarah and I got to shoot Justin and Kelly’s wedding at St. Anne’s Catholic Church in Castle Shannon followed by their reception at St. Thomas More across from South Hills Village and once again my faith in Pittsburgh weddings was restored. From the cookie table to the sermon and from the wedding dress to the dance floor there is just something different about shooting a wedding in Pittsburgh and I think it’s the people. Pittsburgh wedding couples and their families are a lot more chill, a lot more relaxed and down-to-earth, and they roll with the punches in a much more natural way and that makes them so much more fun and easy to deal with. Kelly and Justin were a perfect example of this – these two amazing people were extremely chill, they were so much fun to photograph and created the best atmosphere. Their families and friends were just as relaxed and fun to work with which makes things extra special! Oh and I can’t forget to mention they were great tippers – not everyone tips their wedding photographers but these two were super generous which was the cherry on top of working with such a great couple!

Justin & Kelly’s Wedding

Sarah booked the wedding and is handling the processing so she’ll be posting a lot more to Facebook but I’ve done a bit of post-processing and the following are some of my personal favorites (so far).

A huge thanks once again and congratulations to Justin and Kelly for having Sarah and I photograph their wedding – you two are an amazing couple and we wish you all the love in the world as you travel through life together. Cheers to you!

Update: I googled the name of the person who was confused about my wedding photography prices. They appear to run some sort of wedding business in Kansas but no business website comes up when I google the name – just yellow pages listings and other such directory lists.

I’ve ran special offers on my Facebook page for some time and I’ve received very good response to them from my Facebook fans but I wanted to make sure that anyone who comes to the website is aware that they can find those specials and take advantage of them by becoming fans of WDO Photography on Facebook. I won’t tell you what those deals are here – you’ve got to become a fan on Facebook to take advantage of them anyhow but recently we’ve offered deals for everything from portrait packages to special event photography discounts that can be applied to wedding packages as well as corporate events or even family reunions. Check out what we have posted now and check back regularly for new offers.

Click here to become a fan and to take advantage of the Facebook only special offers.

It goes without saying that theknot.com is a HUGE wedding resource. They themselves claim that 80% of brides turn to them for information which makes them the industry’s equivalent to Walmart. If 80% of the consumers are using them, even for just a small percentage of their planning, shopping, and other wedding prep needs then it should be a no-brainier for most wedding vendors who want to gain more clients – the knot is probably where you can find them.

That being said I recently discovered how ruthless, manipulative, and deceptive they are in their marketing, advertising, and vendor relations. As you’ll read below I sent the regional sales rep, Sara Brunner, a message expressing my feelings about their deceptive practices and asked them to change their ways. I’m not holding my breath but what I am doing though is this – blogging about it in the hopes that you my dear reader will avoid using them in favor of other, more organic, more truly local resources.

The Backstory

While I was doing some research this week into search engine optimization I saw that, (as expected), theknot.com has a huge local market share in the search engine results. They’re not the top listing for Pittsburgh photographers, (and I’m already listed on the site that is), but they are one of the biggest.
Knowing what I know about SEO I decided I’d see if they have free or minimally priced listing (like a great many vendor listing websites do). As it turns out they don’t. No big surprise, and really no big deal because let’s face it – they are the top dog, (according to their own statistics). So they ask for just under $200/per month for advertising which isn’t unreasonable considering that if I add one more wedding a month (or 12 more a year) I could, without any price increases, cover that and not have it even make a mark on my bottom line.

Exploring theKnot

I was seriously considering paying for an advertisement on theknot.com when in the course of my research I checked the local listings page and saw that they have some curious, (i.e. deceptive), language. They have the ads for the type of vendor for the area and then they have below these ads a list of links to all the other folks who have paid for ad space but that don’t fit on the first page. It really is smart from an SEO standpoint as these folks are still listed on the first page of the vendor listings and then listed again with their ad but I digress.

Knotted Up

Where the problem lies is that they have this list under the heading: Complete List of [local area] [vendor type]

So for the list of all of the paying photographers from Pittsburgh it reads: Complete List of Pittsburgh Photographers

Now I’m not an idiot, I understand marketing but “complete list” really? No, not really. I’m not on there. I know a number of other established, well known, busy, and profitable wedding photographers that are not in this “complete list” of photographers. In fact some of the biggest names in the Pittsburgh wedding photography business are NOT listed in this list.

Tightening theKnot

So this is the part where I share with you dear reader the message I sent Sara, the sales rep. Here is the body of the message:

Good morning,
I see on your site that under the local vendor lists you have a section titled: Complete List of [local area name] [vendor specialty]

This is a little disingenuous isn’t it? I mean, honestly, I’m a Pittsburgh wedding photographer and I’m not on the “complete list of Pittsburgh photographers”. I know others that I don’t see on the list either so it can’t truly be “complete” now can it?

I could understand you using the wording “Complete list of The Knot’s (approved/favorite/paying/whatever) [local area name] [vendor specialty].

Don’t get me wrong here, I’d like to pick up some extra clients and the knot could possibly deliver them but with such disingenuous and manipulative language on your site I’m not so sure that I would want to support your business when your website seems to be less than truthful.
Now, I’m not an idiot, I understand marketing and I understand playing hard ball. I also understand the difference between being aggressive and being outright assholes and I’m sorry to have to say this but your company seems to be leaning towards the later.
I’ll make you a deal though – you clean that up and I’ll consider buying an add. I’ll also be posting this letter, as an open letter to the knot on my wedding blog.
Thank you for your time!
W. Donald Orkoskey

Untie The Knot

Like I said before – theknot.com is a huge resource for brides and wedding couples. Again though they are deceptive in their business practices and I encourage everyone to see them for what they are. Digging deeper I found some interesting information about a lawsuit back in 2000 that was the result of them trying to back out of and dishonor contracts with franchise owners of Weddingpages which they bought-out that year. I’ve not found the results of the suit but they were clearly interested in maximizing profits at the expense of small business owners. Read more about the suit here.

One thing that strikes me is that companies that do business like this encourage others to do the same. That’s not to say that all of the vendors listed on theknot.com are in any way as corrupt, morally depraved, and money-hungry as they are. In fact the majority are just trying to survive in a business that can be a little difficult to do so in. That being said the chances of coming across a vendor that will do anything to make a buck and that will deliver a less than desirable product or service are much higher with a website such as theknot.com over a locally ran site or vendor collective that polices it’s members and knows them personally.
In trying to find a way to reach them to discuss the issue I came across the following very interesting post from this February on the Fred Miranda message boards. The post is about theknot.com providing a vendor dashboard. Two of the respondents say that the knot lost their business already and  one reported that a representative told him his business would fail if he didn’t advertise with them. Fail? Really?

This god-complex is the same that I’ve encountered from people in other high pressure sales positions. One SEO salesman told me that he’d pray for me since I was going to be on welfare soon since I opted not to pay his company $1,000 per month to have my business be the only one listed on Google’s front-page. He told me they’d find another local photographer willing to take that offer and that I’d loose my business, my house, my car, my wife, my dog, and so on if I didn’t buy what he was selling.

To think that a sales-person would be driven that hard to feel the need to threaten people is insane and shows just how profit driven and/or unnecessary the company they work for is.  I truly hope that the folks at theknot.com will fix their deceptive wording. If they do I’ll honestly consider buying advertising from them.

I’m meeting with Maya today at Espresso A Mano to go over the proof of her and Ryder’s wedding album.

It’s taken a little longer than I’d normally like to get it together and get them to sign off on it but I know that in the end it will be worth it because it’s going to be a beautiful book. They were married in October and we’ve had one review already now that we’ve made some big changes I’m sure that they are going to love it!

I got Sarah involved a bit more with the album process this time and taught her how I put them together. I think she was a little scared at first but she did a bang-up job. I can’t wait until Maya sees what we’ve got for her!

It must be time for spring cleaning because we’ve finally updated the portfolio and added some photos from a few more recent weddings. We’ve included photos from Matthew and Heather, Maya and Ryder, Wendy and Aaron, and Amanda and Fred. The last update we did was more than a year ago.

We still have dates open in 2011 so after checking out the portfolio be sure to contact us to see if we have your date open.

Be sure to call or email soon before your date is booked.

I seem to be on a Matt kick lately. Actually I’ve been friends with Matt here for years and when he finally popped the question he and Zahava came to me and asked if I would photograph their wedding. Matt was the best man in my wedding so clearly I was happy they asked me to be their photographer but was saddened to learn that they had selected a date that I already had booked. As a consolation, and a wedding gift I did their engagement photos.

Typically I take my couples outside and we go to either Frick Park, the Strip District, or some other very cool location. In fact I don’t think that I’ve ever done engagement photos in the studio but they requested it so we did it. It was a lot of fun! I usually don’t get to shoot tethered, (which is with my camera attached to my laptop), I like shooting this way because I can instantly show the couple their raws.

We spent about 30 to 45 minutes posing and shooting and in the end we came out with a few great shots. Another thing that is funny these days is that many of the couples I work with don’t publish their engagement photos in the newspaper but Matt and Zahava have chosen to do so which is great! The photo above is the one they are publishing.

I wish you both so much luck in your lives together and am so happy for you. I know you two are perfect for each other, I’m so glad that we’re friends and only wish I could have been there to photograph your wedding.

Matthew and Heather were married on May 1st at the Mattress Factory on Pittsburgh’s Northside. We took a walk to Allegheny Commons Park to do their formal portraits. It was a beautiful day, it was warm, the sun was shinning, and people were out all over the park.

There were two additional wedding parties that showed up when we were doing their portraits and since it was prom season there were prom photos happening too! Add to all of that the folks that were out with their dogs or just laying about reading and it made it a bit of a challenge to get photos of the happy couple without getting other people in the photos. We managed though and ended up getting a handful of great shots. It helps when you have a great couple to work with and Matthew and Heather made it really easy.

Matthew and Heather live on the Northside and are very involved in their community (just one other thing that makes them awesome). They’ve become great friends with the shaved ice vendor that has sold his tasty treats next to the park longer than anyone can remember.

Their wedding photos wouldn’t have been complete without a visit to their friend. The line was long and it took us a few minutes extra but it was a lot of fun talking to all the people and seeing the crowd smile at Matthew and Heather – everyone loves weddings!

In the end Matthew bought a shaved ice and gave it to the girl in line behind them. I guess nobody in the wedding party wanted to stain their dresses or tuxes.

As I mentioned Heather is a very talented musician. We took some photos of her playing and some photos of their rings on her violin.

By the end of the night the happy couple was still all smiles and we sneaked away to the top of the stairs at the Mattress Factory to snap a shot of them with the city in the background. This shot was tougher than it looks because there was absolutely NO light in the stairway to focus with.

We were able to sneak out there because Matthew and Heather had work in the Gestures show which opened the week after their wedding and goes through June 20th.

Thank you Matthew and Heather for choosing us as your wedding photographers, Sarah and I had a great time!