Posts by Wil » Philadelphia Wedding Photographers in West Chester, PA • REINER PHOTOGRAPHY

Author Archives: Wil

Philadelphia area wedding and portrait photographer

05.07.12

Emma and Keith’s Wedding, at the Vicmead Hunt Club in Delaware

Emma and Keith were married this past weekend in Delaware— their church was St Joseph on the Brandywine, and their reception was held at the Vicmead Hunt Club. Vicmead is an amazing venue, and their history as an exclusive fox hunting club lends a certain unique charm to the location. We all enjoyed watching their horses gallop about just outside of our party while Vicmead’s barn cat enthusiastically befriended 100% of the guests in attendance.

We had an amazing engagement photography session with Emma and Keith a few months back, and we just knew that their wedding day was going to be amazing! Here’s a sneak peek of our favorite images from the day…

05.02.12

Kaitlyn and Michael’s West Chester Engagement session

We met up with local West Chester graduates Kaitlyn and Michael for an engagement photography session this weekend. They are huge Philadelphia sports fans, so (much to Mike’s relief) we all met up beforehand at a local West Chester sports bar to and ended up catching the Flyers game. Luckily, Philadelphia came out on top and the Flyers brought home a win, so we were all in very high spirits for their engagement session. We had a great time strolling around West Chester and getting to see the special spot where Mike popped the question to Kaitlyn this past January. Check out my favorite shots from their engagement session below:

04.18.12

Philadelphia Engagement Photography Session with Inna and Roman, in Fishtown and Center City Philadelphia

Gen and I were very excited for our engagement photography shoot with Inna and Roman because It had been awhile since we had last visited our former stomping grounds of Philadelphia PA.

We started out by exploring their neighborhood in Fishtown, Philadelphia. It was quickly decided that we were going to follow a narrative involving Roman on his motorcycle—well his stand in motorcycle for the day to be more specific, his actual bike was in the shop but luckily he had a buddy nearby willing to lend him one. We had a great time putting together a little story about Roman romancing the beautiful Inna by driving by and just happening to have some tulips to give her.

Next, we hit up some more recognizable stops in Fishtown, including a little park where residents are invited to stop and smell the roses and an impromptu photo session under the city’s famous El train. As the sun sank lower into the sky we headed towards center city, stopping off for a shoot at the Race street pier under the Ben Franklin Bridge.

As dusk emerged we had 2 more fun shoots. We took a stroll through Louis I. Kahn memorial park at 11th and Pine Streets near Center City Philadelphia. where Inna and Roman had stopped after their first date. We wrapped up the session on the middle of Broad street looking towards historic Philadelphia City Hall. Check out my favorite photos from their engagement photography session below.

04.12.12

Michael and Laura’s save-the-date cards

I just went to my mailbox and was happy to see that Michael and Laura have sent out Save the Date cards with a photo from their engagement session that we shot over in Ridley Creek State Park a few months back. Their wedding is coming up in October and I think it was a great idea to do the engagement photos in the fall last year to match their upcoming fall wedding. Plus, I’m always happy to see couples using the engagement session on their save the date cards, check out the design below.

engagement session on save the date card

04.08.12

a few photos from Max’s 3rd Birthday Party

My nephew, Max, just turned Three so we all threw him a rager of a party on Saturday out at my brother’s house in West Chester. Check out the cake that his mom made, and the awesome flower arrangements from local West Chester florist Kati Mac! This time is kind of the quiet before the storm as our wedding photography season is just about to start, so we were mostly hanging out and not taking the photography too seriously— but I think we got a few cool shots— check them out below.

03.30.12

Testing the new 600EX-RT flash with an “old” 5DmkII

This afternoon I was testing my new flash, the 600RT-EX, and my sister (Delia) graciously stepped in as a last-minute model! The main reason we were shooting pictures around West Chester today is to see if High Speed Sync (HSS) is working on the new flashes despite Canon’s claim that it will only work when attached to the newer 2012 cameras. Well, it works! at least on my 5D MarkII. To make this picture, I utilized HSS to get my off-camera flash to sync even though my shutter speed was pushed all the way up to 1/800! That’s great, as usually I’d have to stay under 1/160 on my full frame cameras because I’d be triggering with the old fashioned Manual-only radios… I’ll be testing these flashes more over the next couple of weeks and cannot wait to use them at a wedding.

testing the new 600ex-rt flash

03.04.12

Terry and Stuart’s Wedding at The Gables at Chadds Ford

Last weekend I was pleased to be photographing Terry and Stuart’s wedding down the street at the Gables in Chadds Ford . The Gables restaurant is a great place to grab a bite to eat and I have had a few wonderful meals there in the past, and I was happy to be working so close to where I live and right down the street from where I grew up. Here’s a (password protected) link to all the photos from the day, for those in attendance: Stuart and Terry Wedding Photography Gallery And below are my personal favorite photos from Terry and Stuart’s wedding…

03.03.12

The 600EX-RT, new flash introduces radio triggering to the Canon system

Today Canon announced the new 5D mkIII camera, which is a pretty big deal but I was actually more interested in a little surprise that they slipped in under the radar: The new 600EX-RT flash with built-in radio triggering. Basically, the same as the “old” Canon 580EX flash but with a radio controlled remote-flash triggering system, instead of the old and inefficient optical (line of sight) triggering.

Doesn’t sound like a big deal but I can think of a million applications, especially for wedding photography, where this will really come in handy. Having a reliable way of controlling remote flashes and leaning on ETTL once in a while is something I’ve been wanting for a while now. If these do what the spec sheet says that they do, then these will be a grand slam and exactly what I had always hoped for in a flash/commander unit.

Obviously, I’m super excited to get my hands on these new flashes— I don’t have one yet, as they aren’t going to be available until late March. Probably going to pick up two before the wedding photography season starts.

new flash from canon

02.19.12

Longwood Gardens engagement session – Emma and Keith

We had a very rare warm day (or maybe not so warm for this winter) so it was really a great day for an engagement photography session. We met Emma and Keith over at Longwood Gardens this afternoon, and had a blast shooting engagement photos as we walked around the gardens.

The sun was shining, Emma and Keith were great in front of the lens, and there were tons of gorgeous scenes to choose from. While traipsing though Longwood’s winding paths and golden fields we found out that Keith is a painter, and recently he’s been working on some amazing oil paintings of pets and animals. Check out his work here.

We also made our way to an indoor greenhouse with the most incredible smell of orchids, which Longwood is having a special exhibit of now.
We must’ve gotten sucked into some sort of flower scented time warp because the next thing we knew it was time for Longwood to close and we were being chased out by any staff who happened to see us. We had a great time exploring the grounds with this laid back couple – looking forward to their wedding in May!