My story, Your story

We are all writing our own books, the story of our lives.

Mine began on a small farm in Indiana. We lived on a gravel road in a valley inhabited by my mother's family. Cousins called out from the next hill over. My father's father lived on one end of the farm, my mother's parents the other.

My whole world within a stone's throw.

In this little world, I found photography and it taught me a completely different way of being. The camera helped me capture bits of the world in ways that made sense to me. It changed everything forever.

After a ten- year career as a photojournalist, my photography path brought me to weddings - about 500 of them so far.

That's a lot of weddings.

I've learned a lot along the way: How I think they should be photographed (candid), how to interact with clients (as friends) and the importance of doing them correctly (very).

You get one shot at getting it right and you need the years of experience - the practice of a million exposures - to get it just right.

I believe in serendipity. I don't care for the contrived. I like the real. I want the candid. I want to look at an image and feel like I know the people in the photograph.

What I do is storytelling. I use images to tell stories. Every wedding day has its unqie narrative and it's my job to get out of the way and capture the story.

It's a privilege to witness these monumental days, to catch fleeting moments and keep them forever. I want to tell these stories so they can be retold for generations.

Douglas