Marie + Rob

posted in Day to Day
June 19, 2010

Text and photo by Davina Palik

People always comment on how wonderful our jobs are – and they are right. We get to capture one of the happiest days of a couple’s life. The first day of the rest of their lives together. But a few days ago, we photographed a very different type of event. Marie, who should have been getting married today, got together with her closest friends in honor of the fiance she lost just a few months ago. She put on her wedding shoes and reception dress, got her hair done, and had some cocktails with the girls who continue to be her support system. As she told me at some point during the night, this is what Rob would have wanted her to do.

There are no words to express how truly devastated we were to receive this news, and I can only begin to imagine what Marie has gone through and continues to go through. But I can say that she is my hero. The courage and strength she’s shown is an inspiration. I cannot think of her without getting emotional. I have put the wonderful thank-you note she wrote us on our fridge for a daily dose of perspective; a reminder of what is really important. And we will proudly display the milkglass vases she got us for our wedding (she reads my blog!) next year (thanks Marie!).

As for today, we remember Rob and send all of our warmest, most positive thoughts to Marie. She told me she had no regrets about how she spent the short life she had with Rob. She said she was thankful that they never took each other for granted. These words will stay with me forever. I pass them on to you in hopes that they may give you perspective too.

To Marie + Rob.

  • Alice: You've created a lovely post that shares a story of grace, beauty, love, and wonderful friendship. I hope that even well wishes from strangers will add to Marie's strength and courage, as I have her in my thoughts today. Thank you for sharing. (06.19.2010 11:00am)
  • Daniel Aguilar: Thank you for sharing this, it will for sure serve and an example of life and inspiration for many of us. Thanks again. (06.19.2010 11:39am)
  • Kevin Wrenn Photography: what a beautiful and heartfelt post you guys. Thanks so much for sharing this touching story. makes me appreciate those I love more and more! (06.19.2010 10:17pm)
  • Citlalli Rico: Thank you for shaing this guys. I will keep this post bookmarked to remind me also what is really important. All my warm wishes to Marie. Beautiful image. (06.20.2010 01:14am)
  • Heather: I'm sitting here at work crying. Thanks for sharing this lessons, I'm going to call Scott and tell him I love him! (06.21.2010 09:22am)
  • Brittany: This post gave me chills. What a nice reminder of how precious life is. Beautiful and touching image. (06.21.2010 11:43am)
  • Liz: Wow. So beautiful, so heartbreaking and so inspirational. It is so nice to hear she still celebrated the day in the way she did. (06.23.2010 11:41am)
  • romin: I remember when we were in California when you guys received word about Rob. What an amazing heart Marie has for honoring her relationship this way. Thanks so much for sharing, guys. Much love. (06.26.2010 02:52am)
  • shannon: this post brought me to tears. What a beautiful image of a beautiful soul. (07.21.2010 11:17am)

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Montreal Children’s Hospital Fundraiser

April 21, 2010

Written by Davina Palik

I’m so happy to announce that i’ll be working in collaboration with the montreal children’s hospital foundation to raise funds for the incredible work they do.

This is a cause that we really believe in and we hope you’ll help us spread the word!

  • Sarah Kealing: What a wonderful idea!! and what an ADORABLE LITTLE GIRL! Way to go changing the world for the better... (04.28.2010 07:37pm)

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Catching up / Recap

April 20, 2010

Written by Daniel Kudish

A lot of things have been happening here while we were on our roadtrip and even more since we’ve come home last week. We’re heading back on the road this week, to Toronto, for a wedding, two engagement shoots, and two 1-on-1 workshops! We’re really excited about starting up the wedding season again, but in the meantime, here’s a little visual recap of what’s been going on:

We started an online Etsy Shop, with our favorite photos from the roadtrip. 8×12 prints are 20$ !

We’ve been working on launching our separate websites, to promote our non-wedding photography (commercial, pets, babies, maternity). Davina’s website should be up in the upcoming weeks.

One of our favorite blogs, Once Wed, posted a little feature on us:

Kristiaan + Lionel’s engagement shoot was featured on a couple of blogs, WedLuxe (below) and and Andre Winfrye Events‘ blog.

Emilia, of our recent Emilia + Bill shoot, writes her own blog Auburn + Ivory. Their shoot also appeared in several other places. First, on Erin Ever After’s blog…

Then on the Project Wedding, One Lovely Day blog and  finally, on the very cool HiFi Weddings blog

Lastly (for the blogs), yesterday morning, a UK blog,  BeyondBeyond posted Tavia + Ruben’s San Diego engagement shoot.

During our trip, we were also lucky enough to have some of our photographer friends do a session with us. First with Sasha of You + We, in SoCal (one of our favorites is below)

And a couple of weeks later, Romin of SaiaWeddings, came down from Seattle with his little family to spend a day with us in the north of California and do a photo session!

There’s lots more going on so we’ll be keeping you up to date very soon!

  • Hi-Fi Weddings: look at all those features and accomplishments! yay :) congrats! (04.20.2010 03:31pm)
  • romin: you guys rock. we love you and can't wait for your next road trip. congrats with all the awesome recent buzz! it is so deserved :) (04.20.2010 06:29pm)
  • Adam: Holy Cow you guys are awesome! I have no idea how you have enough time to do all the things you do, but whatever you're doing don't stop, because I LOVE it! (04.21.2010 09:26am)
  • Sasha: Vary nice! :) (04.21.2010 11:54am)

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Mystic

posted in Day to Day, Travel
January 8, 2010

We’re back from Mystic 5 and we had a wonderful time! We met tons of fantastic photographers, attended several seminars and consumed many, many drinks (hey, it was basically one big party)!
The days were really long and there was very little sleep to be had in between so we’re quite tired, but mostly we are inspired, motivated, and so so so excited to start our 2010 season. We’re at the Marions-Nous bridal show in Montreal this weekend (make sure to pop by our booth if you’re attending!) so we’ll be posting a few photos from that next week. Sorry it’s been a little slow on this blog of ours, we’re busy with some more boring stuff in the office (i.e. not taking photos) but we’ll be back into weddings soon enough!

In the meantime, here are some photos from the last 5 days. Warning: this post contains A LOT of photographer name dropping. You have been warned!

Sasha, Ross, and Lesya of Flosites and You + We Photography and me, checking out the blog Flosites created for us. By the way, what do you think? you like?

Sasha and I had a hot pepper eat-off on our first night. He kicked my ass.

The Canon vs. Nikon debate lives on. Here Daniel is getting familiar with the video features on the new Canon 7D.

Vlad, sharing some footage with Stacey Doyle, which he can now use as blackmail. (Check out Vlad’s wedding photos, shot by Ben Chrisman, they are amazing!)

During Mystic, we learned that photographers are pretty good singers too. Karaoke was a huge hit!

Sasha explores the wonders of Nikon, this time he tries out a self portrait:

John Michael Cooper (still can’t believe we got to meet him and his wife Dalisa – they are superstars!) using the computer as a lightbox to look at some negatives.

We were lucky enough to spend much of our time with Dave and Quin of DQ Studios. We were huge fans of their work but we had no idea they would be such great people too! This is what we did the whole time we were together:

Our fellow Montrealers, Tim and Angela, couldn’t resist either

A huge highlight was getting Jerry Ghionis to take a portrait of us (this photo was taken by Angela). Jerry’s a huge name in the world of wedding photography so it was quite an honor!

DQ got a piece of the portrait action too. Daniel took this one!

The day we were supposed to be heading back home, we got a call from Ross who was in New York (waiting to catch his flight back to Moldova where he lives), and he managed to convince us to go and meet up with them. We hung out at Jason Groupp’s studio and later had diner with Angelica Glass (LOVE her!), Southern Weddings’ Lara Casey, Jason Groupp’s Lindsey Thorne, and photographer genius Joey Lawrence, among others. We are still on a cloud from meeting all these people we admire!

This is Lara and Joey:

and Lindsey:

and of course Angelica who is seen here on her trusty iphone (the second most popular photographer’s tool, apparently!)

the end!

  • Dave Cheung: YEAH!!! LOVE THEM!! So great to finally meet u kids :) Soooo fun to hang. Great memories in great photos ... thanks for sharing and .... get iPhones already!!! :D:D:D:D hugs&luv (01.08.2010 11:09am)
  • kate: looks like you had an amazing time guys! must have been so inspiring! xo (01.08.2010 12:04pm)
  • Sasha: Love these pictures, especially the self-portrait of that handsome man! :) (01.09.2010 02:04am)
  • Lesya: GREAT photos guys, miss you already! (01.09.2010 06:44pm)
  • Quin Cheung: ow owwwwww! (01.09.2010 07:41pm)
  • aga: awesome photos as usual! bummer we had to miss mystic but even bigger bummer, we missed the GTG in NYC and thus meeting the two of you! Perhaps next time... (01.17.2010 06:10am)
  • Emma: I wish I had connected with you guys in Mystic.....love your work! Next time! (01.26.2010 04:59pm)
  • Walter van Dusen: I'm really glad you had fun at Mystic 5. I now hope you have "more" fun at Mystic 6 ;-) Walter (03.17.2010 05:27am)

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Happy New Year!

posted in Day to Day
January 3, 2010

Happy New Year! We wish you all the best in 2010! We are so excited to get this year started and we’ve got so many exciting projects on the way.

We are writing to you from Mystic 5 in Connecticut, a big photography conference where we are having the chance to meet with some amazing photographers and hear how many of them run their business. It is really interesting and so much fun!

We’ll be away for a little while so until our next post, we wanted to share some of our New Year’s party photobooth photos with you. We threw a party for some of our closest friends and it was a blast (hats were mandatory). Here are a few of our favorites:

davina + daniel new year photobooth pictures

  • Quin Cheung: Yay we finally got to meet you at Mystic and you're just as cute (if not cute-er) in person as in pictures! Congrats on the new blog, it looks awesome! (01.05.2010 02:49am)
  • erin woolsey: aww sweet! what a great theme and awesome photo booth. looks like you brought in the new year in one amazing way :D (01.19.2010 11:47pm)

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