Joannie & I would like to share some of our favorite images from Luke & Ashley’s stunning Grand View Lodge wedding reception last weekend!
In “Part One” of Luke & Ashley’s Grand View Lodge wedding, we took you from getting ready to their first looks and then lots of great family & wedding party photographs.
Luke & Ashley looking pretty awesome!
In “Part Two”, we’ll take you on a beautiful trip down the aisle of their wedding ceremony in The Vineyard. Then on to their really beautiful Grand View Lodge wedding reception at the Gull Lake Center Grand Ballroom.
A Pretty Wedding Ceremony In The Vineyard
Luke & Ashley’s wedding ceremony began in a rather cute and funny way. The wedding processional was going very smoothly right up until the two adorable flower girls, Reagan & Stella, and the adorable ring bearer, Chase, were set to enter the scene. This is where it got interesting (and very cute).
These three little buggers had more of an interest in the three musicians than they did in coming down the aisle. It was so cute to watch as they kind of “split up” as they were being led in. Eventually, each of them did come down the aisle. But it ended up that each one of them came down the aisle separately. I’m guessing that that was their plan all along. Each one wanted all of the attention and so I’m pretty sure they decided to do that without telling anyone. It was very cute.
“The split up!”
The rest of their wedding ceremony was picture perfect! It concluded with a “selfie” that their best man, Nick, just before their first kiss.
Selfie!
A wonderful social hour at the Gull Lake Center followed. With guests enjoying tasty hors-d’oeuvres and cold drinks on this warm, humid day in Nisswa, MN.
A Stunning Grand Ballroom
Luke & Ashley’s Grand View Lodge wedding reception was up next. The Grand Ballroom was as pretty as it gets, and In their highlight music video, I’ve included several images of the room and especially the incredibly beautiful head table. Wow!
It doesn’t get any prettier than this!
Luke & Ashley’s grand entrance to their Grand View Lodge wedding reception leads immediately to their first dance as husband and wife. After a wonderful dinner, with several entertaining speeches and toasts, Ashley had her first dance with her dad and Luke with his mom. The dance floor was wide open (and full) for the rest of the night!
Now that the wedding dance was going strong, as their wedding photographers, our day was pretty much complete at that point. But I really, really wanted to play some more on this beautiful property. So Luke, Ashley, Joannie & I snuck away for a short photoshoot at sunset.
Pretty!
Special wedding photographs like these are what I like to call “Signature Images.” These beautiful images made our little getaway very, very worthwhile.
Luke and Ashley in front of the Grand Staircase.
The World’s Only Light Painting Wedding Photographers
Our finale wedding photo was a light painted wedding photograph. We create it in nearly total darkness (complete with lots of mosquitos). The spot was at the very pond where we took the image at the top of this blog post. It was also the location of many really fun wedding party images taken earlier in the day! After we finished creating the initial pond images, Joannie & I sent Luke & Ashley back to their wedding dance, and we stayed back to light paint the rest of the scene.
The final composition is a combination of about fifteen images that were captured while I ran around light painting with one of our flashes. I tried to light paint the various parts of the trees with Joannie pushing the shutter for each exposure. I combined the lighted tree images into the finished images in post-production later on back in the studio. The final images look pretty cool!
Nighttime at the pond.
Was That Lightning?
It must have looked kind of weird from a distance because one of the Grand View Lodge employees saw the flashing in the trees and walked over to investigate. He said it was weird because he could see the flashes but couldn’t see anyone (Joannie & I were dressed in black) until he got right by to us! Funny!
Luke & Ashley, Joannie & I had a totally awesome wedding weekend with you guys! Ashley, your family (as always), was so welcoming and sweet to us and we can now see that Luke’s family is just the same, especially “Luke’s mom” & “Luke’s dad”. Thank you for the honor of being your wedding photographers! We look forward to sharing the rest of your wedding images with you very soon. I’m also really looking forward to creating what will be an awesome wedding album for you guys! – M&J