Here is a photo from her brother, Nathan and Katie’s wedding:

Megan’s sister, Nathalie and her husband Alex got married last year at the Houston Yact Club:

And, we look forward to Alex’ sister, Jessica’s wedding, next March in Houston as well!

Date: September 10th, 2011

Ceremony: Saint Mary’s of the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, La Porte, Texas

Reception: Megan’s parents’ home in La Porte, Texas

Love Megan’s expressions – I can photograph these all day.

Nathalie and Alex in front of their photo

Megan made her own cake for her wedding – she has also made her sister’s wedding cake last year.   The food was amazing.

One of the best part of having a wedding at home is how relax you can be.  One of my favorite moments of the day:

Experimented with some film:

Film:

Gotta love it when the groom’s family gets on the dance floor as much as Jonathan’s.

What’s even more interesting is that the bride is the sister of a groom in 2008 that we placed #1 in reception category in the same contest     And both of these top 5 finishes are from the same wedding.

Here they are – first one is #4 for Bouquet/Garter (Action) category:

Here is one of my favorite images of the year – #5 in Emotions:

Pretty cool that both images are from the same wedding – Nathalie and Alex’s Wedding Day in Houston, Texas.

Her brother’s wedding, Katie and Nathan, which won #1 in reception (along with 1st place for that quarter in 2008) can be seen here which coincidentally was my very first blog post – didn’t blog at all until 2008.

Even better – she and Alex wrote a testimonial for us and listed this image as one of their favorites – you can read it at:  Houston Yacht Club Wedding – Alex and Nathalie’s Testimonial.

So when we had the idea of presenting 3 images from each wedding, it became a real daunting task to go through all 30k images.   We knew we had to have some ground rules.  We decided that the majority of the images need to be both bride and groom together, that they’re nearly all moments with a few portraits thrown in.  And, we need to have over 80% of the images with either the bride or the groom in the picture (and limited the number of guests images – so quite a few really crazy and wild reception photos didn’t make the cut).

Still, cutting down from 29219 down to just 93 images and limit them to 3 images for a single wedding was a lot of work.  I hope you enjoy watching the slideshow as much as I enjoyed making it – I can still remember each wedding as if it was yesterday!  Some of these are also my clients favorites – we did a survey last year and will be publishing those shortly as well.

The slideshow ends with one of my favorite reception images from 2010 – and is also appropriate because I want ALL of my brides feel like Jessica and her sister at the end of one of the most important days of her life:

A BIG thank you to all of our clients for a great 2010 and best wishes to y’all for 2011!!

Date: October 23rd, 2010

Ceremony and Reception:  Rice Memorial Chapel and Rice University, Houston, Texas

Amira and Matt is one of the sweetest couples we have ever photographed.  From their relaxed and fun engagement session to their wedding, their sweet personalities just show right through.   And picking Amira’s alma  mater, Rice University, is a really good decision.  What a great location!

It’s amazing isn’t it, that they met each other online also.

My wife Hazel was able to help me with this wedding and lots of awesome ceremony photos are hers.

Here are a few images from their wedding day:

Amira wore her grandmother’s wedding dress as well as ballet shoes.

The Jewish wedding tradition, the bedeken, takes place right before Amira walks down the aisle.  It involves signing of the Ketubah and Matt actually pulls the veil down on Amira at this time.

Amira circles around Matt 7 times…

LOVE Rice University!!!!!!!!!

One of my favorite images of the year:

Another one of my favorite images of the wedding – gotta love their expression of anticipation.

The Horah!

Congratulations Amira and Matt – one of the most friendliest weddings ever!

Here is her letter:

Dear Tony and Hazel,

My husband and I just had the best Thanksgiving ever!   We had the pleasure of watching your slide show with Matt and Amira.  It was so amazing and beautiful.  And the music was great with it, too.

We really appreciate all you did and can never thank you enough.  We knew your pictures would be totally awesome.

If a picture tells a thousand words, you have just told a never ending story of the marriage of Matt and Amira.  And what a beautiful love story you have shown!

They are so pleased and so are we.  I will probably watch the slide show each day for a very long time!

I hope you and your family had a nice Thanksgiving.  We are thankful for you and the incredible work you do!  We feel lucky that both of you came to Houston on Oct. 23rd.  It was so kind of you to share your talent with us on such a special day.

Thanks again for making my day!

Sincerely,

Debbie – the mother of the bride

Here is one of my favorite photos from the wedding (and quite frankly one of my favorites for the year) – it’s simply a moment between Amira and father during their dance:

This moment, like many others, is a combination of just waiting for the expression and little bit of luck.  There was a nice light in the reception, a spot light almost from the ceiling which was much brighter than any other ambient light sources – it was quite blinding and would be a bit difficult to match with flash.  So I had asked them if if they can turn it off – they couldn’t as luck would have it.  Rather than trying to fight the light, I simply kept an eye on that bright spot and waited for a moment to occur.  While I am sure I could have photographed this moment without the light, it simply wouldn’t be as dramatic.  The cool part is – Amira went to Rice U for theatre education, and this photograph and the light reminds me a lot of the type of lighting you’d see on a stage during a play.

I’ll post he wedding in a few days!

Ceremony: Annunciation Catholic Church, Houston, Texas

Reception: Ocean Palace

Johnnie owns a farm in Madisonville, Texas.

Jenny works in New York City.

How did they meet?  Vegas, baby!    They met in Las Vegas when Johnnie went to a bachelor party and Jenny was there on vacation.

They came to Austin for their engagement session earlier in the year – read it here.

The wedding day started off with a Vietnamese ceremony in the morning where parents and family members gave gifts and good wishes to the couple, then a catholic ceremony in the afternoon, followed by a couple hours ride in the limo and took a few photos in two locations, and then a fun and wild reception.  If you have never been to an Asian wedding with a full toasts in each table where the guests made the couple play a bunch of games – well, read on

The game starts – i think they had to get a penny out of Johnnie’s pants…

Now, Jenny has to be blind folded and figure out which one is her husband.

Now they make Johnnie pick up a cherry with only a straw and his mouth to give it to Jenny.

Yes, make the guy who caught the garter to put it back on the girl who caught the bouquet, awesome!

What a great day – congratulations Jenny and Johnnie!

Wedding Ceremony: Saint Michael Catholic Church, Houston, Texas

Wedding Reception: The Houstonian, Houston, Texas

Beautiful wedding at the Houstonian!

Melissa and Alfredo met each other the night before Valentine’s Day, just over a year ago.  Here is what Melissa told me about how they have met:

On February 13, 2009 the night before Valentine’s Day, Melissa and Alfredo went to a house party with their respective friends, and little did they know that night they would be meeting their future spouse.

Alfredo’s smile quickly captivated Melissa and before everyone started to leave to continue the party at a local club, Alfredo asked for her number. Two days later on Sunday,

Alfredo called Melissa, and despite being on call at the hospital, they talked for almost 3 hours that day!

After 9 months of courtship, Alfredo rented a beautiful sailboat in Kemah, TX, where he planned a romantic picnic, and proposed to Melissa in the middle of the ocean. Of course, she said YES and the rest is history!

The wedding ceremony took place in the St. Michael Catholic Church near downtown Houston with the reception at the Houstonian.  It was one of the best reception party that I have been to this year.

Slideshow of the wedding:

Some highlighted photos of the day:

Love this image of Melissa’s dad waving goodbye at the couple:

Congratulations Melissa and Alfredo!  Hazel and I are honored to be part of your day!

Houston wedding photography by Tony Ku, Ku Photography LLC

Ceremony and Reception:  St. Regis Hotel, Houston, TX

A beautiful wedding in the St. Regis Hotel in Houston, Texas!

Denedra and Jeff served in the US army for a number of years.  Denedra has recently retired from the service and Jeff is now working as a contractor for the US government overseas.  Her wedding planner, Danyett Baxter of Two Be Wed, did a great job on her wedding when she was still deployed outside the continental USA.

She has some of the best details in the reception that I have seen this year – great job by Denedra and Dyanett.

I was really impressed by how the lighting that was projected onto the ceiling complements the theme of the wedding reception.

An impromptu bouquet and garter toss at the exit….

Congratulations Denedra and Jeff!

Houston wedding photography by Tony Ku, Ku Photography LLC

Ceremony and Reception:  Houston Yacht Club, Houston, Texas

We finished off the May wedding days with Nathalie and Alex’ celebration in Houston, Texas.

From Nathalie about how they met:

We met during freshmen year at the University of Texas. We were neighbors at the University Towers and were introduced by our roomates Danielle and Daniel, who already knew each other.

We met Nathalie at her brother’s wedding a couple of years ago in Fort Worth, Texas.  We also photographed one of her close friends wedding last year, Ashley and Jimmy.  So we knew going in that the wedding is going to be great and the reception is going to be a lot of fun!

Nathalie’s sister, Megan, who graduated from culinary school, made their wedding cake!

We started the day at Nathalie parents’ house:

Alex gave her a present of a map of Galveston Bay, as Nathalie loves sailing since childhood.

Nathalie gave Alex a Ketubah.

Congratulations Nathalie and Alex!!!

Ceremony and Reception:  The Gallery, Houston, Texas

Two M.D.’s in love.

Tina and Chase knew each other while they were in medical school at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio (Chase has just graduated last year).

This is the story of how they have met, according to Tina:

Chase and Tina both went to medical school at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UTHSCSA for short).  Although Chase was one year ahead of Tina, they met through a mutual friend who invited Tina to their study group.  Tina remembers that first encounter as Chase glancing up from his textbook to say a brief, dismissive “hello,” and then resuming his reading.  Thankfully, they got to know each other a little better at Starbucks where they and several other friends studied every day.  It took Chase over a year to gather the nerve to ask Tina out (at Starbucks, of course), to which Tina was shocked because Chase had never appeared to take a interest in her — little did she know he had kept his eye on her, waiting until the timing was right.  On their first date, they went to the movies and afterward, talked for hours at a pub where they discovered they shared interests in more things than just a well-brewed cup of coffee…and the rest, as they say, is history.

Starbucks…. actually, that’s where I met Chase last May in South Austin before we got a semi-permanent space at the Austin Executive Centre Suites, too!  Must be something brewing in the coffee….

I wish people would include dogs more in weddings!

Tina and Chase decided to meet each other before the wedding.  Obviously Chase hasn’t seen her dress and here is the entire sequence:

They were practicing their first dance….

It must be San Antonio because it is always windy when I photograph in the city or around the area…

I love it when a wedding has so much emotion from both the bride and yes, the groom.

I love these four images that Hazel captured, from pure celebration to joyous crying.

Everyone was tearing up…

We love it when the groom shows emotion (i.e. cries) in any wedding!

For the entertainment, the bridesmaids decided to do a dance as if they were Tina and Chase…

Meanwhile, the guys decided to ask Chase questions about Tina that he should have known (but obviously, the questions was set up so that it’s impossible to get the right answer), and the groomsmen were supposed to punish Chase by using one of the objects on the floor….

Oh oh…

Congratulations Tina and Chase!

Houston wedding photography by Tony Ku, Ku Photography LLC, Austin wedding photographer.