Aperina Studios Blog

Happy New Year from Aperina Studios

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 00:57:42 +0000

We would love to take this time and wish you all a Happy New Year! May God bless you in 2012 even more! May all your dreams comes true (well all the possible one) and of course we wish all the brides set to be married in 2012, a beautiful and unforgettable wedding!

Our company has grown this past year and we are excited to grow even more in 2012. Our plans are big! We are working on a bunch of new ideas and projects that we believe well help expand our studio and improve many qualities of Aperina Studios. We are investing into Aperina Studios even more this coming year creating an even better product for our clients. Some of our goals are; Educate ourselves more, buy (more) new lenses, launch new website, and decrease our turn-around time for our product delivery. These are just some of our goals, but we definitely have a lot more that will help build a stronger foundation for Aperina Studios. Send us an email if you have any ideas for us, or maybe you found a place where we can improve. Let us know.

We are extremely excited at the bright future we see with our dream, Aperina Studios.

Happy New Year!

Vitaliy & Svetlana’s Wedding Teaser | 09.18.2011

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 04:56:49 +0000

Our team always tries to guide the couple through their wedding day so that we can get as much footage as we can to create a rich film full with a variety of content. Fortunately, with Vitaliy and Svetlana, this was very easy for us to do. They put their full trust into us and listened to the advice we gave them when we met up with them a few days before the wedding. They told us how they met, their favorite moments together, their experience being engaged and so on. This helped us to get to know them better as a couple and gave us some time to think about what ideas and story line we want to bring out while filming so we’d be able to make the best film possible. We stand firm on a belief that we need to educate our clients. We did that by helping Vitaliy and Svetlana understand how to express their love story more vividly through out their wedding day. This creates a film that has a more colorful story and a greater emotional attachment. We also advised the couple to take some time during the reception to go outside and capture a few beautiful sunset shots while the guests enjoyed the food and music inside. All these things made it very easy for us to be creative with their film and teaser, and to not only captured their wedding day, but the love story behind it.

We created a wedding teaser couple days after the wedding, however, we weren’t satisfied with it so we didn’t post it. We approached the editing very roughly and quickly, that made the story very unromantic and even unprofessional. We believed the wedding had more potential into becoming a WAY better story and edit. So we put it aside for couple weeks. Today, I opened up Final Cut Pro and decided to start from scratch. I am extremely happy with the resulting teaser and pleased that I took the time and restarted my failed edit. It was definitely worth it. Enjoy this wedding teaser.

Venue: Morgan Creek Golf Club

Music Selection: Come What May - Nicole Kidman & Ewan McGregor

Roman & Vera’s Wedding Teaser | 10.29.11

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 01:02:32 +0000

Sometimes I get stuck because I run out of songs to use for my online wedding teasers! Here, I ran out – until I logged into Facebook and someone posted a song they loved. I chose this song for this teaser instantly because once I listened to it, I loved it too. So here it is. Enjoy and share.

UPDATE: Teaser has been updated with a more developed story. Enjoy.

Song: We Are – Joy Williams

Roman & Natalie’s Wedding Teaser | 10.23.11

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:51:35 +0000

Roman and Natalie’s long distance relationship finally ended, and a new, more amazing life together began. Their love for one another was seen throughout the day and there was no mistake that they were meant for each other. Even though they just saw each other only 6 times before their wedding, it felt like they have known each other for forever. Talking to Natalie before the wedding about the video and hearing their story, I got excited and really wanted to film their wedding. And honestly, the excitement didn’t fade away. The wedding went smoothly and I saw their story in many aspects of the wedding. I loved that. I believe that every wedding should be portray the love story of the couple that is getting married. And their’s was a perfect example. Roman is a Pastor of a young church in New Jersey. Knowing that, I realized that it would be great to start off the video with a Bible verse; a Bible verse that was very special to both Roman and Natalie.

Toward the end of the reception, I knew that I’ll be making a teaser for them. I was inspired to take a cinematic path in telling their story through this short wedding teaser. So here it is. Enjoy and Share.

Reception Venue: Citrus Heights Community Center

Music: Heaven – MUX (from iStock)

Nik & Inna’s Wedding Teaser | 10.16.11

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 00:37:53 +0000

This is Nik and Inna. Happy. And this is their wedding teaser.

Well of course, but what’s cool is that we love filming weddings! Including this one. When I edited the first version of this teaser, I wasn’t to happy. I didn’t even want to post it online. So I waited couple days, and pulled off something I love. Totally starting from scratch, choosing a new song, and bringing couple new shots. After completing the teaser version 2, I was satisfied and here it is for you to enjoy. Enjoy and share!

Venue – Morgan Creek Golf Course

Song – I’m In Love With You – Joy Williams

Justin & Annmarie | Napa, CA SDS (second day shoot)

Paul Lyubezhanin — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 13:56:57 +0000

I love photographing weddings but I love photographing second-day-shoots even more. The reason for this is that I as the photographer am in charge of the whole day. I love control!! I don’t abuse it, but use it to set up amazing shots using the time I need and the places I think will look amazing… Having a gorgeous couple helps a lot. I photographed Justin & Annmarie’s wedding two days before their SDS. It was an amazing and fun wedding (maybe I’ll post some wedding photos on here a little later). We decided to go to Napa, CA for the SDS as they both loved the winery, nature setting. I love photographing in Napa. There are numerous different wineries with their own specific features and it gives me as the photographer amazing variety. We stopped by a couple wineries that day, got kicked out of a couple, but overall it was an amazing shoot. We ended our session with some romantic photos by Lake Hennessey. Enjoy my favorites from this SDS session!

I did use my tilt-shift lens for this shoot as many of you have probably noticed… I really love these next two shots as they are not only amazing silhouettes but also have the tilt-shift effect, making them unique photographs… Experimenting with different techniques always produces amazing results!!

Justin & Annamarie Wedding Teaser | 09.17.2011

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 01:58:41 +0000

Justin and Annmarie were invited to another wedding we filmed a while back (Andrey & Olivia in July 2010), and after they saw that weddings teaser they instantly fell in love with all of our work. We got to know them and of course we wanted to be part of their wedding by capturing their wedding story.

On the wedding day, I had all the team meet up at my house, we ate breakfast and headed out the door. I told my wife while walking out of the door – “today’s gonna be a great day.” And I wasn’t wrong. The wedding was a blast! The location was beautiful! Justin and Annmarie enjoyed the day and we were there capturing their gorgeous wedding story. Through out the day I was imagining what will go into the teaser as I had couple of songs inspiring me. After the wedding, more than a week after, I chose Kaleidoscope Heart by Sara Bareilles. I love the way I paused the song to give room for the speech and filling in that gap with a soft cinematic song. That gave me the chills sometimes and I love when that happens. Hopefully you guys will enjoy it as well. Enjoy the wedding teaser!

Jonathan & Gina’s Wedding Teaser | 09.25.2011

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 22:00:53 +0000

In most weddings we know exactly whats going on, but this wedding introduced us to many new traditions. Hearing a short history of the traditions from the groom, we understood that it’s very important that we capture every moment. Working with the couple was simple. Jonathan treated us with so much respect at the wedding that I was honestly surprised but humbled at the same time and just wanted to do even better. The entire wedding was really fun. Enjoy the short teaser. A longer film will be coming later, as of course, this teaser doesn’t even cover 5% of what happened at the wedding.

Song: As Love Is My Witness – Westlife

Vitaly & Sveta | gorgeous engagement, wedding and San Francisco SDS

Paul Lyubezhanin — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 04:45:34 +0000

Summers are crazy for us wedding photographers!! Mine was no different… I’ve been so busy lately with photographing many gorgeous wedding, doing different photo shoots and other little projects… but it’s about time to update our blog with some new photos from an amazing wedding I did about a week ago.

I photographed Vitaly and Sveta’s gorgeous wedding on September 18 right after shooting another wedding the day before… With formated cards, fresh batteries, and a Rockstar energy drink the next morning I set out to the grooms house with an amazing feeling. I was really excited to shoot the wedding of my new friends but also as excited to use my tilt-shift lens. That Saturday was just one of those days where you just don’t know where the ideas keep coming from… Vitaly, the groom, recently came to America and I thought that it would become an issue with the different styles but I was amazed at the modern mentality he had. They were both very stylish and knew how to pose, requiring only a little bit of correcting from my side… The engagement session was amazing, the wedding was gorgeous and very lovely, and the second-day-shoot (SDS) we did in San Francisco was very beautiful and sexy… This blog post tells the story of their wedding day and includes my favorite photos from each of the three photo shoots I did for this amazing couple. Enjoy!

Engagement session in Roseville, CA – Vitaly and Sveta asked me for my favorite place to go to take photos. I have many favorite places so I chose one of them for this gorgeous couple. We walked the streets of Roseville with Vitaly’s guitar while creating amazing photos of their love …

This is the story of the gorgeous wedding day – Sveta and Vitaly met in Ukraine when Sveta flew there to visit her homeland. Many of their dating days were in that part of the world. On the wedding day, Vitaly gave Sveta a little treasure chest with many little memories inside from their travels in Ukraine… It was an amazing gift which brought many memories back to Sveta during her makeup session… It is very interesting to listen to the different love stories people tell and I am lucky to take part in capturing the biggest moments of these love stories for all of our amazing clients. Here is the wedding day as I captured it in photos…

After the ceremony, we all headed down to Morgan Creek Golf Course and had a beautiful and delicious wedding reception.

In the middle of the reception, we went outside to capture some moments with the sunset…

After capturing some amazing photos and video footage, we went back inside and continued the festivities… Vitaly’s parents couldn’t attend the wedding in person so there was a live Skype video of them in the reception hall as they were celebrating the wedding in their living room in Ukraine…

San Francisco, CA second-day shoot (SDS) - On the Tuesday following the wedding I grabbed my gear, especially my new favorite lens (Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5 L), and headed out to Sausalito, CA. Vitaly and Sveta were already there, enjoying their ice cream as they prepared for another day of creative, artistic photography… I love shooting SDSs because it gives me total control over a situation and that is where I let it all out artistically… I hope you enjoy some of my favorite shots of this amazing couple as we walked around Sausalito and then visited Baker Beach in San Francisco, CA.

George & Vera’s Wedding Teaser | 08.27.2011

Vitaliy Lyubezhanin — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 17:28:49 +0000

Vera emailed me around 8 months before the wedding giving us a nice compliment and of course inquiring about her wedding date. Then she told me the wedding is in Portland, Maine. I was shocked. All the way from there! How did they find us? Well thank you Yuriy Manchik for your referral. Of course they signed the contract, gave us more compliments, and got us excited for the trip.

Couple days before the trip, hurricane Irene was threatening our travel. Definitely got us worried, but we came there safely. We beat the storm by around 20 hours in one of the states we had a layover.

We met George and Vera that night and quickly started to study them as a couple. Talking to them, we realized that George drove a lot to Maine as he was from New Hampshire. So we decided to incorporate that into the video and start off the teaser that way. George was fun to work with his sense of humor and simpleness. Vera was influenced by George and was just as fun and kept the mood easy going. Through out the day we went to many beautiful places that Maine has to offer and captured some amazing shots. Even there church backyard was a photo-shoot! We would drive around and be like: Wow, this place is awesome, and that too, oh and look there! Seriously, every backyard was usable for a nice photo/video-shoot.

After the wedding we got home and I quickly started backing up the footage, looking through it, and marking my favorites. The next morning we went to their church, ate lobster, played some volleyball (surprisingly competitive), and experience Irene first hand! Being ready to fly out the next morning, we broke apart our equipment so it’d fit in our luggage and went to sleep. Next morning, we drove to Portland airport, dragged the 6 bags we had and went to the kiosk to type in our info. Surprisingly, the kiosk gave us an error: “sorry your flight is not available.” WHAT? YEP! We got stranded for couple more days in Maine. So we played more volleybal, ate more shrimp, and got to know more people. What a fun trip!

Song: All About Us - He is We (Thank you Inna Gristak for the song tip in your txt.)

So that was our experience, you may go ahead and experience the wedding teaser. Enjoy and share!