Ben & Stefanie, Denver Country Club!

Last weekend I photographed the wedding of Ben and Stefanie, two school teachers who are IN LOVE!!! Sometimes you can really feel it at a wedding and theirs was no exception. So here's their story. I threw in a bunch of extra shots, since I didn't get these up the following day, which is what I usually shoot for. I'm a slacker! No I'm not!

These were photographed at the Denver Country Club and I want to give a special shout to Amber, who was their catering manager. She was AWESOME. She got me everything I needed for the reception slide show and otherwise... and was so accomodating that I thought I was in some sort of great dream. Thanks Amber!!

Nice shoes!


The wedding programs. I LOVE outdoor ceremonies!!!!


Stefanie is happy because well, she's gettin hitched! She looks great, even before her make up!


Beautiful flower girl in anticipation!


I never got a chance to see who the dress is by, but it was very elegant!





BOING!!!!!


Mom, putting an antique necklace on Stefanie.



Bridesmaide puts on Stefanie's garter, while others keep her upright!

Trying to get a sneak peek of the wedding site, awaiting her arrival!

These are music CDs, party gifts for the guests.

Groomsmen, doing what they do best... horsin around.

Here comes the bride!


I Love it when there are rose petals in the aisle!



Ben's dad's reaction to "the kiss"

I took probably the largest group photo in my life at this wedding. I'll put up the grand daddy in another post, but here's a close-up with my Canon 70-200 2.8 IS L Lens.

Let the party begin!


It's like artwork that you put in your mouth...


NOT to put in your mouth. This is for smelling and looking at.


Ben and Stefanie, listening to toasts...



The engagement photo I took of them last winter in Breckenridge!


Guess what song they are listening to, and you win a prize!


OK... as I was packing up, I realized I didn't get my famous mirror shot that my peeps like so much. So I decided I better not let down my peeps, so here are a few before going home. My dawgs were barkin, but I can't let down my peeps!


OK, so I got a little carried away!


...OK REALLY CARRIED AWAY. I was havin fun!

Published!

Hey, I got published again, this time in The Knot Real Weddings, CO. So if you find yourself at the book store or grocery store, look for this and see if you can find my schtuff!

MC Paparazzi

A couple years ago I was visiting my cousin Laurie in the Bay Area, CA. She lives in Palo Alto, but we went out to San Francisco. YOU ARE NEVER GOING TO GUESS WHAT HAPPENED.

...which is why I will tell you. Anyway, we were walking through town and went by this huge park. There were all these really nice studio lights set up. So I told Laurie to stand in the light so I could get a nice portrait of her. Of course I just happened to have my Canon EOS 1D Mark II Camera and my 70-200mm 2.8 IS L Lens with me. I took her photo and then got yelled at by this movie director guy. Turns out we were on the set of a movie that Reese Witherspoon and Mark Ruffalo was in. Somehow we managed to get by security and were hanging out on the set of this movie! As soon as I found out that I was among celebrities, I got into Paparazzi mode.

We saw Reese and Ruffalo on the set and so I started to take photos. I wasn't the only one doing this. Every passer-by with a camera stopped. Just happened that I had a long professional lens. I got singled out. Reese's bodyguard or something smacked my camera and broke my flash! I didn't know it was broken until later or else I would have put the guy in a strangle hold. Maybe not. He was twice my size.

Here's the damage done to my precious Canon Speedlight 580 EX, a'la REESE WITHERSPOON and company! Cracked my LCD!



I toyed with the guy and would casually walk away, then quickly I'd point my camera right over to Reese and Mark! Then he'd start walking briskly over to me, which is when I'd start casually walking away. I did this for a good half hour. It was hilareous!

Anyway, here are the shots. :)

Mark Ruffalo. Not to be confused with Mark Cafiero.

Oh man, Reese is lucky that Jenny was not there to see her trying to kiss me!

Here are some shots of Reese and Mark, chillin out. Reese is a GHOST in this movie. Don't be scared though. She's a happy ghost and doesn't want to hurt anyone. I just noticed in the background of this shot, you can actually see Mr. Meat Head, glaring at me! (upper right hand corner!).

Here's a few other people with Reese and Mark. I never saw them in the movie. But they had sushi on the set. Maybe they were bringing Mark and Reese some sushi. Mark and Reese are happy.

The title of the movie at the time was "If only it were true". That's what was embroidered on all the directors chairs, but they changed it to "Heaven Sent" or "Heaven only Knows" or something like that. Jenny and I rented it last week. It's a chick flick, but I actually enjoyed it! I saw the exact scenes that these shots are from.

If you look close enough in the movie, you can actually see a big meat head of a bodyguard smacking an innocent wedding photographer's camera! ;) You owe me, Reese!

Big MAC

I'm playing catch up on my blog! Sorry peeps! I've been busy this week. I am writing an article right now for Rangefinder Magazine... I'll tell you what it's about later... it's a SURPRISE!

And I've spent many a late night putting together an outline for the 2007 Wedding and Portrait Photographer's International convention. As you know I was a Master Class presenter this year. While I was in Vegas, I got to hang out with Jim Kennedy, who's quite possibly the largest wedding photographer out of Orange County, CA. He's literally making history in this business, so I am excited at the opportunity to speak at the next WPPI Convention and Trade Show in Vegas. I sent out our outline this morning.

This week for Splurge Day, Jenny and I got a Big Mac. A big MAC. Here I am, stealing the mac from the Apple store. Photo courtesy of Cherry Creek Mall Security Camera.

I've been so busy though, it's been set up, but only turned on once so far.

I'm excited about it for many reasons, one that pertains to my peeps is my new upcoming iBlog! It's not just another silly ol' blog, guys... I'll be able to post slideshows to music after every wedding I photograph! It will be cleaner and more custom!

Also, get ready for CafieroBride.com. It's my new web site, not to replace Cafierophoto.com, but that's a secret, too! You'll see!

Say What?

I am dry on ideas for a fun blog post tonight, I'm busy editing images from all of my weddings from the past few weeks, but I love this blog, it gives me such a great excuse to take a little break and recharge!

The television in on in the other room and I heard one of Volkswagon Jetta's new commercials. I think it's hilareous and genious. It shows a 20-something year old guy picking up a girl at her parents home for a date. The girls dad, who looks like just a really nice guy says, "hey, the weather is great today, maybe you two could go on a little hike!".

The guy gets FURIATED and says, "YOU go take a hike! Not every Jetta owner likes hiking ya know".

The girl is all, "Daaaaad!" and her dad is like, "What?"... totally dumbfounded. It makes me laugh every time.

(Oh by the way, sometimes I type things like "she was all" and "I was like". Etc...) Just me being silly, folks. I don't really talk that way. On a related note, in college I broke up with a girl because she decided she wanted to start talking "baby talk". That's not very attractive.

The genious part is that there really are stereo types about Jetta owners. I was shopping for a Jetta, but I'm not a "metro" kind of guy. People think I am because I wear "product" in my hair when I go out with people. Anyway I got an Audi instead and now I REALLY get made fun of by my "uber" friends. Sometimes you just can't win. Fact is, I'm a mountain man, but I don't think my wedding clients would appreciate me parking a muddy lifted jeep via valet at the Four Seasons for their fancy champagne wedding.

This is Derek Zoolander. When I talk "Metro" this is what I mean.
When I first got started in the business professionally I didn't even have a studio. I'd meet clients at Starbucks and would hide my Jeep, parking it WAAAAAY in the back. The door fell off of it once and I had to drive to a wedding with no driver side door. I thought I could hide it, but the bride saw me as I hopped in. At the reception she said something like, "nice jeep." and not in a complimentary way. It wasn't long before I sold the Jeep for $1500 bucks and got a nice Audi A4, which I LOVE.

All the fellow Ski Patrollers make fun of me now and call me "metro-boy" and my good friend, Matt Norfleet said I am officially metro now because I style my hair, wear fancy lookin jeans, and the clencher: "muscular, but not strong". Ouch. That one hurt. I guess it's true. Whenever I go to the gym I can't seem to bench nearly as much as all of the no-necks around me.

Family Feud!

I never seem to realize what I am getting myself into when I plan a family reunion on my mom's side. But after all the planning is done and I've got all the peeps together, it's without fail a blast of a time.

Just today I sent out my proposal for a Christmas family reunion. I'm proud to say that the last two get togethers were concieved by my email proposal. I'm doing it again because my family is so cool. Here are some shots from our most recent reunion. I think this was like, 3 years ago!

Granny sinks a putt in our putting competition! My cousin Matt in the background is two weeks younger than me and is a Dentist in Scottsdale.





Shelby, takes advantage of an opportunity for some human kibbles. My Granddad's pocket protector in the foreground.




My nephew Jay is upset because Shelby at his torilla chip. My job is not to comfort my nephew, but to DOCUMENT the emotion! ;)



Here's what my Granddad looks like when he's in a good mood. He's in a good mood because it's cocktail hour.

My cousin Russ is at Creighton becoming a dentist, just like his bro. Look how hice his toofs look.

Here's my older sister Gina, under the supervision of my cousin Matt, the dentist. Matt has great teeth too, and Gina lives in a concrete basement with her imaginary friend. We let her out for a quick photo.

Gina pretends to be normal in this one. Man Geenie, you're short!

$4000 for a wedding album??

I know it seems rediculous. I just got my studio sample for the famous $4,000 album set. It's a three-album set that comes in a beautiful leather triple slip case. It's the Leather Craftsmen 3500 series flush album. Comes with my Mandolino package, which I have named in honor of my grandfather. I photographed these at my studio this morning. Later I'm going to do a more comprehensive blog post featuring my WHOLE studio, including the flat-screen, martini bar, 1600 square feet of shooting area, and even my very own staffed Starbucks! (kind of!)

The first volume holds images from the "preparation" of the wedding. You know, the bride getting ready, guys fooling around, some nice detail shots, etc.

The second volume holds images from the "ceremony". Father walking the bride down the aisle, the exchange of rings, all that good stuff!

The third book is of the "Celebration"! The party, details, cake, dancing, etc... (my favorite book).

Check out this classy cork finish on the inside of the cover! And that classy logo (design by my delicate flower, Jenny!).

Late Night With...

Conan O'Brian is my favorite late night personality of all time, so I wanted to give a shout to my man with the big hair.

It's been kind of a tradition of mine, I love to end the day with his monologue and I've been doing it for years. His humor is right up my alley and rarely do I ever find myself laughing out loud from something on TV, but he gets me laughing every time. It's the best way to end the day. I love how he's often the butt of his own jokes. If you haven't given him a chance, you need to. Jenny is also a Conan lover. I have definitely found the woman of my dreams. In fact Conan O'Brian was one of the topics on our first date! Awwwww!

Actually, Jenny and I waited like 2 hours to see him in NYC and we got cut from the line last second. It was heart breaking, but we're going back some day and we're going to try again!

This is borderline "too stupid", but it still makes me laugh: Stupid, but Funny


On a related note, I think Jay Leno has gotten really lazy with his jokes. I can't even watch his show anymore. JayWalking, where he goes out and finds ditsy people to make up silly answers to easy questions is a perfect example. And some people love it. I don't get it. I also hate that he's always bragging about his cars, and he seems to set himself up so that he gets to talk about how wealthy he is. BO-RING!

David Letterman is a classic, but I don't watch him either. He was even in the same Fraternity (Sigma Chi) that I was in, back in the frat days, but I don't speak publicly about that! :)

Casio Exilim Point and Shoot

Here are some images from my pocket camera, a Casio Exilim. I don't even know how many "megapixels" it has. 5MP, maybe. But I'm not using it for printing. Just to have something handy when I'm on the go. My big ol' Canon lenses don't fit into my pocket too well.




The funny thing is that at every wedding I shoot, without fail, I get asked by someone at a wedding, usualy a guy, like an uncle or something... "How many megapixels does that thing have?". It doesn't bother me, but it's just funny.

Once Jenny was shooting and someone asked her how many "megaplexes" her camera had. That's even funnier! Megaplexes!!! What are those?


Here's a random story.

Yesterday I was at 7-11 getting a protien bar, and I wanted to get a diet pepsi slurpee, but their slurpee machine was down. I was a little disgruntled about that. But anyway, there was this girl buying a grape soda behind me. I didn't think much of it, except, "she better brush her teeth after she drinks that".

So I got in my car and started to pull out of the parking lot. There was the girl, crossing the street. She was looking somewhat frantic, and she couldn't get across because there was too much traffic. Then I realized why she was frantic, she was missing her bus! The bus was stopped.

Finally a car stopped and let her go by. This whole time I was waiting for traffic to stop too, so that I could get going, but I was really involved with what was going on here. So the girl starts running, like full speed. I could feel that the bus was just about to go. I was really cheering on this girl in my head.

So she's running and running and she had a bag and dropped it! By this time I was gritting my teeth as she turned back to get her bag. You could really feel her tension. It was making me anxious! By the time she grabbed her bag from the ground and started heading back, the bus was leaving.

I was heartbroken for the girl, and was contemplating whether or not I should offer to give this girl a ride to the next bus stop or something. Meanwhile, she's chasing the bus at full speed on foot, waving her arms, and yelling, "STOP STOP STOP!!!".

This story has a good ending! The bus driver saw her and stopped! I felt like cheering.

Anyway, there's story time for you. Did you know I'm wearing a robe and smoking a pipe right now? OK, you got me, I'm not.

Union Station: Denver, Colorado

I'll let this be more of a visual post. Here are some of my shots from a recent photographic field trip that Jenny and I went on a while ago to the old train station here in Denver.

What is a "telegraph"? ;)


I didn't step on any cracks. You can thank me for that however you feel necessary, Mom.

SWEET!


Probably my favorite shot. Just really random. If you ever get a chance, do a google search on legend photographer Henri Cattier Bresson. He's REALLY random, but visually stimulating. It's a lot of fun to see his work.


This is a rubber cone that I found sitting next to a janitor's supply door.

My Secret Weapons!

I don’t know how many of my peeps are self employed, but it’s definitely not easy. I’m about to post (next week), a more comprehensive story of my journey from being a liquor store employed ski bum in Silverthorne to Wedding Photographer in AZ, CO and wherever people want to have me.

But to make a long story short, it’s an extra challenge being the ADD person that I am. A long time ago, I read a study of a Harvard class where the professor took a poll to see if any of his students were in the habit of writing out their goals. Of his entire class, there were just six students who admitted to writing out their goals every day. He saved the list.

Ten years later, the same professor contacted all the members of his class (or as many as he could, I’m sure), and took another poll in regard to their income. There were exactly six students who reported making over $1 Million dollars a year. You guessed it, they were the same students who wrote out their goals.

My goal in life is not to become a millionaire. It is simply to succeed in doing what I love, which is wedding photojournalism. As of now, my goal is to photograph the nicest weddings and the most beautiful venues in the world. I love traveling and I love witnessing the birth of marriage between two people. It's awesome to look through a 200 mm lens into the eyes of a bride as she's listening to her fiance's vows at the very moment of their wedding ceremony. Sounds silly to most people, but I love capturing the emotions and personalities of the friends and family of those two people. I love photography. Always have.

Anyway, I have been writing out my goals every morning and again every night for years. I write out my goals for the day, month, year, 5 years, and 10 years. Twice a day. I never allow myself to fall asleep before I’ve taken the 10 minutes or whatever to write it all out, and I do not do a SINGLE thing when I wake up, until after I’ve written them down again.

I feel totally blessed that I have found Jenny because she not only supports this crazy habit, but she has taken it to a new level. She designed these cool goal books that have my logo on them. I have new pages that I never had until now that I fill out, like what I'm going to do THIS WEEK to improve myself… (with several tables: financially, personally, on efficiency, and health & fitness).
My Blackberry phone is awesome, too. It allows me to respond to email quickly if it’s urgent. The calendar feature syncs to Outlook so whenever I get a wedding inquiry, I can tell right away if I’m available or not.

Finally, the little leather book is something that Becker Photographer gave to me at his work shop in NYC. Becker is one of the hot photographers in Orange County, CA. I use the book all the time to write out ideas whenever they come to me.

People assume that having your own business means you can just do whatever, whenever, that you can just sleep in if you want. I wish I could just sleep in and eat Bon-Bons in my boxers all day, watching reruns of The Brady Bunch. Or McGyver. That guy is so cool.

Anyway, there’s a peek into the day in the life of me… Some think I am a workaholic, but I do make a real effort to put the work away one day a week and just have fun. SPLURGE DAY!

Here's a shot Jenny took at one of our EARLY MORNIN coffee and goal writing sessions! I love this shot!

My Nonnie can KNIT!

Over Mother's Day weekend I was out shooting a wedding (see below) and a fashion shoot (see below) in Arizona, which was great because I got to see my Nonnie and family out there. Let me tell you about my Nonnie.

Her real name is Matilda Cafiero, hails from Naples, Italy, and is about 4'10" and can roll a mean meat-a-ball. Her english is a little rough and to this day, she has not been able to pronounce my name. "Mark" is very tricky. It comes out, "Mike". "Mark" is way cooler, but the woman just can't speak the best english. And she's my Nonnie and I love her.

Her favorite show is "Docta Pill" (Dr. Phil), and not too long ago she was at the deli and needed service. She said, "Push-a the butt, and the butch will come out", which means "If you ring the buzzer (by pressing the button), there's a butcher in the back who will hear it and come to your assistance".

As I was growing up, she'd always give me good advice, like, "Don't say no to drugs". I think she meant "JUST" say no to drugs, but I decided not to doubt her just because her english is "no so good".

Anyway, she knitted me a beautiful hat and scarf, just in time for summer! Bless her heart. I wore it out this weekend and I just wanted to take use of this blog to say THANK YOU NONNIE!! I love my new duds!

On Saturday, Jenny and I hit up the City Park Driving Range. It's no Troon, I'll tell you that!

And I did a little shopping...


Here I am, hoping that no one sees me stealing a honeydew.

On Splurge Day, Jenny and I had HOT DOGS and BEER! Mmmmm

Oh yeah, that's what I'm talking about!

Ahhhhh....

Is it hot out here, or is it just my new hat and scarf? Maybe both. The temp got in the 90s here in Colorado!


Here I am this morning on my AM jog at Wash Park. Let me tell you, I was turnin' some heads this mornin!


Photos by my woman, Jenny. ALL IMAGES (C) 2006, so don't even THINK about stealing these photos and selling them to modeling agencies!!!!!