Palm Springs, CA – Ace Hotel Wedding Inspiration Photos

Last Updated on May 31, 2019 by

A few months ago I had the opportunity to attend The Hybrid Workshop at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs, Ca. The main reason I attended was because it covered shooting film and digital side by side and allowed for a way to get the images from both mediums to match in color and consistency. When I first started in photography, all there was was film and I really loved using it. Not only did I love spending time in the dark room, I really enjoyed making my own prints. I could spend days in the film lab and not even think about it! Nothing else mattered, life was easy.

As time passed, and more and more film stocks became unavailable – along with the ever increasing price of development and scanning becoming too much to bare – I slowly but surely switched over to digital. All the time I would spend in the film lab disappeared, and eventually, so did the prints I loved making and sharing. Quite honestly I never LOVED digital as much as I LOVED film…until now. A couple of years ago, while sorting through old prints and digital files, I said to myself “Man, I wish digital looked like this!” Film is so beautiful outdoors and in bright light, while digital is not so great in contrasty light but excels in low light. I started thinking that I could use both mediums’ strengths to my advantage and I started implementing film back into my workflow – 1-2 rolls every shoot. One roll of color film and one roll of black and white film. The workshop helped me refine my process. I never advertised that I was shooting film and digital together (in case I screwed it up), I just did it. And although clients couldn’t quite pinpoint what it was, they would say things like, “I love your work… I don’t know what it is about it, but it’s got something.” I knew that “something” was film, proven to me by them predominantly choosing the film shots as their favorites.

The best part of shooting film is that the prints came back and that’s why most of my Wedding Collections come with printed proofs. The ability to look at your wedding day, engagement session, family session, etc. on printed pictures right in front of you is something you have to experience for yourself. For a long time, the tangible print was dead but I’m bringing it back.

Can you tell which are film below?

 Special Thanks to all the great vendors!