Varia Studio Blog

Varia was contracted to shoot a wedding in Portugal in September. She usually offers trash the dress sessions to her clients and gets very excited when they agree to participate and go with Varia’s ideas.The wedding ceremony and trash the dress was to take place in Algarve – the picturesque region of Portugal, the southernmost point of the country.We flew to Lisbon and then drove to Carvoeiro, which is located in the heart of Algarve.Trash the dress session was stunning – it started on the cliffs around Praia Don Ana with a beautiful view of the land and the sea, approximately a hundred meters above the beach level. The surrounding was outstanding; it felt like the African savannah met the ocean – great location to start.Then Varia and the couple moved to the beach – and immediately got all the attention of the local people.I guess a bride running down the beach, swimming in the ocean and lying in the sand in the wedding dress was quite a surprise to them. Some of them even followed us for some time, others took pictures of us.It all was going great until Varia got deeper in the water and the couple started swimming. In the midst of the trash the dress shoot Varia tripped over a rock in the water and fell. All the equipment – the camera, flash, sync cord, batteries etc – was instantly dead, but the pictures on the card survived (kudos to Sandisk - their cards do not drown in salt water!).This is the TTD that we called “Trash the Dress and the Camera” session.(And the rest of the stuff was shot with backup equipment).But it was a lot of fun and well worth it.

On my 25th birthday on November 25th I left Toronto for my second time trip to Mayan Riviera this year. It was fun having my friends joining me for this trip to celebrate my “Champaign Birthday” and spending the whole week with them.
Ok, lets not forget the real reason why I came to Mexico!!!
I met Osi and Juan at ” Bridal Bash” organized by Megan Crouse. Megan is Toronto-based destination wedding specialist and a travel agent. Coupe weeks later I got a call from Osi asking me if I would be interested to photograph her wedding in Mexico in two month. Sure, I am always ready for travel and the first time I met this couple I though they would be great to work with and I was right.
We decided to trash one of Osi’s wedding dresses couple days before the wedding. I had this idea of having Mayan Ruins as a backdrop and I could vision it too. Note to all photographers you must have a permit to shoot in one of the archeological sites/ruins in Mayan Riviera. First we tried to get to famous Tulum ruins, but we where told that it was some kind of government event and solders patrolled every possible area. Oh forgot to tell you Osi and Juan are spanish-native speaking which helped a lot to find out that there are some ruins in area that no tourist go to.
We were told to go to Xel-ha archeological which was founded around 100 B.C. Osi, Juan and myself sneaked in for an hour to do first part of “Trash the Dress” session at this great site. And of cause we were respectful to the Mayan legecy. These site offered lots great loactions for photographs: giant trees and ruins were perfect to get some romantic shot of Osiris and Juan. The only thing that bothered - mosquitos!
Our second stop was Tulum beach - beautiful turquoise water and powder-like white sand. I seen this type of beach so far only in two other locations - Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands and Holguin, Cuba.
Osi and Juan are so easy going- they would do anything I would ask them to do - run, jump, laying on sand and wait when the big wave would come :)The night before I order the bottle of champaine to my room so I can bring it down tot the beach and use it for my pictures plus I realize it would make bride and groom more relaxed…lol… it was really cool photographing Osi and Juan opening bottle of champaine while waves would destruct them and move and push them it was same when they were drank it too.