Author: MASadmin

One great thing about having a roommate who speaks Korean is that you get to hear about all the cool variety shows that cover Korean tv. They are quite different from American reality shows. Sure, they have contestants, contests, and celebrities, but the shows are more gimmicky and less serious than the shows in the US. I don’t understand them but the simple fact that the Korean subtitles on their reality shows are the producers making commentary about the show, while you watch it, is something that I enjoy. It’s like they understand that watching your tv is interactive – if you’re not making commentary, yelling at the screen, or rolling your eyes so loud your neighbors complain about the noises, then you’re not getting the whole TV watching experience.

One show is called We Got Married. The premise is simple. Celebrities are teamed up together to live as “newly weds”. Every week they have a new challenge to complete and the show is basically the couples watching themselves compete while giving their own commentary after it happened. After 100 days together, the couple celebrates their “marriage” by having wedding photography done. My roommate has decided that this is how her wedding pictures are going to turn out even if she has to go to South Korea to get them done.

TLC needs to get this show and Americanize it. I would watch.

I’m not going to lie, I find inspiration boards interesting. The concept behind them is easy – it’s merely a collection of images to match your wedding scheme. If you have a color and a season, you have all you need. But, even with my professional background, I’m a complete fail when it comes to these. The idea of trying to put together a complete collage of inspirational wedding pictures is daunting. I haven’t even been able to organize the magazine articles and ads I clip from men fashion magazines – there’s no way I could throw an inspiration board together quickly.

But she can.

Here’s the board she made for my fiancee. She told her that our color was white and it would be in the Spring.

Neat, no?

The idea behind them is not to look for perfection and find every nicknack that is going to be in your reception hall. The idea is to merely try to quickly get an overall sense of what you’re going for with the overall look and feel of the wedding. And sometimes the best person to do that is a complete stranger on the internet.

As an amateur photographer, I understand the appeal of playing with the RAW settings on your digital images and increasing the brightness/exposure to the point where the whites are really white, bright, and dazzling. In fact, if you whites aren’t as white as Joe Biden’s teeth, most people feel you’re doing your photography wrong. But what I refuse to tolerate is wedding photography where brown skin is white washed into oblivion.

Prune Prune Prune

I’m Mexican-American, my skin is brown. I like it, enjoy it, and like that even in the dead of winter, I’m not pale. Well, that’s not true. I do become pale – just my version of pale which is a light milk chocolate. Not only do I enjoy my skin, I’m pretty proud of it and what it represents: my ancestry, my family, and where I come from. I enjoy the history of it.

But God help the wedding photographer who does to me and my lovely fiancee what they did to that couple I linked above.

The guy is Asian, his fiancee is white. By increasing the white wash factor, the woman of the couple fades into Casper land and the Asian guy skin tone ends up matching his future wife’s. The distinct individualities of the people in the couple disappear and they become merely some gelatinous blob of over exposed ridiculousness. In fact, her facial features seem to vanish into the background and where she starts and ends isn’t distinct. The photographer might have been trying to be artistic or trying to symbolically show that the couple is now “one flesh” but, come on, this is an unflattering and ugly way to do it. Or it’s possible that the young woman, who admits to being photographed, preferred the photographer to render her in a fantasy/un-realistic way but, ugh. This is not an appealing way to photograph someone.

I realize that at the more wedding photography I look at, my standards and wants are getting stricter. I’m starting to realize how big of a team I’d like, the equipment I’d want them to use, and the style I’d like them to use. I want a photographer who, when I look at their pictures, I can learn from them. I know I’m not that good but, from my first glance at wedding photographers in my area, maybe I’m expecting too much. We’ll see.

I’m a snob – I’ll admit it. I consider myself to be a person with taste, sophistication, and I’m rather opinionated. If I see something I dislike, I’m going to say I don’t like it. If I find something “beneath me”, I’m gonna say it. I might be semi-tactful about it but I’m not going to lie and pretend that something is wonderful when I don’t think it is. And I’m not going to take out my own frustrations with my own view of self, my own personal failure at matching my own personal level of taste and sophistication, by making backstabbing complements about other people and their opinions. My wedding might not have the napkin rings I want but I’m not going to post a fake compliment about yours and how “rustic” or “handy” they seem. Your napkin rings stand on their own and should stand on their own. I’m not going to be THAT person.

But it seems other people don’t share my views.

The poster, Miss D’orsay, wrote a blog post about budget weddings. Well, that’s at least how it originally appears but, after a quick read, it’s obvious that she’s not talking about budget weddings. What she’s trying to do is ask the world to pity her because, to keep within her budget, she’s not allowed to do the things she wants to do. I am, somehow, suppose to feel sorry that her budget doesn’t allow her to hire someone to do her makeup. And not only that, I’m also to tolerate her personal view that a $10,000 dollar wedding is considered ‘cheap’ and ‘a real budget wedding’. Backyard, restaurants, and other venues are ‘quaint’ and look at how lovely these poor people’s events turned out! Her post screams of snobbery but snobbery in its worse form. She laments not having the budget to be able to buy everything and she’s taking it out on others.

Some people will try to claim that this is her attempt to talk herself down, comfort herself, and to force herself to realize that a cheaper wedding can be quite beautiful. I don’t believe that. Her piss poor analogy on her jean size and finding a wedding that “fits” her is what does her in. A size 14 jean does not mean one is rich and opulent – in our society, a size 0 does. You can almost see the frustration in her writing and, if I’m allowed to read between the lines, a certain amount of depression that she’s not given the chance to have the expensive princess wedding of her dream. This isn’t fit and this isn’t an argument about needs or wants. This is just a post crying for pity.

And pity seeking snobs are the most pathetic snobs of them all.

It’s easy to look at those who are wealthier than you, to look at the pristine pictures in the magazines, and to someone feel that you’re not up to the task. Life isn’t a magazine – you’re not allowed to spend three weeks photoshopping your life, airbrushing your freckles, and stand on a box so that during the ceremony you can be taller than your bride. Being a snob isn’t striving for that level of perfection – being a snob is understanding taste, sophistication and how to work that into your life. And, amazingly enough, a lot of that isn’t bought off a rack – it’s tailored to you or you make it yourself. So if you want a wedding to match your snobbery, you need to have taste yourself. The problem is that a lot of people DON’T have taste but automatically assume they do. And if you don’t have that, it doesn’t matter what your budget is because whatever you do is going to fail. You will then spend your life lamenting the details and what didn’t go right at your wedding. I won’t be like that. I have taste, I have sophistication but I also understand what needs to happen to make my wedding sparkle. And money isn’t what’s going to do it.

Hopefully this is that Miss D’orsay and brides will eventually learn or else they’re going to renew their vows everything three years hoping to “get it right” but never, ever will.

And why? Because I have one from here sitting in my fiancee’s fridge waiting to be eaten. Eaten by me that is. This, of course, leads me to this wonderful creations : The cupcake tower.

Yes I am raiding MarthStewart.com.

It’s a good idea for a wedding cake. Cupcakes are small, cheap, and – depending on your guestlist – it’s entirely possible for everyone to get one and plan it so that very few leftovers are left. But this isn’t exactly a great idea for a wedding if you’re expecting over 250 people (and yes I am expecting that much – my fiancee and I are THOSE PEOPLE who have to select the final option on wedding size when it comes to online forms). And this won’t work for people who either can’t eat sugar or who aren’t cake people – which, sadly, is a large chunk of the people at our church who will be invited to the wedding. Which leads me to the idea of a dessert/cake buffet.

So what should the buffet have?

Doughnuts?

Meringues?

Mini Angel Food Cakes?

Mini Lemon Tarts?

Pies?

And then maybe display them like this.

Hmm. And since this is going to be a ‘light’ reception, and will consist mostly of standing-room only, by keeping the dishes to mini/hand held desserts, it’ll make it easy for people to not only eat, but also to keep it varied enough to accommodate all the different eating styles of people that will be in attendance. I had though, for awhile, that I would want a cake buffet but that’s not feasible because, if you don’t have chairs and tables, who’s going to be able to eat a piece of cake? But everyone will be able to ingest a small mini tart or cookie or the like.

Huh. I just came up with a pretty good idea. /me pats self on the back.