Nestldown Wedding in Santa Cruz, CA with 35mm Film Photography

All I can really say about Nestldown is IF YOU KNOW, YOU KNOW.

Tucked away in the Santa Cruz mountains in a small little town called Los Gatos just a couple turns off Highway 17, is the immaculately gorgeous redwood venue that has infinite areas to explore.

REDWOOD WEDDING VENUE

First off there is the redwood grove that, in my opinion, would be what this venue is famous for. There are these very dramatic (in a good way) steps that take you into the redwood grove. I’ll be honest, as a working vendor at this venue the stairs are an obstacle but as a guest it gives you such a unique experience and really explains why getting married in Santa Cruz, or California for that matter, is the absolute best place in the United States. The creators of this venue truly brought the phrase: “fairytale wedding” to life with this.

CALIFORNIA FILM PHOTOGRAPHER

As beautiful as it is, photographing in any redwood venue poses it’s own set of challenges on sunny and cloudy days. 1. on bright, sunny days you constantly have to be mindful of the pockets of light and shadow because of how the light shines through the trees and makes harsh shadows and bright highlights in a very concentrated area. For example: there could be a bright highlight shining on the groom, but the bride could be in complete shadow all because of how the trees cast shade and how the light shines through. 2. On cloudy, gloomy days even though the light is nice and even in open areas, within the redwoods the environment could be a couple “stops” darker because of all the shade that the trees cast. And because of the amount of shade the trees provide, daylight, or lack thereof gets dimmer much quicker. And if you shoot film (me!) that makes it a tiny bit more difficult because film needs plenty of light.

But even with all my panicking, both the digital and film photos turned out amazing, anyways, on to the photos…

And if you make it to the end of this post, there will be a link to the entire gallery!