You know how they say that if your house burnt down, the first thing that most people would take with them are their photographs? Well sometimes we forget to make time to have professional photographs taken with the people we love. We wish we didn’t wait 6 whole years until we asked one of our favourite Canberra photographers Dan O’Day to spend the afternoon photographing us. We realised that we’ve spent so much time photographing other people’s relationships with their family and friends, that we’d neglected to document our own!
Why have your photograph taken when you get engaged? Well when we’re old, these photographs will be a reminder of this time in our lives. Technically we weren’t actually engaged at the time, but we’d been living and working together for 3 years and we had mutually decided that we’d get married someday. There was just no ring to prove it! Thank you Dan for giving us a gift that we could never give to ourselves.
I also just want to take a minute to explain to whoever might read this, exactly why I think Dan is such a great photographer. Many years ago (maybe 7 or so?) I watched one of his presentations. He talked about a photography project he worked on in the early hours of the morning when he couldn’t sleep. In the past I’ve found that being creative helped me deal with anxiety, and I really connected to Dan’s story and how open and honest he was about his own struggles. In between then and 2016 when he won the title of Australian Wedding Photographer of the Year, there were many years of incredibly hard work. It wasn’t an easy road of writing a couple of blog posts here and there, and photographing a few weddings for famous people. It required dedication, passion and putting 110% into everything he did. That’s why I think Dan is such a great photographer. I’ve always respected him for this, and I also admire him for who he is as a person. We admire his soon to be wife Andrea equally. Together they are a wonderful team, and it’s important that we all remind ourselves how lucky we are to have inspirational, considerate, genuine and honest friends in our lives. Friendships and family are everything. Tell your people that you love them. Tell them often.
– Anthea
We have too many favourite photos, so here are just a few of them.
