From the beginning of my wedding planning, photography was THE most important aspect to us, as far as wedding vendors and details go. After the wedding day, all you have left (besides the spouse and the memories!) are your pictures and/or video. Plus, keep in mind, everyone tells you that the day goes by so fast, well that is an understatement. Not only does it go by fast, but it is a whirlwind, and there are so many moments that you "forget". Well, thanks to Juan and his team, every moment of our wedding day is captured and we could not be happier.

Overall: I cannot recommend Juan and his team enough! To say they are dedicated to their art would be a huge understatment. These guys go above and beyond to catch every moment, to make every shot beautiful, and to make sure you are happy. You will not find a better team with a better product at a better price than Juan's.

Communication: Juan has always been prompt in responding to my emails and questions since our very first interaction. I had reached out to him via email for information on package pricing. Throughout, from the time of booking (about 11 months prior to our wedding) to our wedding day and beyond, I was in almost constant contact with Juan via email. He answered every question I could ever have in a prompt manner. A few weeks before the wedding, he sent me an email with questions about certain things/shot we wanted on the wedding day. Tip: I sent him a list of "formal" shots I wanted (family shots, bridal party shots, etc.) via email with my answers to his questions. On the day of the wedding, he and his assistant whipped out their phones and went through the list, ensuring we got every single shot I requested.

Packages/Pricing: Based upon his packages, and our wants/needs, we chose to book 8 hours of wedding day photography coverage (Juan & his assistant, Daniel) plus a Trash the Dress session (Juan, Daniel & a 2nd assistant) the next day for 2 hours. With our package, we received all of our photos on DVD and a photo album. I had made a list of 5-6 photographers whose style I liked, and reached out to all of them. Juan was at the top of my list, but I thought he'd be too expensive for us. Once pricing came back from all of the vendors and I created a spreadsheet to compare, Juan was one of the most competitively priced vendors. I signed the contract with him, paid a deposit, and we were set. Another thing I would recommend is to book at least 8 hours of wedding day coverage. We have shots of every aspect of our wedding, which resulted in us receiving over 1500 edited images of our wedding day! There are so many things that you "forget" happened because of the pace of the day, and you will be so glad that Juan & his team captured those little details for you. We only booked our videographer for 5 hours, and when I look at the photos that Juan & Daniel captured after the videographer had left, I think "I wish I had booked the videographer for longer because he missed SO much!" Ensure you don't feel that way when looking at your wedding pictures and book the full day of wedding coverage for photography!

Product/Timeline: A day or two after our wedding, Juan posted 1 teaser picture of our wedding day and 1 teaser picture of our TTD session on his Facebook page ("like" his page, you see so many pictures!) About 1 month after our wedding, Juan posted a blog entry of photos from our wedding day with a full set of teaser pictures. (Take a look at the blog entry to see just how many little moments they captured.) About 5 weeks after our wedding, Juan posted all of our wedding pictures to a site for us to choose 150 for our photo album. I then sent him a list of our 150 photos (including altering some of the coloring on the pictures for the album), and he sent me back another link to the wedding album layout. Once I approved the layout, it took about a week (6 1/2 weeks since the wedding) to receive our wedding album (beautiful!) and 6 DVDs of our wedding and TTD pictures. The wedding album is absolutely gorgeous - hard cover with our names on the front, and the pictures are arranged so beautifully. The pictures are printed onto hard cardstock pages. Very elegant and clean-looking.

Day Of: Juan arrived at my resort, The Royal Playa del Carmen, around 1:30pm for my 4pm wedding. He and Daniel introduced themselves and started setting up their equipment. They spent a ton of time with "the girls" getting ready and around 3pm, Daniel went to spend time with "the guys" for getting ready pictures. Weather was iffy on the day of our wedding, and our ceremony/cocktail hour/reception were all scheduled to be outdoors. Around 2:30pm, my WC called & said we should move everything inside. After I hung up the phone, Juan respectfully disagreed with her, saying he felt we could at least do the ceremony outside (which was the most important thing to me to have outdoors). He would take pictures of the weather in the distance and show them to me, which made me more confident when my WC called back at 3pm and said we could move the ceremony back outdoors. Thanks to Juan, I felt ok with that decision!

Thanks to Juan's help, we had our beautiful ceremony in the Oceanfront Gazebo at the Royal Playa del Carmen.

After our ceremony, we did some formal shots in the Gazebo, including the obligatory group shot.

We then headed down towards the beach for some shots of just my groom and I.

After about an hour of shooting on the beach and surrounding areas, we made our way to our reception. Juan & Daniel hit the mark of capturing every important detail and the tone of our wedding.

TTD: The following day, we did our TTD session on the beaches near our resort. We were now working with Juan, Daniel, and a 2nd assistant, who they called "Gordo", lol. We met at 9am for the shoot, and Juan had us walk down the beach a bit for "more interesting" scenery.

We started out nice and dry on a pier...

But then it was water time...

Tip for TTD: Make sure you eat a full breakfast! It is tiring being in the water with your dress on (mine was SO heavy wet!) and you will be exhausted by the time you are done if you are playing in the waves. Also make sure you wear sunscreen and bring some towels to wipe your eyes!

If you have any other questions, please feel free to contact me! I'm going to post all of my professional pictures on our photo sharing site (password: playa), if you want to see them.

Edited on 10/31/12 to add: I'm in NJ and we were hit by Hurricane Sandy. Last night, I got a message from Juan asking how we made out with the hurricane, that he was worried about us, and asking if there was anything he could do. I was SO touched by him sending that message, it really speaks to his character. Plus, he's an awesome photographer. :)