"It is the best job imaginable, and I can hardly believe that I get paid for something I love so much," Gene told me. He met me during the lunch break of a photo workshop he attended in San Francisco. With the help of his laptop, he showed me his work, hundreds of beautiful photographs full of laughter and a zest for life. He is a wonderful person with whom you want to spend your wedding day.It is hard to comprehend, but Gene almost missed his calling. Luckily, he had to sign up for a photography class as a prerequisite course for his art history studies in college. After a few assignments his instructor took him aside and told him that he had a great talent, and he should do something with it. He followed the advice and worked for a photographer in the area before he started on his own.

Now, after several years in the wedding industry, he has made a name for himself. His distinctive style in which he fuses the background with his "models" seems to be created on the spur of the moment. Often engagement pictures are taken during strolls through a city, on a beach, or in the country side. I loved one with the couple kissing as they perched on the heavy art deco furniture the waiting room at the train station. Another showed the couple leaning on the reflecting metal wall of a modern structure. And another featured an exuberantly laughing couple tumbling down a children's slide. They don't seem staged; they just seemed to have happened. The first two pictures scored highly in the 2005 wppi print competition.

His wedding albums are spectacular. He intersperses the photos of bride and groom with details from the wedding: favors, a veil, a hairdo, a single shoe, all seen through the eye of an artist. His clients love his personality and his work, and my friends who worked together with him on several occasions had to say: "He is an excellent photographer and a fun guy. I cannot rave enough about how well he treated bride and groom and the entire wedding party. He is one of the few who also attends rehearsal dinners."