Eddie and Amber saw us TWO years ago at a bridal show and said “we HAVE to have you… and the BOSE… and that sub!” They are a young, Christian, enthusiastic couple who had MANY ideas about an exciting New Year’s Eve wedding celebration with their closest friends and family.

So the challenge? The location was a church gym; A gym with a balcony that allowed some of the lighting to have a higher vantage point.

The easy part? I worked with Joette from Party People Celebration Company and Marilyn with Flowers by Marilyn. EASY WORK! These two ladies, coupled with Monica (my lead lighting designer) and Derek (senior tech) made the gym transformation super easy. I promise you won’t even recognize that it’s a gym!

Oh yeah, and there was a WICKED COOL balloon drop!!

So what did the lighting include?

• Well, we had 4 totems around the dance floor lit in a cool white (camera didn’t show it as cool) with a moving head on top of each one.
• Baby blue uplights adorned the entire room, even warming up the swag and drapes that Joette set up
• White trussing held scanners (which were used as spotlights), special requested effects lights, and dance floor floods. Trussing was lit up in wedding colors.
• The balcony held two leikos which projected a really nice pattern on the wall. The pattern rotated super slowly!
• The balcony also held floods which lit the entire area where the tables were placed. A couple of blacklights gave the white décor a very subtle pop. We didn’t want to saturate it.
• Blue and green stars grazed the area between the balloon drops.
• A blue liquid sky made a special appearance that transformed this beautiful wedding into a chic night club!

LOTS of beautiful pics and three videos… two timelapses and an event recap! What an AMAZING New Year’s Eve!!!!!!!

Oh yes, and a Snap Yourself Silly Photobooth added to the perfect ambiance!!!

First time lapse (from up high):

Second time lapse (floor level):

And the event itself!

I gotta admit, this was a wicked cool wedding. Sean and Jennifer are an awesome couple who love to have fun and wanted to have a wedding celebration that reflects just that. With a very diverse playlist (Soulja Boy to Steve Earl), they were open to all ideas I had for them.

The Huntington Hills Golf & Country Club (Northside Lakeland) looked beautiful thanks to swags and drapes by Flowers by Marilyn. Our lighting décor also gave the perfect touch. Both Sean and Jennifer were awed by how beautiful the room looked!

Package chosen:
*Entertainment Coordinator
*Ceremony System
*Dance Under Stars
*Dance Lighting
*Full room uplighting
*Under-table lighting
*Pinspot Lighting (to highlight the cake cutting)

See the awesome pics and video below! Thanks to Tim Hicklin from Storybook Weddings for encouraging my wife to piggyback the camera behind his so we can take advantage of his camera light!

Leeanne and Paul are an awesome couple. I love people who I can joke with and not worry so much about being a stuffy professional– I felt like I was able to relax and really have fun with this whole crowd. The whole night was amazing as we got to set up an entire nightclub at this wedding. Here’s the list of what we set up:

• 4 lit up columns around the dance floor with moving heads on them
• Blue laser
• Color-changing uplighting
• LED Floods
• Aerial effects lights
• Haze to bring it all together
• 2 Realistic Water Reflection Effects on the dance  floor.
• Game Show system customized with questions about Leeanne and Paul
• …and slide shows!

A big congrats go out to Collin and Jerrika Aiken!

They wanted to have a PARTY from the beginning the reception started and party they did! The ceremony was moved indoors due to the rain, but that didn’t slow anyone down. Pete (my assistant) and I rearranged certain parts of the room to prep it for the ceremony.

Everything looked beautiful and the rain was just a sign of God’s promise to a new beginning in their lives.

The reception was great, featuring their first dance on clouds using our one of a kind system.

The dance crowd was small, but they danced large! Pete and I had a blast!

Package Chosen:

• Premier (Upgraded to Entertainment Coordinator compliments of APE)
• Custom D’Elegance Lighting Package with Uplights
• Lighted Columns
• Dance on the Clouds

Check out some amazing photos by KC Photography and a video below!

Pete and I by our setup as we clean up our area.

The setup for the head table/ceremony altar!

First dance on clouds… Mr. and Mrs. Aiken look in awe at the stars on the ceiling!

Dancing begins!

Pete, Collin, Jerrika, and myself.

And now a video!

I absolutely love Lake Ashton… the food and service are stellar. It’s even better when you have AMAZING weather and the bride and groom are the best people to work with. Yup… this wedding went VERY well.

Christine and Blake wanted to have a good time… whether people danced or not wasn’t their main concern as much as it was making sure that everyone left with a smile on their face.

My wife and I enjoyed setting up, there was a member of Lake Ashton practicing for the talent show… he blessed us with his talents on the piano playing songs from Van Halen’s “Jump” to Queen to Disney… for the first time ever, I asked for a request!

The emotion flowed through Lake Ashton during the ceremony, Christine and her father, Davis, were so excited that they shared tears of joy before David escorted his little girl down the aisle.

The reception was  a blast! The photographer, Sofia (http://www.PhotographyBySofia.com), was a lot of fun to work with and I hope to be sharing some of her photos here soon! Christine and Blake worked really hard to plan their special day to make sure their guests felt special, too… and I think they achieved that goal!

The uplighting was awesome… we designed it to change colors throughout the evening…. during dinner, they alternated between their wedding colors.
Check out some great iPhone photos as well as a cool YouTube video. The lighting setup was elegant (no trussing, no ugly tripods, but it flooded the room with color… even the uplighting changed color according to mood!)…. YouTube doesn’t do a great job of keeping the video as bright as it was originally, so click the HQ to see a better quality video.

Package chosen:

Entertainment Coordinator

Colorchanging Uplighting

Light Columns

Dance Under the Stars

D’Elegance Lighting

Ceremony System/Coordination

LIbby & Jess were a pleasure to work with and I enjoyed every bit of it– despite the rain! Even though it dumped all over the equipment for the ceremony, it still worked (thank God!) for the entire evening. We had a large setup in a tent with over 200 people.. so we had to make good use of the room we had! These people were here to PARTY… The entire celebration lasted over 8 hours!

Lights Transformed their Tent

Here’s some highlights:

* We did a Jeopardy-style game show.

* White trussing lit up to match the wedding colors

* BOSE Sound System

* Uplights

* Live Video Camera

* Starfield!

Libby & Jess wanted this to be a casual-style wedding, and requested I don’t wear slacks or a tie. So I came in dress jeans and a coat jacket. During the game show, I got to put on my “Gameshow Host Jacket.” Absolute cheese, but everyone loved it!

So check out the pics by clicking below! The first 9 are from a Alex Gilliard, an amazing photographer! Check him out at AlexGilliard.com

The rest of the pics were taken on my iPhone… and of course a video!

Gotta love it when someone answers a question 1/2 right and “judges” have to make a call. There’s my assistant, Derek.

“I’ll take ‘Before the Wedding’ for $300″

Got it right!

“She Cheated!”

An amazing shot from Alex. The lighting REALLY transformed the tent!

Teaching line dances… with a stupid look on Derek and my faces. We were still waiting for the cold front to come in. It was around 80*+ in there.

Everyone was singing along… Derek had to open a crack on the tent to let some cool air in.

Someone requested Tom Jones’s “Not Unusual”

Here’s the place on the way in… 2000+ acres. We saw deer on the way back!

No, the house isn’t tilted.. just a windshield refracting side effect.

Uplights, LED floods, video screen (only place we could put it) and the starfield!

This cute lil’ guy was chasing the lights the entire time. We had fun controlling them as he chased them around the room.

Dance!!

Ok.. the last two pics need some explanation. We were way out in the beautiful country in Hardee County. They rented porta-potties as the rest rooms. These always amuse me because people write clever (sometimes) sayings on the walls. Whoever rented this before wins hands down. Check out the writing next to the urinal.

“This way to Mexico”

I’m not sure why, but that’s the funniest thing ever!!!

And now, video!