Roman Alokhin: Blog

Anastesia and Steffen Wedding St Catherine of Siena Church Metairie

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Wed, 24 Jan 2018 03:33:43 GMT

This wedding featured elements of New Orleans and Ghana cultures. They have strong heritage in music, food and clothing. However, the most important asset of both cultures is the people. New Orleanians as well as Ghanaians are generous human beings who love celebrating life to the fullest.

We thank the newly weds Anastesia and Steffen for truly welcoming us (New Orleans wedding photographers) into their lives with this wedding that we will niver forget!

Ceremony: St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Church, Metairie

Reception: Magnolia Plantation, New Orleans

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Kimberly and Jamar Wedding Peristyle City Park New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Wed, 10 Jan 2018 04:40:03 GMT

This particular New Orleans wedding featured a wonderful mix of a tranquil ceremony at the Peristyle in City Park and an upbeat reception in the Central Business District. Peristyle's location provided an opportunity for us to create some romantic post-ceremony photographs of the couple and some fun shots of the bridal party.

The reception was held at the Federal Ballroom in the heart of New Orleans downtown (Central Business District), where century-old buildings give a sense of a history and sophistication.

We are very thankful to Kimberly and Jamar for inviting us to be part of this amazing day!

Ceremony: Peristyle, City Park, New Orleans

Reception: Federal Ballroom, New Orleans

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Yun and Dennis Wedding Royal Sonesta New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 21 Dec 2017 20:12:50 GMT

One of the things that we all love about New Orleans is variety and diversity of styles that are immediately apparent as one walks or rides the streets of the city. Same goes for our weddings that can range from loud and funky to quiet and formal and anything in between.

Yun and Dennis celebrated their marriage at the famous Royal Sonesta in the French Quarter in exceptional elegance. Fresh Lapsang tea that Yun's family brought from China was served as the wedding guests danced to some of Sinatra's famous songs.

Ceremony and reception: Royal Sonesta Hotel in the French Quarter, New Orleans, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Elizabeth and Walker Wedding Felicity Church New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 02 Nov 2017 03:32:54 GMT

Elizabeth and Walker exchanged vows at the gorgeous Felicity Church uptown. As part of New Orleans current rebirth period, some of the historic buildings are renovated to become venue spaces. This particular space is simply amazing and can look very authentic as a church for the ceremony or as a great open space for the reception. Elusive Expressions thanks Elizabeth and Walker for inviting us to be part of their gorgeous wedding!

Ceremony and reception: Felicity Church, New Orleans, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Josie and Jason Wedding Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Sun, 01 Oct 2017 13:43:27 GMT

New Orleans has some of the longest standing traditions and culture in the United States. Josie and Jason had their incredibly beautiful Greek Orthodox ceremony at Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral, which happens to be the oldest Greek Orthodox church in North and South America!

Families and kids dancing traditional Greek dances, wonderful Baklava and wedding cake! We can't say enough good things about this wedding! Not to mention, the church's spiritual leader Reverend Father George Wilson made us feel very welcome and a pleasure to work with!

Ceremony: Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral, New Orleans, LA

Reception: The Crossing, Kenner, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Kristin and Michael Wedding Creole Queen New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Tue, 19 Sep 2017 03:52:53 GMT

It's impossible to talk or think of New Orleans without, at least, mentioning the Mississippi River. Kristin and Michael celebrated their marriage on the beautiful Creole Queen river boat that cruised the Mississippi as the couple and their family and friends enjoyed the unique atmosphere of the paddlewheeler's surroundings, live music and spices of New Orleans cuisine.

Ceremony and Reception: Creole Queen paddlewheel boat, New Orleans, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Katie and George Wedding Degas House New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 20 Jul 2017 14:54:28 GMT

The story of Edgar Degas' coming to New Orleans is an amazing piece of history of this great city. Katie and George celebrated their special day at Degas House, where Edgar stayed with his family and painted some of his masterpieces. We feel honored to have photographed this momentous wedding!

Ceremony and Reception: Degas House, New Orleans, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Roman and Setareh

Victoria and Simon Wedding Louisiana Castle

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Tue, 27 Jun 2017 19:19:03 GMT

Gorgeous can mean beautiful or enjoyable. This particular wedding of Victoria and Simon was definitely both!

Ceremony and Reception: Louisiana Castle in Franklinton, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

Emma and Kelvin Wedding Parc73

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Sat, 24 Jun 2017 04:30:53 GMT

This was an amazing wedding at Parc 73 in Prairieville, LA with unpredictable weather and a wonderful couple, Emma and Kelvin. Rain came pouring down in the middle of the ceremony and only made this wedding so much more special :-)

Ceremony and Reception: Parc 73, Prairieville, LA

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

Rhanda and Justin Wedding New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 09 Mar 2017 15:29:15 GMT

We really wanted to photograph this wedding and Justin and Rhanda selected us as their New Orleans wedding photographers. We are very thankful for such a wonderful experience full of celebration and emotion.

Ceremony: Kingdom Hall Of Jehovah's Witnesses

Reception: Kenner City Park Pavillion

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

Maggie and Jason Wedding Birmingham

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Mon, 28 Nov 2016 02:14:31 GMT

Sometimes couples contact us to photograph destination weddings. This was one of them in Birmingham, Alabama and we certainly were happy to participate in this lovely wedding. The weather was perfect. Champagne and sparklers were aplenty. Dancing was not taken lightly. What a great trip!

Bride/Groom prep. location: Tutwiler Hotel

Ceremony/Reception location: Avondale Villa

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

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Afsane and Timothy Wedding Baton Rouge

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 20 Oct 2016 14:00:00 GMT

This was a very nice wedding in Baton Rouge. We really enjoyed meeting the couple's families and friends. Although time is always a luxury at a wedding, we were able to steal Afsane and Timothy from the wedding party and drive to downtown Baton Rouge for some creative photos.

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

Low Light Event Photography with Canon 5D Mark IV

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Tue, 11 Oct 2016 16:43:39 GMT

Just wanted to share my first impressions of Canon 5D Mark IV performance in low light with high ISO settings. This is a field test of the new camera and my thoughts on how it compares to my 5D Mark III that I’ve been using for the past 4 years.

I photographed an annual Love in the Garden event in the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden Sculpture Garden using the new camera with one lens - Canon EF 35mm f2 IS USM.

5D Mark IV ergonomics is basically the same as 5D Mark III, so there was no learning curve for me. I didn’t use the extra button below the joystick yet, but I can see that it would be useful for changing different types of focusing. I know some people configure it as their ISO button, but I’m so used to having “Set” button in combination with the Main Dial for changing ISO on my 5D Mark III that I configured it the same way on the Mark IV. The new camera is a little lighter, and I don’t know about others, but I can tell a difference.

The first thing that was truly striking about this camera was focusing speed in live view. Compared to the older model, it was night and day difference. If you shoot in live view mode, this will be enough to buy the 5D Mark IV. I was so used to using the joystick for moving the focusing point in live view that I kept forgetting about the touch screen focusing functionality. Even then, I was still impressed how much faster I could focus.

As far as single point (non-tracking) viewfinder focusing goes, I could also tell that there was improvement, although not as dramatic as in live view. I would say it’s about a 20% better than 5D Mark III, which is quite good. It is not as apparent until there is practically no light in the scene, then, you can tell that 5D Mark IV grabs focus better and faster.

High ISO performance is about the same as 5D Mark III or a little better. In practical use, I couldn’t tell a difference. The fact that the files are larger will make a greater difference for how much you can enlarge the photos though. Overall a good thing for people who make large prints.

One other thing that I’ve been waiting for, which is very important for my wedding work, is a faster SD card slot that was a problem for me on the Mark III. Since I shoot to CF and SD cards simultaneously, there have been some candid moments that I had missed with the Mark III because it would lock up while dumping its buffer through a slow SD slot.

I will add more observations to this post as I spend more time with this camera. Would I recommend buying 5D Mark IV? If you use live view and need larger files, definitely YES. Otherwise, 5D Mark III is still a very good camera.

Photos below have been processed with Adobe Lightroom CS. No noise reduction or sharpening applied. Several photos exposure adjustment was increased by half-a-stop or a full-stop.

P.S. July 2017

Now, 10 months after getting the 5D Mark IV and photographing dozens of events and weddings with it, I still observe the same things I wrote about above; however, a few things changed in the way I photograph.

Firstly, I use the rear LCD screen a lot more often than I thought I would, with its fast dual pixel focusing system. It's particularly useful when I put the camera above my head to get a high perspective shot or if I need to get a closeup shot low to the ground.

Secondly, I am getting more and more used to metering for highlights and pushing the shadows in post production to increase the overall dynamic range of the image. With 5D Mark III, I was usually recovering highlights since the shadow detail of that sensor wasn't as good when pushed 2-3 stops. The way I do it now with 5D Mark IV seems like just another way to get the same thing as before, but I do get better results now in terms of overall information in highlight and shadow areas.

Finally, I definitely notice a bump in focusing speed between this generation camera and the previous one. It's quiet noticeable when I use my 5D Mark III as a backup to the Mark IV.

The one thing to keep in mind if you're considering purchasing a 5D Mark IV, is file size and post production. My mid 2012 Macbook Pro with a

quad core I7, 2.6 Ghz processor and 16Gb. of RAM has taken a pretty big hit in performance. My desktop system with a quad core I7, 4.0 Ghz and 32Gb of RAM doesn't have any issues, but that's a lot of processing power. Just something to keep in mind if you're running on an older system.

Venue: Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden

Organizer: New Orleans Museum of Art

Music performances: Storyville Stompers Brass Band, Mojeaux, and DJ Nikki Pennie

Photographer: Roman Alokhin

ISO 5000, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 3200, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 2500, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 8000, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 6400, +1 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 12800, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 12800, +1 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 12800, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 8000, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 12800

ISO 5000, +1 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 6400, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 3200

ISO 8000, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

ISO 12800

ISO 12800, +0.5 Exposure in Lightroom

Reading Series with Jami Attenberg and Lara Naughton

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Mon, 03 Oct 2016 01:57:59 GMT

Was invited by a writer friend, Taylor Murrow, to photograph a Dogfish reading series with Jami Attenberg (author of a New York Times Bestseller "The Middlesteins") , and Lara Naughton (author of "The Jaguar Man"). Had a wonderful time!

Elusive Expressions photographer: Roman Alokhin

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Kaycie and Jay Wedding New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Tue, 27 Sep 2016 00:40:52 GMT

It's always a pleasure to photograph a friends' wedding. This time, particularly, it was an incredibly special day with location and weather changes. And what a bunch of wonderful people. Makes us very happy to do what we do!

Bride/Groom prep. location: Le Pavillon Hotel downtown New Orleans

Ceremony/Reception location: Rosy's Jazz Hall

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman

Alycia and Robby Engagement New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Fri, 02 Sep 2016 14:30:00 GMT

Had a great time photographing a friend's engagement.

Location: City Park

New Orleans wedding photographer: Roman

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Jenn and Mike Wedding New Orleans

roman@alokhin.com (Roman Alokhin) — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 02:27:05 GMT

Ceremony venue: Christ Church Cathedral

Reception venue: Elms Mansion

Elusive Expressions New Orleans wedding photographers: Setareh and Roman