Hazelwood Photo

I used Hazelwood Photo to document an even of mine and couldn’t have been more pleased with the results. Sarah’s style is natural, bright, organic, and fun. She knows how to capture great moments without intruding. I really appreciate her help and couldn’t recommend her more highly! Amazing experience!

My life as a fiancé and preparing for my wedding, consisted on pinning on pinterest and oohing and aahing over lovely wedding blogs and magazines. I knew I wasn’t going to have a beachfront, floral infused wedding, but I wanted to remember that beautiful day and have the photographs to look back on. I found Sarah from hazelwood photo on ruffled, and I immediately looked on her webpage. I absolutely LOVED her approach to the wedding pictures, the only thing was she lived in Portland, and I am in Tucson, Arizona. Thankfully, she was happy to come down for our event and I got my pictures back today, and Oh My Goodness, I would tell you a thousand times over and over again to book her. I looked at my gallery and I was there again. I looked prettier than I have ever seen myself, she captured shots that took me back. I had a huge party and not a lot of room as I was getting ready and I felt like I was running behind but sarah kept it together for me, and delicately placed us perfectly. i am forever grateful that I have a timeless gallery of wedding pictures. Sarah is very professional and always has communicated super well. thank you sarah!!!

I was very careful about hiring a photographer for my wedding. To me this was one of the most important parts of the wedding since the photos are your memories. I found Sarah on a blog and fell in love with her pictures and styling right away. Even though I live in Los Angeles she was very accommodating to make time to meet with us when she was out here. She is very sweet and professional. The first time we met, I left and told my husband that she is the kind of person I would totally be friends with :)
After we hired her, she was great again about scheduling our engagement photos and even suggested the location which we were so happy with– Catalina Island!
On our wedding day– this girl worked her butt off! We had a lot of pictures to take and she made everything happen. Sarah is totally committed to making you happy. Even when I could tell she was probably exhausted and trying to wrangle everyone in for photos she stayed calm and with a smile on her face. Also– she is very good about giving direction. My husband and I were a little clueless but Sarah totally helped us.
When we got our pictures back I just about died (in a good way). I’m just completely blown away by how amazing they look. Sarah caught all the right moments and everything turned out gorgeous! I wish I had another event I could hire her for. I would recommend her to any of my friends.

My husband and I are both in the design/​photography industry, so naturally we thoroughly scrutinized Portland photographers before deciding on one for our summer wedding. We interviewed several, poured over portfolios and read hundreds of reviews. Hazelwood photo was immediately included in our top 3 choices. I reviewed Hazelwood’s portfolio and site many times and each time I was struck by the images of couples not just gorgeous because of their wedding garb and styling, but for the way Sarah and team captured the subtle light nuances, spontaneous compositions and expressions, and spirit of the event that is unique to each couple. Sarah succeeds in capturing not only the posed and suspected moments of a wedding, but the details, the emotions, and the moments you didn’t expect to see that make up the day. Upon meeting Sarah, we were instantly impressed with her level of professionalism, confidence and seriousness mixed with kindness that makes you trust her and know that her presence will not be a hinderance on your big day. Although quality was more important to us than price, Hazelwood’s rates were also surprisingly very reasonable compared to the competition.
Sarah was very responsive to all my inquiries before the event, was flexible in meeting all of our needs, and was very gracious even when I handed her a two page laundry list of items I wanted her to capture in the short time frame of the wedding. She somehow managed to check off every one, and then some! She willingly drove to a remote location in the gorge that we had chosen for our first look shots, and on the way she noticed a large white tipi and suggested we do a quick renegade shoot there as well… which was above and beyond our expectations and turned out to be a brilliant idea adding an unexpected twist to our portraits!
A day after the wedding, I was elated to receive a few select images to whet our appetites for what was to come. They were gorgeous and gave us instant results and something that we could share with guests and in our thank you cards. So cool!
We received our portfolio of images in exactly the time that we were quoted. They were displayed on a super professional and easy to use site that we were able to share with guests. We loved the feature of being able to mark selects, order prints and see them all easily with no loading difficulties or delays. The images blew our minds and expectations! We got the posed and requested shots as expected, but also shots of every hand crafted detail we had labored over, images of our vendors in action, and tons of candid images of our guests, toasts, and venue throughout the evening. As a bonus, I was surprised to find Sarah had spontaneously composed shots of the décor and details around my home as I was getting ready. Needless to say, these summed up our vibe and style and made the collection feel so personal, intimate, and truly ours. Also, I usually despise the «hanging dress» portraits that you always see, but the way Sarah composed mine, in my garden framed by the rich textures of the garden shed and flowers in bloom, it turned out to be one of my favorites!
One thing that I was worried about initially was having a photographer over-​edit our images, adding too many effects or colors that we would want to strip off before printing. Sarah was not willing to give us raw images, and asked us to trust her editing since it is part of her final touch and look. I’m SO glad we did, since the images are perfect and not overdone. The colors are rich, the skin tones look soft but vibrant, everything is crispy and textured, and ALL the images are perfectly print ready! I can’t even imagine if I actually received raw images since it would take ages for me to get them even close to this level and after the wedding chaos its the last thing that I would want to do!
All in all, I would recommend Hazelwood a hundred times over. I am obsessed with her work and completely trust her eye. She is a true gem and I hope to get to work with her again for another event. Five stars all around!