2017 - Adventure Weddings & Elopements
In July of 2016 we had just gotten off the Pacific Crest Trail after three months of hiking through the mountains & living in a tent. We arrived in back in Texas and quickly felt the call to the mountains and finally felt the courage to make a major change in our lives. We got rid of the last of our unnecessary belongings and moved into our tiny Honda CR-V the following month. Unsure of how to get paid work, we entertained the idea of doing adventurous wedding & couples photography as our means of living. We launched our website that month & headed west with just one wedding on the books.
We ended up in Colorado, and this year has been an absolute whirlwind. We booked more weddings than we ever expected, traveled to places we'd never been, spent lots of hours in front of a computer, and got to experience the fullness of joy and stress and adventure and real, raw beauty that is wedding photography. Nate and I worked side by side almost every day this year. Its been a learning and growing, pushing and pulling experience that has forced us closer than we've ever been.
All the late nights spent finishing up galleries, all the emails, website coding, hours spent stressing over captions on social media, miles of trails we scouted, endless google researching for locations, all of the time, money, and stress put into building our business into what it is has paid off in so many beautiful ways. We've been able to travel and experience the amazing stories our couples have. Several of our couples have become dear friends. And the best part of it all is that its provided a way for Nate and me to do something we love together, and sustain a life in pursuit of adventure, stories, and friendship.
Wrapping up an entire year into one cohesive post has been difficult to say the least, and to begin thinking about goals for next year feels overwhelming in comparison to all of the amazing and unexpected things that happened in 2017. But it all breaks down into something simple. I want more of the same for 2018, but deeper & richer. We are excited to work with more couples who are passionate about the outdoors, to travel to new places, to take intentional time off for our own personal adventures, and to grow into better people as we pursue a life of intention.
A few things we did in 2017:
We shot 27 weddings, 3 elopements, and 20 something couples sessions (I lost track!). We shot in 2 countries (US & Canada) and 7 states (Colorado, Texas, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, New Mexico, Washington). We photographed in a diverse set of landscapes including the desert sand dunes, on a frozen lake, underneath a waterfall, by rivers, on cliffsides, under string lights, and next to campfires. We went to 11 different national parks (Rocky Mountain, Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Canyonlands, Great Sand Dunes, Grand Teton, Black Canyon, Zion, Mount Rainier, Bryce Canyon, and Banff). We climbed 5 Colorado fourteeners (Mt Huron, Mt Belford, Mt Yale, La Plata, Quandary). In all of this, we've made new friends, learned new skills, and made lots of memories that we are so grateful we caught on camera. We are so excited to see what the new year has in store for us.
JANUARY - Buena Vista, CO + Ouray, CO
FEBRUARY - Quandary Peak, CO + Grand Canyon, AZ + RMNP, CO
MARCH - Austin, TX + Estes Park, CO
APRIL - Aspen, CO + Buena Vista, CO
MAY - Great Sand Dunes, CO + Mt Evans, CO + Austin, TX + Twin Lakes, CO
JUNE - Laramie, WY + Telluride, CO + Yellowstone, WY + Mt Huron, CO
JULY - Mt Belford, CO + Seattle, WA + Telluride/Ouray, CO
AUGUST - Mt Yale, CO + RMNP, CO + Breckenridge, CO + Casper, WY
SEPTEMBER - Vail, CO + Banff National Park, AB + Lake City, CO + La Plata Peak, CO
OCTOBER - Buena Vista, CO + Bryce Canyon NP, UT + Moab, UT + Quandary Peak, CO
NOVEMBER - Aspen, CO + Penitente, CO + Grand Canyon NP, AZ
DECEMBER - Zion, Salt Lake City, UT + Dallas, TX + Breckenridge, CO
Cedar & Pines is an adventure wedding photography duo made up of Nate and Megan Kantor, a married couple based in the mountains of Colorado. They believe in honest wedding photography, capturing the small candid moments to the epic landscape views. They love photographing intimate weddings and adventure elopements from the mountains of Colorado to destination weddings in California, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, Washington and the ends of the earth.
