Oh yes, finally the post on our pre-wedding photo shoot in Korea! We have been waiting eagerly for a year for that! I will not be posting much photos here as I would like to keep it to minimum until after the wedding, I will just be blogging about the experience instead.
We started out very early to catch the subway train from Anguk Station so that we can reached the destination by 9 AM at Wondang Station. To be honest, we have no idea who to be expecting and all we have is just to look out for a car shown in the picture attachment that was emailed to us by Louvre Bridal. We reached on the dot but could not find the car and we were wondering if we were at the wrong entrance until a guy came up to us and asked if we are here for photo shoot. And well, the car was different from the picture so we miss it out during our quick scan of our surroundings.
He introduced himself as the photographer, PD Song, and surprisingly, he spoke good English so we were quite relieved that perhaps there will be no trouble communicating with the photographer. It turned out that he is the only photographer who can speak English, hence he was assigned to us. After a long drive, we reached L Studio and I just love the surroundings!
Everything happened so fast! The korean lady (I called her “Unnie” which is sister in korean) that was assigned to me took charge of my gown fitting and she immediately put me in a nice silky outfit before ushering me to the makeup room to have my hair and makeup done by other korean ladies. Unfortunately, there is communication barrier between the MUAs, and I could not tell them what I preferred so I gave up with a sigh and let them work their magic. Thankfully, it turned out well, though I have to tell them to work more on my eyes. Le fiance came in after a while and one of the MUA worked on him as well.
Once done, we were ushered back into the waiting room where PD Song sat us down and started explaining how he works and showing us various concepts, explaining to us the process and answered our questions. After that, Unnie brought me to choose the gowns and again, there is communication barrier. I was pretty frustrated because I couldn’t communicate much and in the end I just let her choose for me and just indicated yes or no in korean. So in the end, I only tried 3 gowns since they seem to be in a rush and didn’t have the chance to try others that caught my eye. But I am satisfied with the two long gowns that she picked out. However, I am quite disappointed with the limited varieties for short gowns and I just get the one that Unnie picked out as it seems that they were rushing for time so I didn’t get the chance to try other short gowns at all.
Gown fitting room
Same goes for le fiance. Everything was so fast that we forgotten to request for a vest which we want to have for the photoshoot! We are such slow thinkers and adapt too slow to their fast pace.
And then we got out to do our shooting! Surprisingly, it was not cold at all and the weather was pretty cooling which make the whole photo shoot enjoyable. PD Song was pretty friendly and Unnie followed us around to ensure everything was okay. So we really enjoyed ourselves though we started out being awkward before the photographer eased us into relaxed poses with his humor and showing us how he wanted us to pose.
Lunch time was getting food delivery which the delivery man came in with the metal box and we got our black bean paste noodle as well as fried rice. Food was pretty delicious!
Happy and hungry
Excited with his fried rice
Black bean paste noodle
Fried rice
And again, meal time was short before I got swept away to have my second hairdo and changing into another gown while le fiance changed into another tuxedo. We also managed to take personal photos with the dogs who star in our photoshoot! They were really lovable and pretty quiet, and they were such a pleasure to be with during our photoshoot. I was quite surprised by how well they pose for photos too!
Together with PD Song and Unnie:
Everything ended about 7PM and we ventured around the studio as we waited for PD Song to finish uploading the photos for viewing to allow us to choose photos for the album. I love most of the shots, especially the ones in our casual outfits and with animals. The beautiful backdrops greatly enhanced the photos, making them visually appealing and so cheerful! Kudos to PD Song on helping us to relax so that our poses did not look too stiff.
Unfortunately there were some really nice themes but the focus on us is very blur which we could not use it for our album and all the blurry shots were of the same theme (happened in few themes) so we couldn’t select any from the particular theme. We pointed out to PD Song and he explained that his lens cannot focus on one place but I don’t find it convincing as my face was blur while fiance’s face was very clear (our faces are in one place) so it doesn’t make sense that one of our faces is blurry isn’t it? The fiance also agreed with me so we were a little disappointed because we really love some of the themes.
But looking on the bright side, since PD Song took so many different kind of themes, we still have many others to choose from and we love how the rest of the photos turned out. 🙂 It makes the selection of the photos pretty easy which we selected the photos pretty fast since we felt quite bad that PD Song has to work pretty late. PD Song was kind enough to say that we should not rush and just take our time to choose. Once everything was done, PD Song fetched us back to the subway station before we departed for our accommodation back in Insa-dong.
Overall, we enjoyed the experience even though everything was like a whirlwind and despite the communication barrier, they were really efficient in deciding the gowns and makeup best suited for us so we do not have issue on disliking what we wearing (with exception of my short gown which is not their fault since they have limited range). And we love our hanbok photos too! I wish I can steal the hanbok home!
Finally the long awaited photo shoot all done! Phew!
Here’s one of the photos we used for our RSVP website and one of our favorites: 
And the photos all looked like these when we were selecting our photos, with no photoshopping done! I think there is some auto adjustment of the lighting. Amazing right?
Looking forward to the album which they will send over soon.
Hopefully it turned out well <3
UPDATE: I have blogged about DIY wedding video and posted our photos too! You can see the posts here:
- Cutting Down Wedding Costs: Making Your Own Wedding Video
- Our Pre-wedding photos from L Studio @ Korea
