San Francisco Documentary Wedding Photographer

capturing real moments and emotions to last a lifetime

I’m a Bay Area wedding photographer with a style that combines real moments and a fine art aesthetic to create beautiful and intimate wedding photos with energy and personality. My focus is on seamless storytelling in a documentary style that highlights beauty and brings the spirit of the event into every detail. I’m inspired by connection and absolutely love photographing couples, weddings, proposals, and people in love!

Emotional moments, Captured Exceptionally

My style is modern and romantic, focused on telling authentic love stories. The moments photographed are candid using editorial and documentary techniques. Colors are vibrant and true, combining a mix of soft and moody lighting for a finished visual story that retains the vision of your wedding the way you remember it. I have a photojournalistic approach with an eye for charm, humor, and the little things that make someone look drop dead gorgeous. My intention is to create photos that capture you in your best light and bring you back to these magic moments for years to come.

Grand entrance, festival wedding style

Moment-Driven documentary style WEDDING Photos

I shoot weddings in a photojournalistic style emphasizing the connection between people. My aim is to provide you with detailed, seamless, and thoughtful coverage of the special moments that create the story of your wedding day. From tear-filled eyes to quiet smiles, from thunderous applause to a silent pause between the newlyweds, my work is moment-driven, personal, and authentic.

I offer a calm and easy energy through your preparation, ceremony, and reception, quietly allowing the day to unfold in its unique and perfect way while guiding you towards your best light. You’ll see me smiling and shooting in the corners of the room as I capture the laughs and winks between friends, and getting down on the dance floor with my camera to get the best angle as one toast turns to twenty and Uncle Freddy brings his A+ dance moves to the family dog. And, with a tear in my eye as you make the vows that commemorate the most important day of your lives.

Romantic and classic San Francisco wedding

A Personalized experience from start to finish

My wedding service begins before the event itself. We work together to determine your priorities and sort out the logistics of timing and lighting so that your wedding day can be dedicated to experiencing rather than thinking. Having a plan means we know we're going to get amazing photos, and we're going to know what we need to do to get them! 

My first career was working as a model on the other side of the lens, and it has taught me a great sensitivity in how I approach photographing people. It has also taught me a lot about posing, so when it comes time for portraits of the couple, family, or bridal party, I am happy to direct and perfect poses to create dynamic and expressive photos that deliver a lifelong wow factor. I help you create the dream photo you have in your head, and actually make it fun to be a part of the creative process.

 

Self portrait in my Emeryville studio where I offer portrait sessions for individuals and couples

Hi, I’m Tiana Hunter

Your creative director, visual guide, and top san francisco wedding photographer

It is a special blessing for me to be a wedding photographer. Love and people are my most heartfelt inspirations, and to capture the marriage of these is a living dream. I am passionate about creating a beautiful visual journey of your wedding day with candid photos, artistic bridal portraits, and beautiful pictures of people in love. My focus is creating seamless storytelling in a way that highlights beauty and brings the spirit of the event into every detail. Inspired by natural emotion and connection, I work in a photojournalistic style to capture the genuine emotion and tender moments of your wedding. While I love a good color scheme and keeping up on current trends, my goal is to bring out the real emotion with wedding photographs that live on forever.

I have a natural approach, reacting to emotions, actions, and the vibe of what is happening with authentic images captured in my signature style: a mix of fine art, editorial, and documentary wedding photography. With over a decade of fashion, portrait, art, and wedding photography experience I feel confident in capturing your natural beauty organically and guiding you to the best light and moments to connect with your loved ones. When you hire me you get not only all of my professional photography expertise, but a lot of care as well. Many of my clients become recurring, bringing me back to photographing other life events as they reach new milestones and expand their family.

In addition to my work behind the camera, I have a way of keeping things calm and flowing through stressful times with a combination of humor, encouragement, and decisive action. My intention is to add to the joy of the day, and to make being photographed feel as good as possible. For me, that means being unobtrusive in quiet times, being clear when directing staged photographs, and smiling and dancing my way through your celebration.

I started my wedding photography business in 2014, photographing the wedding of a dear friend of mine on a 100 degree day in Ashland, Oregon. Boy did I learn a lot that day! In wedding photography experience very much matters, as the fleeting moments of your wedding are truly once in a lifetime. Beautiful photos come from not only reacting to to flurry of a real wedding, but carefully planning and anticipating the genuine moments before they unfold and being one step ahead of it with camera in hand. With a decade of experience as a professional wedding photographer in the San Francisco Bay Area, working with me ensures a professional experience from wedding planning to engagement session to the beautiful moments of your wedding day. Ask me anything and I'm happy to share wedding tips such as the best venues in the SF Bay Area, where to get the best shot of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the best time of day to get married at San Francisco City Hall. 

I'm also engaged to the love of my life and planning my own wedding in 2024! I love my photography team of second shooters so much that I booked them to capture my wedding memories over a 3 day celebration. Being engaged has given me a unique perspective on the wedding industry, what my clients need, and how to support them more as a documentary wedding photographer. I deeply care about creating images that capture your personality and what the two of you are really like as a couple, especially in your engagement photos!

THis is your once-in-a-lifetime…

and these are the images that will help you relive every emotion

INCLUsivity and diversity are my core values

Love has no limits, no borders, no colors, no race. Love is diverse, unique, and a unified, universal language spanning all of existence. Love is a choice we make moment to moment. When we find that love reflected in another person, it’s something to hold as sacred.

I am 100% in support and reverence of the LGBTQ+ community and enthusiastically wish to celebrate their unions as a wedding photographer. I believe in equal human rights for all and that civil liberties should represent everyone’s unique orientation and gender identification. The progressiveness of San Francisco is one of the things I love most about living here. We do still have a long way to go as a city, state, country, and world, and I am thrilled to be able to work with amazing couples of any gender identity and partnership preference. I love photographing gay weddings!

Getting those poses flawless at this Christmas Wedding at The Fairmont Hotel San Francisco.

Getting those poses flawless at this Christmas Wedding at The Fairmont Hotel San Francisco.

 I'm a non-traditional wedding photographer (who also loves traditions!)

Non-traditional wedding photography focuses on capturing the unique essence of couples who dare to celebrate their love their own way. Embracing the values of inclusivity and diversity, as a non-traditional wedding photographer I strive to showcase love in all its forms of gender, race, or cultural backgrounds. I love traditions and celebrating heritage, and I also love unique weddings infused with intentionality. That's where I can really capture the raw and authentic moments that define each couple's love story, celebrating their individuality and uniqueness. Bring on the alternative weddings! Renegade weddings! Surprise weddings! I photograph festival weddings, weekend wedding campouts, destination weddings, intimate elopements, and intimate ceremonies with your nearest and dearest on the front porch of the house you just bought. Through my lens I aim to capture the authentic emotions with creative photography to document the joy, passion, and connection between couples who choose to celebrate their love in non-traditional ways, creating timeless and extraordinary memories that reflect the true spirit of modern-day relationships in all of their diversity. 

Let me tell your love story

Learn more about my approach to photographing couples and weddings in Northern California in this video by my videography partner in crime Brian!