One of the best decisions my husband and I made for our wedding! Peter was responsive, easy to to talk to, understood cultural traditions (we had an Indian & Polish wedding), and timely to boot. We trusted him with our wedding day and he delivered. I absolutely love all my pictures and would hire him again! read more

Pawinski Photography - Event Photography Near Me

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I have always been nervous about photographers capturing the moment so you can remember it exactly as is, but this was definitely not an issue with Peter. He was very professional, showed up even before we did to our engagement, and helped my fiance relax and act natural for the camera. The result: some of the most stunning pictures I have ever seen! Even throughout our party, he captured moments I would have never known about which I am so grateful for. I wish he was available for my wedding day, but unfortunately he is not. I highly recommend him. His photographs are amazing, his prices very reasonable and fair, and I love that he makes a slideshow on his website as well as hands over all the digital files on a disk to you instead of charging you an arm and a leg for prints. read more

My husband and I highly recommend Peter for both engagement and wedding photography. He's professional, talented, and down to earth. He's reasonably priced for his amazing work. He met us in our neighborhood to show us examples of his work and wedding albums. He is an experienced photojournalist. His photos are beautiful and truly capture his subjects. The photos he shows are his work. If you contract with Peter, Peter will be your photographer. We appreciate that Peter keeps things simple and is upfront compared to some other photographers. His contract is in plain English. He is very responsive and has a short turn around time in editing and sending you the photos. The day of our engagement session, my fiancé had a work emergency. We let Peter know we would be 30 minutes late and he was very understanding. He had recommendations in Lincoln Park of where to take photos based on the lighting. We went to three or four different locations within walking distance in about two hours. We were excited to post a few photos on our wedding website. He sent us edited photos within a couple weeks so we could finalize our website. The photos are beautiful and showcase Chicago. We recommend an engagement session if you can afford it (It was part of our package and I believe it is $200 al a carte) to get to know your photographer. It affords him the opportunity to get to know you and your style. Prior to the wedding he offered to meet with us or speak by phone regarding the timeline the day of the wedding and our photo requests. He's very thorough. He also made recommendations on where to take off-site wedding party photos and alternatives if it snowed the day of our December wedding. We decided we only needed one photographer, Peter, the day of the wedding since we had about 150 guests and my groom did not want photos of the men getting ready. Peter does contract with other photographers if you are interested in him having a second photographer assist him the day of the wedding. Peter did a phenomenal job the day of our wedding! He arrived early to check out the hotel where both the ceremony and reception were held. He took photos of the ladies getting ready, then prepared the groom and I for our first look photos. He's so creative. The wedding party and my family enjoyed working with him during the posed and candid pre-ceremony photos. The candid photos he took of us and the wedding party during the ceremony captured the beautiful and touching ceremony. He made sure he captured the important moments during dinner and the reception, such as the first dance and toasts, while taking photos of the guests having fun. He took a great mix of photos. About 10:30pm -- after working 10 1/2 hours -- he checked in with me to make sure he took all of the requested photos before he wrapped up, which was really nice. He is very dedicated. Initially we thought it would take 6 or 8 weeks or more for him to edit and send us the photos, which is a much shorter time frame than other photographers. We were so pleased when he sent us the online gallery in just a week. We were fortunate that he was caught up since we got married in December as opposed to the height of wedding season. We can't stop looking at the photos and reliving the day. Our family and friends are enjoying them as well. We have not yet chosen photos for the album or ordered it since we just got married a week and a half ago. We look forward to the album. We highly recommend Peter! read more

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I know Peter doesn't have a huge internet presence (which is nice because he's not blasting your pictures all over the internet for his benefit/advertisement) ... BUT I have to say we are SO happy with our decision to have him photograph our Indian wedding. My parents were semi-worried that he would not know when to take pictures (ex. like during the tying of the mangalsutra) but clearly Peter knows what he is doing! I can't decide which pictures I want to even use in the albums at this point because I love them all! I think the most unique thing about Peter is his flexibility to work with his customers to make them happy. He didn't quibble over working a few extra minutes/hours (whereas our videographer tried to nickel and dime us...). He was willing to take the shots we requested. He came up with creative ways to take pictures, in ways I couldn't even dream of! (One comment is that he doesn't give much direction in terms of posing and head tilts, etc (he prefers candids..), so practice your poses ahead of time! Haha) read more

The standard-issue advice to brides is that the perfect wedding day is a fantasy, and to prepare to deal with a hiccup or two. In my case, I thought our day was pretty phenomenal and only realized later what went wrong. But to be fair, let me back up and explain why I felt we were in such good hands day-of. First, my husband and I met with Peter to discuss what we'd like for our wedding, but also to scope out personalities and make sure we'd all be comfortable. That went well, we booked him, things were good, yadda yadda. He was even flexible with our idea of splitting the hours of coverage over two days so we could have a day-after shoot at another location. Awesome. The day of our wedding came and went, and the day-after shoot as well. Both were so much fun and we lucked out with very mild December weather, which allowed for outside photos we hadn't planned on. We took some great photos, and many fun and happy moments were captured. Fast forward to several months later and me finally getting around to putting together an album for my parents. That's when the record scratched [sound of record scratching]. Where are my parents? My brothers?? Their wives?? Any other members of my family??? None of my family members are in any of the photos, other than the obligatory formals taken following the ceremony. I looked through all the photo groupings, including the outtakes (a few thousand photos). It's as if they just didn't attend the reception. There's my husband and me, his family, various friends, but my own GD parents and siblings are nowhere to be found. None of their smiles or dancing or simply visiting with each other was recorded. In contrast (and fortunately), my husband's family was photographed throughout the evening doing all of those things. I was shocked. How is it even possible to completely avoid photographing the bride's family? You'd kind of have to go out of your way, no? I still don't know how it's possible, and Peter doesn't have an explanation either. The two possible explanations he provided were not valid, which I pointed out to him. He also doesn't have an apology, which is astounding. He's reassured me that he has taken my "criticism" into account. I didn't criticize though. I just pointed out the way he failed to do one major aspect of a straightfoward assignment and asked why it happened. It's taken me a long time to write this, because I have felt so bad about the outcome and also very uncomfortable with having to share this experience publicly. But if this had happened to someone else and they'd shared it as a warning, we wouldn't have booked him. It isn't an easy mistake to make and I'd question a professional's judgment if I knew this had happened. It obviously hasn't happened to his five star reviewers, so maybe our wedding was a fluke. Lucky me. read more

A couple years late, but hey! Peter was/is fantastic. The entire process of working with him, from our initial email contact, to meeting and arranging his travel from Chicago to our venue in WI, to the big day went flawlessly. Peter is a complete professional, and an amazing artist, not to mention a really nice guy. I proudly show off the photos he took of our wedding every chance I get, and not because I'm one of those annoying photo album people. If you are looking for a wedding photographer who incorporates an artistic and photo-journalistic style to create amazing candid and portrait shots, hire Peter right away. We've already had a couple of our friends use him for their weddings (including Julie e. in this review section - hi Julie!), and the were all thrilled with his work. I can't say enough great things really. read more

This review is long overdue, but I just wanted to put in my two bits for Peter. There are a number of reasons why Peter was great: 1. He was willing to take pictures of anything we asked him to. My mother-in-law (self-admittedly to be somewhat nuts) heckled him to take pictures of temple statues that he was explicitly told to avoid, but he did because she wanted them. The temple matron, of course, caught us, and gave him a stern scolding even though it was definitely not his fault. I was mortified, but he was such a good sport about the whole thing 2. The pictures looked great! Since my wedding was teeny tiny (unheard of for Indian weddings), there wasn't much to take pictures of, but he was able to find beauty in all sorts of random things. 3. He is no nonsense. Wedding planning is full of nonsense, and he made this aspect so much easier. We negotiated a more than fair price, and I got a great deal. A month or so after the wedding, we received a CD with all of the photos, including outtakes, in addition to the best images that were lightly touched up. He did not attempt to sell us any overpriced prints, and we were able to get the pictures developed ourselves for the album. Overall, Peter was great, and he has actually done a few of my friends' weddings since mine. We all have great things to say about him. read more

Peter is a photography champion. Not only are the pictures he takes beautiful, stunning gems capturing the look, feel, spirit, even smell of the moment he is capturing, but he may be the only person to run harder than me on my wedding day. That man was there for every shot, and he had an awesome backup guy there to get the shots he couldn't. Peter was on the floor, in the rain, running ahead, climbing above - and yet, never frantic or stressed - he just had it covered. The journalistic style photos were EXACTLY what I wanted. I'll always remember how awesome that day was and how much fun everyone had - and the pictures show every smile, every crazy kid antic, every happy tear. I can't recommend him highly enough. He's the best. read more

I had the pleasure to interact with Peter Pawinski, who took photographs at my son's middle school graduation. The price to download all photos were reasonable, and he communicated with me personally, throwing in some outtakes and a photo of the hall for free. He even responded to a question I had about the business. That's service! Class act. And the photographs look amazing. read more

Any future brides/grooms out there, definitely consider Peter Pawinski for your wedding photography needs! My husband and I are overwhelmingly impressed with his talent, professionalism, and passion for his art. His work speaks for itself, he has a wonderful ability to capture life as it happens instead of trying to pose photographs. Consequently the resulting pictures are believable and candid, rather than stiff and arranged. Peter really tunes in to who you are as an individual, and a couple, and it shows in the pictures. Throughout this whole process, Peter has also been extremely helpful and accommodating to every question or concern that has come up. From details with scheduling to restrictions imposed by our church, Peter handled it all with class. He never made us feel like we were troubling him. We couldn't have asked for a better photographer on our wedding day either, he made everyone feel very comfortable, and did a great job with managing time, and just rolled with anything that came up during the day. Peter went the extra mile to say the least, whether he had to crouch down in a small hole, or lay on the ground, he got the shot. If all that wasn't enough, Peter is probably one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. Very humble, pleasant, and friendly. Not easy to come by these days. Five stars for Peter! read more

I am basically going to reiterate the same sentiment as the other reviewers. Peter will really do all that he can to capture the moment as you are looking to have it. Unfortunately, the air conditioning broke on our 2 hour trolley ride and it was hot. But he still got us great shots. During that time I saw how nice his personality is, and how calm and accommodating he is. He captured all the moments I was hoping he would capture and then some. He has a really creative eye and saw an opportunity to take a shot in our venue as the sunset that looked great. I would have never thought of it, but am so happy that he did. He really is the best! read more

We recently had Peter shooting a big family party, action shots, siblings and a few "posed" shots. We wanted to take these images and have them blown-up onto canvas along with some photobook albums. The natural light from our big windows allowed for tons of wondeful pictures to fill our children's scrapbooks. He even spliced the eyes, and smiles from multiple shots of some "posed" familial portraits to create a perfect shot. Above and beyond, Thanks A+ read more

Peter did an amazing job with our wedding and we are so happy with how everything turned out. He was very easy to work with and I felt his professional approach made our day less stressful. When meeting with Peter we were able to give him a timeline of our wedding day and to our surprise he was willing to come earlier than the time we had on our contract because he wanted to make sure he took enough photos when the sun was out (he didn't even charge us extra). He has a creative touch with his photos that clearly tell a story from beginning to end. I noticed that someone mentioned that there were photos that weren't taken of specific family members. We didn't run into this problem because we made sure to give him a list of who we specifically wanted in our photos. He was very easy going and my guests felt he was approachable as they requested their own pictures during the reception. We were not able to have a videographer at our wedding but this ended up working out as our wedding pictures captured everything. Overall, it was worth every penny. Not only does he create a slide show that you can easily e mail out to friends and family, but you also receive a flash drive that has every photo that was taken (even the outtakes). Peter did exactly what we asked and I would suggest meeting with him and take a look at his work. You will quickly realize that he is truly an artist and his pictures are able to capture moments that will bring back all of the excitement that you felt on your wedding day. read more

We hired Pawinski Photography for our wedding in downtown Chicago in June 2014. He was referred to us by an acquaintance who had Peter Pawinski photograph her wedding about 8 years ago. My husband is a photographer, so he was quite selective in choosing our wedding photographer. Initially, he was very impressed with Peter's photography portfolio. When we met with Peter, my husband was 100% confident that he would do a great job. Peter was very responsive and helpful in planning our wedding. On the wedding day, Peter showed up early at my parent's house and got fantastic "getting ready" photos. He stayed with us the entire day and made sure to capture all of the spontaneous moments. Peter has a very creative eye and recommended unique locations for shots in the city. Throughout the entire day, Peter was friendly, professional, and made us feel very comfortable! We are absolutely thrilled with our photos! Peter put together a slideshow for us, which was really neat to share with friends & family. Our entire portfolio of photos is incredible. We love all of the shots and are so grateful that Peter was available to photograph our wedding! Beautiful memories for a lifetime. read more

WOW! Where do I begin? Hands-down, Peter was one of the best vendors we selected for our wedding. Totally professional and a true artist, Peter's presence at our wedding was a pleasure. He was able to capture the entire story of our big day beautifully. We were seeking a photographer with a photojournalistic style that would snap those necessary portraits while also capturing those moments that are so special during the wedding and festivities. He was able to do that and so much more. Everyone we share our photos with are wowed by his work and we all continue to marvel at the pictures every day. Just can't stop watching his slideshow! AND his pricing is fabulous. So worth every penny! I highly recommend Peter as a photographer...you will be thrilled with the choice! read more

This review is long overdue. I finally joined Yelp and Peter is my first review - because he deserves it! We hired Peter as our wedding photographer last August and he exceeded all expectations. He is a talented photographer, who tells stories with his images. I couldn't recommend him more highly. He has a great personality, a great eye, and a true talent for documenting events in an artistic, tasteful way. read more

Working with Peter was great! He showed up early to make sure he took candid pictures of the bridal party and my family. Peter was patient and made sure he took all the shots we requested. I absolutely loved how the pictures turned out. If you want beautiful wedding pictures hire Peter, no doubt you will get amazing wedding photos. read more