Chris was referred to us back in 2009 while searching for a photographer for our wedding. Planning a wedding is so stressful and with so many vendors out there, it was difficult narrowing down our vendor list. However, once we met Chris and saw his portfolio, we immediately knew that he was the photographer for us. Chris was very professional and helpful. Our wedding was in San Luis Obispo, which is a good 3 hour drive from the San Jose area. He made arrangements, was there early and even stayed over his time. He captured candid shots of our special day. His photo-journalistic style is exactly what we were looking for. When I look thru my photos, I re-live my wedding day! I cry every time! We recently took advantage of a special Chris had. It was a Valentine kids photo shoot. Chris took some amazing photos of my two boys ages 2 and 9, and even managed to sneak a couple family shots. He works very well with children! When we met with him to view our photos, I cried. He captured candid shots of my boys hugging, playing, and running around like little boys. He was able to catch their personalities and handsome little faces. Along with the photo shoot, Chris offered printed and digital packages that were within our budget. The prints we purchased took my breath away, they are high quality and worth every penny! I can't wait to plan another photo shoot with Chris! I highly recommend him! read more

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Chris Shum is a mellow but focused photographer--a needed, complementary attitude to a high-strung, stressed bride like myself. My husband and I were grateful to Chris for spending an unusually warm spring afternoon with us in Santa Cruz for our engagement photo shoot and a whole day with us on our wedding day 6 months later. Neither of us are very photogenic nor comfortable in front of the camera. Chris was able to capture us in our own element and while we were being ourselves--basking in our own happiness and being in the moment. I am moved each time I look at the pieces of photographic gems that we display throughout our home, and we cherish those moments of our lives captured as living art. read more

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Chris is so dedicated and professional, but most importantly, he took the most incredible and candid pictures. He has a very discerning eye that waits to catch those right moments while being practically invisible during the whole event. Every step of the process is well thought out and cared for. From the 1st day we went to his studio and looked through his amazing profolio, you immediately recognized that Chris pays close attention to little details, is extremely personable and patient and easy to work with. On the day of, we had a power outage from the ceremony until almost the end of the night. Chris has been more than accommodating, he's flexible and rolled with our timeline and adjusted schedule. Chris even stayed later past the time and made sure he got the special moments that we wanted. The surprises did not end here. We then received a nicely packaged USB in a little wooden box, that contains all of our photos (both raw and edited photos) in the mail. And later on meeting him at his studio to view the most beautiful photo album he prepared for us, was wrapped neatly in a box and tied up like a birthday present! We cannot say enough good things about Chris and his dedication for his clients. We have been recommending Chris highly and will not stop recommending him to anyone who is looking for a professional wedding/event photographer! You may view our wedding photos here: http://chrisshum.blogspot.com/2016/04/annie-nelson-beautiful-wedding-against.html Thank you SO MUCH Chris! You truly captured all the beautiful moments on our wedding day! Warmly, NAnnie read more

I cannot say enough good things about Chris. His photographs are beautiful and capture the day so perfectly. He was super nice to work with and was willing to do whatever we wanted. He was recommended by a photographer friend of ours (through Fearless Photographers, which I highly recommend), and she was right on! The photos are completely not cheesy and they really capture our guests and all the moments so well. Also, after the posed shots, I rarely knew Chris was even there (he was very unobtrusive), but he came up with amazing candid photos - even of the dance portions of the evening! All in all, I give Chris an A+. read more

All of the reviews for Chris Shum are accurate, to say the least. He does an amazing job capturing the moment. He does so in a way that when you look back at the pictures you don't just see who/what was there, you remember what it felt like to be in that moment. We hired Chris to record our wedding. Not only does he do a magnificent job in taking pictures but he masterfully re-tells the story of the event in the album. To put it concisely, Chris is an amazing photographer, artful photographic story teller, and he works his butt off. If he is available you should book him. You will not be disappointed. read more

Chris was amazing. He was referred to us by a family member when she knew we were planning for a family photo session. Chris was able to capture our daughters' expressions beautifully. The pictures came out even more wonderfully on the artfully-crafted photo albums. Chris has great talents. We were glad to have him as our photographer. Hopefully we'll soon have a chance to work with him again. Chris, we can't thank you enough for taking such amazing pictures of our family. Take good care and we'll be in touch again. read more

I found Chris Shum on Yelp. My fiance and I were looking for a photographer who wouldn't make us pose with our fingers forming the shape of a heart or any other overly romantic poses. After seeing his albums and website, we were relieved to see that Chris photographed other couples who looked kind of like us. We tend to be goofy and awkward in pictures, but I think Chris captured us beautifully during our engagement session and on our wedding day. We didn't have a videographer and so the wedding pictures were really the only images we would have to remember our special day. Our wedding was not a fairytale wedding. It was OUR love story retold with the moment to moment shots that Chris took. We could tell by the quality of the photos that Chris dedicated quite some time to each. Chris and his assistant photographer was with us for over 13 hours on our wedding day. It was fun to see the wedding highlights posted on his blog very shortly after the wedding. Something we could share with our families and friends when the memories were still fresh. read more

Chris took the most incredibly photos. He caught every special moment during our wedding day! And he made us the most beautiful wedding album. He even stayed later past the time we had paid for to make sure we got the moments we wanted to. He was courteous and kind to our guests and family and you never noticed him until you needed him, and he would pop up in a matter of seconds. Noninvasive and kind! I've never had such a positive experience with a photographer. Even the guests were falling in love with him! And above all, he managed to capture moments that were raw and real! His photos are perfectly timed, he knows exactly where to be at the right time. You will not be disappointed with Chris, he will make sure you get everything you want and more. I'm going to him for every photo op. in the future. read more

Chris Shum Photography - Event Photography Near Me

We initially had a different photographer for our wedding day . . . but after we got back our engagement photos we knew we had to seek out another photographer for our special day. A month and a half away from our day and there my fiancée and I were, desperately searching for a new photographer. Then we found Chris Shum Photography. I called and explained to Chris our story to that point and how bad our engagement session was. He was able to meet us in person quite quickly and even asked to look at our engagement set to see just what went wrong. He was polite, professional and very kind. After showing him our previous "photographers" awful pictures, he looked at us and said "I promise you both that I will not let that happen on your wedding day". His extensive collection of work, years of experience and professional attitude and work environment was enough to convince me he would be the great for our wedding day; but that extra kindness, understanding and empathy made us both know he would be perfect. And perfect he was! My wife and I were absolutely blown away with the incredible pictures Chris and his assistant took. From the very first moments of the day to the last, my wife and I were in tears as we relived each and ever moment that they captured. We had to then select photos for our wedding album and we thought 100 pictures would be easy to pick . . . boy were we wrong! It was an amazing "problem" to have but we ended up starting with over 325 pictures we wanted to have in our book! All in all, from start to finish, working with Chris has been an absolute joy. My wife and I cannot wait to work with him to figure out which prints we should get for our 'wedding wall' and we hope to hire Chris for more events in the future. While our initial photographer may have been a bust, I can't be too mad, because that ultimately led us to Chris and now we have the most amazing pictures to remember our special day. I would highly recommend using Chris for any events you have planned and I'll be singing his praises for years to come. Thank you Chris for capturing the most important day of our lives so perfectly! read more

Chris took our family pictures in Half Moon Bay and we could not be happier with the results. He truly captured our personalities as we interacted as a family. He does a great job taking staged photos but I think the photos he took of us as we played and interacted with each other were the most natural and beautiful photos of all. He has a way of just capturing the moment. I highly recommend Chris if you want some truly beautiful and memorable photos. read more

We're so glad we had Chris as our wedding day photographer! He's very talented and a pleasure to work with. We were looking for someone who was good at capturing people's emotions and his portfolio really stood out to us in that regard. There's a quality to Chris' photographs that has nothing to do with Photoshop. I'd have to say that he has a great sense of being in the right place at the right time. As our wedding was quite a lot of stress to coordinate, his professionalism made things a lot easier for us. As soon as our wedding activities began in the morning he was shooting pictures like a madman. Being camera-shy, at first it felt a bit strange having someone trailing us and taking photos of our every move. But after a few minutes, Chris, with his black attire, started to blend into the background like a ninja journalist. In his quest for the perfect shot, our guests commented later that he was stooping, running, squatting, lying down, seemingly everywhere at once. The results were fantastic. It was just as we expected from looking at his other portfolios. Throughout the whole process, Chris was punctual, patient, and responsive. We highly recommend him. read more

Chris Shum deserves a more than 5-star rating! My husband (then fiancé) and I were looking for a photographer who could help us capture the very special moments of our wedding last spring. We received a lot of referrals for wedding photographers in the area and Chris Shum was one of them. We met with a few of the photographers in the referral pool and pretty much decided right away that Chris was the one whom we would want to hire on our wedding day. Chris does wonderful work and gave us lots of personal attention; he is also a very calm person and is super easy to work with, not to mention his professionalism and photography skills. He was very flexible and rolled with our work schedule for our engagement session. Not only was he able to capture the special moments during our engagement session, he was able to capture quite a number of special moments of us, our family members and our guests during the tea ceremony, wedding ceremony , the cocktail and our dinner reception. We were all very happy with the pictures and have received many compliments from our friends and relatives who have viewed them. In addition, he promptly posted the highlights of our wedding pictures online which tells the story of our wedding, which made it easy for us to share the link with folks who could not be there for our big day. We would not hesitate to recommend Chris Shum Photography to anyone who is looking for a professional and amazing wedding photographer who knows how to capture the special moments, not only of the wedding couple but also their family and guests. read more

We had a great experience with Chris as our wedding photographer. We were looking for a more candid, photojournalistic style of photography for our wedding, and Chris's style was exactly what we were looking for. He did an incredible job of capturing the moments: the toasts, the laughs and the tears... we were really impressed. He and his assistant, Dilip, worked super hard during the wedding. They overstayed the 8 hour period that we hired them for, and kept taking photos into the evening. From a logistical standpoint, Chris was also very responsive and easy to work with. We were planning the wedding remotely from NY. We visited SF and did an engagement shoot on a very tight schedule; Chris was accommodating and punctual, and pulled off a very speedy and successful shoot. It was also very easy to work with him remotely, we planned out everything from meeting times, locations, etc. over email and phone. We would highly recommend Chris Shum for wedding photography. read more

Chris's talent first caught our eye after we looked through photos from his online portfolio. When we met him in person, he was passionate and enthusiastic. We met with no other photographers because we were confident that he would offer just what we were looking for. Chris helped capture our wedding day as well as engagement photos. We could not have been happier; he definitely delivered! We have recommended him to our friends and will continue to do so. He is able to capture moments and scenes in a way that helps us re-live the emotions and moments that we will treasure from our wedding day. We highly recommend him!! read more

Chris Shum was our wedding photographer, and it was wonderful to work with him. As soon as he showed us his photos from previous weddings we knew we had found our photographer. His work is stunning, and he was friendly, thorough and helpful throughout the process. When we received our photos he had captured the moments so beautifully that I could actually hear the laughter of my wedding party and remember how I felt in each moment. Chris clearly has a passion for what he does, and it comes through in his work and demeanor. We have already recommended him to many friends and family members, and we will continue to do so! read more

Chris is an AMAZING photographer. We picked him for our wedding last fall because his style was unique and stood out among the other photographers going for that old, rustic style that is popular these days. What we really liked about his work is his artistry in silhouettes, human emotion, and capturing moments that can be framed as art. He was also like a photo ninja, you won't even notice the shots he takes, and then you're blown away by the final results. Chris is very professional and works well with other vendors and new environments, paying attention to details to take beautiful photographs. You can trust that he will be on time and work hard at each event. We recommend him to anyone for all their treasured life moments. read more

Let me first say that I am a photographer myself, to help add weight to my opinion of the very talented and accomplished Chris Shum. I was looking for a photographer to take newborn pictures of my first child and looking back at it I feel so lucky to have found Chris! I wanted someone to come to the house and capture in images our new life as a young family, to go beyond taking photos of the baby (which I can do myself) and photograph the brand-new love we had for that little child. Well, the session began with my two-week-old baby deciding that he would scream bloody-murder for 45 minutes. Chris was incredibly patient and understanding and that helped relax the situation. If you are looking for newborn (or hyper-active children) or wedding photos, it is assuring to know that Chris can handle stressful and challenging situations and still manage to get gorgeous shots all the while. I look at those newborn photos all the time and am just overcome with emotion. We hired Chris again when my son turned one (he was much better behaved!), and we are so happy with the pictures! Chris's images are breathtaking and he is equally skillful at taking pictures indoors and outdoors. He captures the energy and emotion of relationships and love with poignancy. I guarantee you will have a difficult time picking favorite pictures to print!. Look at his photo blog, his photography speaks for itself, wow! He is also good with responding to email and calls and is friendly and approachable when setting things up and receiving the photos. He's a great guy overall. I have looked at a lot of photographers in the area and Chris Shum is easily the best in the south bay! His pricing is up there but he works extremely hard and it is seriously worth every penny. We will certainly use him again to document our growing family over the years. :-) read more

Let preface this by saying I too am a professional sports photographer and have several close colleagues who are wedding photographers. I could have easily picked up the phone and gotten any one of them to shoot our wedding... and that was our plan until I saw some of Chris's work. It is simply amazing! Chris was referred to us back in 2009 and after seeing his portfolio my wife and I immediately knew he was the one we wanted to shoot our wedding. His photo-journalistic style, keen eye of composition and use of available light sets him apart of the sea of other photographers out there. Chris is very professional and easy to work with. He is willing to go above and beyond for his clients. The final product he delivers be it an album or prints is the utmost quality. Since our wedding in 2009 we have had Chris shoot a mini valentines day session of our two boys at a local park with awesome results.... our boys who are 9 & 2 are not the easiest to work with but Chris handle it without missing a beat and delivered awesome results. read more